Jordan Brand just unveiled a small taste of what releases to expect in early 2017, and we noted that there were plenty of sneakers missing from the lineup unveiled.
The Air Jordan 13 is scheduled to make a comeback in the classic White/Black – True Red – Pearl Grey colorway. This is one of my favorite colorways of the shoe. Actually, I don’t think there is an original colorway of the Air Jordan 13 that I don’t like. They were all perfectly done and didn’t require a silly story to coincide with the release. They wanted to release a Black/Navy low…so they did, simple as that. Yes, it might have paid homage to UNC, but it was an unspoken story and the release worked well because of it.
Now we’re looking at seeing this colorway release once again, even though they released not too long ago (in 2010). However, the materials weren’t up to par with that release so we’re hoping these use the premium materials the OG was known for.
Enjoy an official look at the upcoming Air Jordan 13 Retro White/Black – True Red – Pearl Grey for 2017 and mark February 18 down on your calendar if you plan on grabbing a pair.
Images via Nike Inc.
A Basketball shoe. Nike needs be embarrassed when they compare what they used to do, with the crap they release now. LeBron has had some hits early on, with the 3’s being my favorite, but place any of the Jordan XI, XII and XIII’s, next to anything Nike has released since, and I dare to say that they have failed miserably in regard to versatility, function and value. The Jordan XXIII comes close, but damn that is a noisy shoe. Kobe Bryant’s name alone discredits anything made for him, let alone the plastic crap they put out under the guise of performance, yet at a stupidly high price.
“Kobe Bryant’s name alone discredits anything made for him”
I’m not following you on that statement.
But yeah right now Nike seemingly has no shame to put out something sub par. Nowadays, there are obvious ingredients to making an ideal shoe given today’s resources and being able to see a lot of examples in retrospect. It’s the elephant in the room. Adidas pretty much applied common sense in acknowledging that. Nike was onto something with the KD9/HD16/AJ31, yet stuff like the Kobe AD and Soldier X still wreaks of their half-assed ways.
Sure enough as consumers, we shouldn’t totally get bent over a brand’s direction when we can obviously spend money as we please on other available products that are more worthwhile, but yeah you can look like Nike like “wow, really trying to milk those sheep.”
They get my business with their remastered retros, because those were indeed more inspired shoes — and that’s something today’s performers just don’t have. We’re talking about shoes designed within technological limitations in terms of production and design resources bearing the name of one of, if not the greatest player of all time and all his moments wearing those shoes to go with it. But I have to emphasize “remastered”. I didn’t buy retro’s period until this year. Part of it was
finances, part of it was being aware of how off pairs could be. Even if it was branding alone, it just felt like I’d be buying a spin-off vs. actual retro.
Most recent Nike shoe I have is the Kobe 11 because of fandom, and it was a throwback colorway that I couldn’t buy with the IV at the time. Didn’t take long to feel pretty underwhelmed by it. As a performer and on sentimental worth, it’s just so…meh. Maybe I was better off paying resale for a deadstock IV-VI. Those in themselves were more significant in terms of where he was at his career, and as a turning point in his line, not to mention the surge of low cut appeal.
Kobe Bryant has never been known to be a stand up guy, which has hurt his image. The perception of Kobe has never been one that people wanted to emulate OFF court, with Laker fans being that only exception. If you go to the celebs photo section of sneaker websites, nobody is rocking, nor checking for Kobe’s shoes, none. They say in that Asia he was pretty popular as well, with no proof being able to be provided. Even during the years that Derrick Rose was hurt, his shoe sales numbers were in the same ballpark as Kobe’s were in the U.S of A. There were actual sites that posted the info of who sold what during those years, but they have since disappeared. So you wanna talk performance, well his shoe prices are stupid for what you are actually getting. Low top, plastic and rubber, 220. Nah’ man. Even Jordan retro leather shoes are a buck ninety, and playable.