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He was like, "Oh, wow."

Like, yeah, this-- this is...

this is authentic.

-I'm ready whenever... -I'm answering you...

not the camera.

-Ow. -Sorry.

I'm just teasing.

-That's a big question. -Okay.

-Good. That's a good question. -Hm, that's interesting.

Start that over.

Yeah, man. Some shit's about to go down.

You literally were like, "Oh."

Oh, man.

That might be the hardest question you asked me today.

It's a beautiful thing.

I mean, it's not that simple.

It's difficult for me to kind of put it into words.

I'd love to give you the kind of two minute, uh...

Wait. Uh, how are you gonna ban greatness?

What was the question? Just remind me to get back in.

Everyone has their own connection to it, right?

The sneaker. Somebody got shot for a pair.

That's what we're gonna talk about.

That's the dumbest shit in the world.

I'm not trying to take a political stance with a shoe.

Now, get out of here please.

Damn. That really just changed the entire course.

Hard to explain.

And it's... it's like it's just a shoe.

You know...

I don't really remember a shoe

having that kind of effect before.

I don't think they could comprehend the impact.

It was about a red pair of shoes.

It's got to be the shoe.

Yeah, motherfucker, it is the shoes!

It was about a red pair of shoes.

It rose like a phoenix out of the ashes.

That gave a voice to the voiceless.

Go.

It's got to be the shoes.

♪ Let's do it ♪

♪ Hey, hey, hey ♪

♪ Hey, hey, hey ♪

♪ Come on, come on ♪

♪ If man Is the father of the son ♪

♪ Is the center Of the earth ♪

♪ In the middle Of the universe ♪

♪ Then why Is this verse comin' ♪

♪ Six times rehearsed ♪

♪ Don't freestyle much But I write 'em like such ♪

♪ Amongst the fiends Controlled by the screens ♪

♪ What does it all mean All this shit I'm seein' ♪

♪ Human beings Scream vocal javelins ♪

♪ Sign of a local nigga Unravelin' ♪

Chuck D, raptivist, rap artist, Public Enemy.

Early 1980s, I was 20 years old,

and knew he was in trouble when Reagan became president

and Bush became vice president.

Here's a brief segment...

You had slum, ghetto situations of disenfranchised and then

non-servicing before.

But you didn't have that particular drug

of cocaine going into crack

and you didn't have the plethora of guns...

ever before.

It was not a good look for people of color

and progressive people.

People, you know, are trying to like express themselves.

You know, whether it was a music artist

wanting to have their own voice,

whether it was a fashion designer

wanting to be avant-garde and have their own voice.

Everybody wanted to have their own voice.

There was something that had been brewing.

-We wanted to be heard. -We had gotten into

a very conservative movement in the early '80s

where the moral majority was coming out.

We had gone through some economic hardships.

We had just come out of the Vietnam War and Watergate.

So I think people were looking for heroes.

People who were clamoring,

looking for someone to just express our sensibilities

and our style and our taste.

I remember the environment that I was in.

I was like, "This... "This ain't it.

You know, there has to be more."

Not has to be.

I know there's more to it than this.

Well, some of the same things

that we were going through then that still affects us today,

so as much as I like to believe things have changed,

the-- some things are just constant.

That decade was-- it was a certain

reality that had changed from the '70s.

We are everywhere! Fight that!

Graffiti is not an art.

-Give us what we want. -Give us what we want!

Rise up! Fight back!

-Our street! -Our street!

-Our street! -Our street!

-Our street! -Our street!

The NBA was in a fairly precarious position.

Coming off those years in the '70s,

the NBA was still viewed as a niche sport.

The national television audience at that time

being a largely white audience

and there was a lot of speculation

that we'd never be able to have a league

that had such a high percentage of African-American players

and sell out to the public.

NBA action.

It's fantastic.

Despite the success of Magic and Larry.

Like you-- that, you know, it didn't have the feel

of Major League Baseball or the NFL in terms of

broad popularity.

We were struggling with some really unfair

stereotypes about NBA players.

Guys were doing coke. Guys was doing pot.

Guys we're dying.

Guys were being banned from the league.

And a fight between J and Bird

has broken out on the court.

We were constantly trying to upgrade

the public image of both the game and the players.

So it was an outlaw league and, again,

the ratings went down, and the popularity went down.

And David Stern came in.

I was the commissioner of the NBA from '84 to 2014.

It was a-- a difficult time for the league

in terms of-- we didn't have a TV contract to speak of.

There was no... video capture.

But I think we might have been in a relationship

with Converse, as the official shoe of the NBA.

And Converse had no idea what to do with the NBA.

Just wanted to get through the day.

It was that difficult.

If you knew anything about Nike,

Nike stood on this kind of rebel-ish behavior.

Almost a foundation built on rebellion.

John McEnroe,

Prefontaine,

was rebels.

