Tag: Phil Knight

If Zion Williamson Was Wearing Starburys This Injury Would Have Never Happened

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CNN – Nike is playing damage control after Duke basketball phenom Zion Williamson tore his sneaker in a game Wednesday evening. Nike’s (NKE) stock was down more than 1% on Thursday. Nike builds its reputation around creating premier shoes and clothes for athletes, but that image took a hit with Williamson’s sneaker snafu.

I’m pretty sure I could hear Phil Knight pounding his fist on his desk all the way in Oregon when this happened the other night. Obviously Zion is not your typical consumer, but having your shoes explode on national TV injuring the guy NBA teams are blatantly tanking just for a chance to draft is a bad look.

Nike’s stock has fallen after the paper mâché shoe fell apart in front of the country. Makes you wonder, whatever happened to good, quality basketball sneakers? I’m not talking about that low top bullshit that Kobe nearly broke his ankle in either. No I’m talking about the GOAT basketball shoe; the Starbury.

The greatest shoe of all time, made by one of the wildest dudes in the history of the NBA in Stephon Marbury. All for the low, low price of $14.98. As a broke as college kid I appreciated the Starburys. Unfortunately I could never find my size in AJ Wright. Sigh. Even eBay hates us 5’8″ dudes. Stephon my man, hook me up with a size 10! I respect what Steph was trying to do though. A revolutionary if you ask me. If only Zion had the same pair of kicks we wouldn’t be talking about a knee injury, we’d be talking about the most dominant college basketball player in the country in a pair of shoes cheaper than a 30 rack of Natty Lite.

Nike Wastes No Time in Dropping the Colin Kaepernick Commercial and It is Awesome

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Mattes touched on the decision by Nike to put it all on the line yesterday and make Colin Kaepernick the face of its 30th anniversary “Just Do It” campaign. If you have access to the internet you saw the full spectrum of responses across the country. There were people applauding Nike’s brazen effort to directly go against their biggest partners in the NFL by dropping this campaign without even a whisper of a heads up. There were people legitimately burning their swoosh apparel and cutting the Nike logo off their clothes, so much so that there are already fundraising campaigns encouraging people to donate to charity rather than burning perfectly good clothing. Then of course there was everyone in between.

Hate Colin Kaepernick or love him. Call him a traitor or a true Patriot. Either way, this commercial accomplishes exactly what Nike does best. It pushes the boundaries, it boils down a whole bunch of noise into one message in a two minute and five second commercial. It’s bound to be polarizing, which is exactly what Nike wants and probably what this issue needs.

Take the venom out of the discussion and try to understand or at least empathize with why everyone believes what they believe. On every side. It’s silly that it may have taken a company that makes shoes for people to actually have that conversation.