Answer my question!

The question, jerk!

Nike was a very volatile,

much smaller, but, um, very aggressive and volatile place

and you really didn't know if you had a job from day to day.

It was, quite frankly, crazy.

It was crazy. Was nutty.

My name is Tinker Hatfield and I'm director of--

I don't even know my title.

Let me start this over. I'm gonna make up one.

People didn't even know how to pronounce Nike.

I mean, what is this?

There was a time when the people of the outside world, the uh--

and the media were wondering what's happening with Nike.

I'm Phil Knight.

Nike had lost touch of who they were,

the integral company that they had abandoned.

And I told Nike, you know, "You guys gotta

get back to that. That's who you are,

that's the heart and soul of your company."

And they said, "Nah, that's not us.

We're not that company anymore." And I said,

"Well, you better fucking get back to being that company."

Obviously, I don't think you can foresee

what happened.

When you disrupt...

people can't help but pay attention.

No one wants to walk in the same shoes.

It's not real. That's not--

it's not how we're built as human beings,

to all walk in the same way.

Trying to change the tone...

And there's always a look for a stand

in one direction or another.

Uh, where that stand's gonna come,

who's gonna unify, when is enough?

And from time to time, in every generation,

there's something-- there's some rebels

that kind of, shake stuff up.

And it's like Sam Cooke said, "A change is gonna come."

Nothing much I can do about it.

My name is Elizabeth Semmelhack

and I'm the creator of the rising sneaker culture

and the author of Out of the Box:

The Rise of Sneaker Culture.

Early sneakers were actually symbols of status.

Created in the middle of the 19th Century,

for lawn tennis.

The fact that you had a rubberized sole

meant you could play on damp grass.

And of course lawn tennis was something that was enjoyed

by the privileged few.

But by the end of World War II

sneakers become the footwear of childhood

and they lose all status.

We didn't wanna be associated with wearing sneakers

because people who wore sneakers everyday didn't have money.

So we would carry our sneakers to the park.

And it's not until the 1970s

that the sneaker is returned to an item of status.

There was a time in America, I mean,

it was all Converse.

Canvas Converse, white or black,

high top or low top.

And it cost five dollars back in the day.

You had to beg your parents.

Five dollars for a sneaker back in the day...

that was a lot of fucking money.

But when you got your first pair of Cons,

the whole block would come out.

That was the start of hot shoes.

Chuck Taylor is the first person

to have his name on a sneaker.

If I asked the average person,

"What does Chuck Taylor look like?"

They'd know the shoe, but they don't remember him.

When I was growing up, Dr. J had Converses.

And they would say, "Hey, Dr. J,

where you get those moves?"

♪ Where'd you get Those moves? ♪

♪ You move with such grace ♪

♪ Are you a member Of the human race? ♪

♪ Hey, Dr. J. ♪

And we wore Converse in the hood...

but we didn't like them as much as we liked other shoes.

Fila was a big hood sneaker for a while.

You know, I wore them, but also wore other brands.

You could see Adidas around. Like, you know,

a few people had Adidas, a few people

had Converse, or whatever your thing was.

Adidas is special because of Run-DMC.

Word up, and we always rock our Adidas on our feet.

♪ I wear my Adidas When I rock the beat ♪

♪ On stage front page Every show I go ♪

♪ My Adidas ♪

No. Let me start again.

If your sneakers slip and slide,

get the one that's starts inside,

ask your moms, empty her purse

to get the ones that say Converse.

I'm from the time when it was weird to have

tons of sneakers.

Back in the day, people would come in

and try on like, five or six pairs.

Just cause the way they looked on the wall,

instead of hunting and knowing what you're coming for.

It was, like, you had to have your own sense of style.

The game was, I'mma walk into the sneaker store

every other day and see what they got new.

It's just that-- it was weird to have

20, 30, 40, 50...

Like it was-- like, "What the fuck

are you doing with that many sneakers?

Sneakers were always a big deal in my house.

We grew up in a very poor neighborhood.

If there was anything you were gonna take care of

and-- and really cherish, it was a pair of shoes.

Growing up in the hood

before we had cars, we had shoes.

Our shoes were our Bentleys, our Maybachs.

You know, that's what they were. That's how we treated them.

Our connection, my connection

is they might make you play better.

Dumbest thought in the world.

Now, that's who this shoe was made for.

Magic Johnson and Larry Bird

had shoes called Weapons.

And they did an ad back-to-back

holding the-- the sneaker like it was a gun.

Nobody cared.

They didn't really sell across to New York City cats

just because guys played ball.

But everybody didn't play basketball.

You didn't wait for All-Star Weekend to come out

so that you can go buy...

Charles Barkley's sneaker.

You didn't really wanna have anything to do

with your athlete idols off court.

You just wanted to see them on the field.

And then when you saw them,

you know, post-game interviews

or if you were lucky enough to catch them in the street

or whatever it was...

you're like, "Wait. This is the guy

that I idolize on, which his style is so weird."

If you was a good basketball player

that was second to being a good hustler.

We didn't wear basketball sneakers around Harlem.

Sneaker culture in basketball,

everything was really kind of basic and generic.

It was white and black,

white in the team color.

Everybody kind of had the same formulas.

It was just cup soles and standard toe cups,

and then you would have every brand

to stamp their logo along the middle.

Things were stale and a little flat in the world

of basketball shoes.

Jason Mayden, former senior design director

for Jordan brand.

I wouldn't call myself a sneakerhead.

I mean, you never get high off your own supply.

You don't do that. Rules of the game, man.

You can't make the stuff then covet the stuff.

In '84, I became a fulltime employee

for like-- I'm not a shoe designer,

I'm a very good problem solver though.

A lot of Nike's original designers didn't come from

industrial design. They came from different disciplines.

And so they knew how to manipulate

-materials and processes. -In '84,

Nike was not a design company.

It was a half-ass shoe company.

And it was more of a marketing effort

than it was anything else.

Adidas was killing Nike,

marketing-wise.

They were like the fashion hit, not Nike.

And the shoes weren't selling.

Our main objective was to get into basketball.

Even though they had some sales to a 16-year-old kid

that we were trying to attract

didn't think of Nike as anything other than

a running shoe company.

Well, it may be the 20th century and all that

but there are still people out there who run

as if their life depended on it.

We weren't part of any federations.

We didn't support the NBA, or the NFL, or...

It was kind of some kind of a controlled, uh, mayhem.

That was a very early time period and,

you know, we had Moses Malone.

Big boy'd just become MVP.

They had just won a championship.

We had quite a few players.

But Converse had Bird,

Isaiah, Mark Aguirre, you know.

So they had a large pool.

And we were kind of the upstart,

up and coming company.

When you ain't got the ball,

you can't shoot the ball.

Nike.

Peter Moore knew that they wanted something

to be revolutionary

and change people's eyes and how they looked at things.

He was fascinated by air, flight.

They really loved the idea of flying.

I was fascinated because of the opportunities

that it would allow you to ride on air.

-You needed flare. -...against two.

Bird a runner. It's good.

You needed showmanship.

What a pass. Magic Johnson...

You needed air.

We had a lot of good players.

We had a lot of players on uh, the NBA All-Star Team.

But we didn't really have a marquee player.

We didn't have anybody that was First Team, All-NBA.

And we needed to get a player that could play at that level.

And I mean the whole marketing thing with Nike

was Rob Strasser's genius idea to attach

an athlete to the brand.

So he calls Sonny Vaccaro,

who was his basketball guy.

Sonny Vaccaro said, "We need to sign the kid."

That was the phrase he used, "the kid".

What do you mean we need to sign the kid?

We have $500,000. We wanna sign three players.

He goes, "No. You only need one player."

-Steal by Dr. J. -Johnson.

-McHale... -...to Larry Bird.

-Malone for the dunk. -Kareem Abdul-Jabaar.

Who could be a guy who could fly through the air?

Who could be our Jumpman?

Here goes Jordan for the dunk. Holy hell.

♪ Come on, come on, come on ♪

I'm just a freshman on the block.

The tie... 18.

-Jordan! -Jordan!

...with Michael Jordan...

I'm Roy Firestone. I'm a broadcaster.

In 1984, I interviewed Michael Jordan.

I think he might have been 19 years old.

The word is that Michael Jordan is going back

to North Carolina next year, will not turn pro.

Have you definitely made up your mind?

Can you say it without equivocation

-that you're going back? -Yes, I think can.

But right now I am gonna be coming back.

Michael Jordan wasn't even sure

if he was gonna come out of the 1984 draft.

He wanted to stay maybe his senior year

at North Carolina but he wasn't sure.

When we were scouting Michael, we obviously

had the opportunity to see him at North Carolina.

They played a passing game, teammate oriented.

Not very much one-on-one basketball.

I would never make it as a scout.

I certainly don't remember thinking

in college when I watched him, that I could be watching

possibly the greatest player ever to play the game.

And I saw him a fair amount. I was at Duke,

ACC schools and huge Carolina rivalry.

Here's James Worthy, the great

All-American power forward...

James Worthy, Sam Perkins, Brad Daugherty,

I mean, it was a great a Carolina program.

They're gonna take Michael Jordan out of the game.

He was All-American. He won the Wooden Award.

But he wasn't a flashy, thrilling player.

He wasn't Kobe Bryant in high school even.

You knew he was good,

but he was a component part of a great team.

In '84, Jordan is ready to come back

for his senior year of college and Dean Smith tells him,

"No, it's time to leave."

The same thing with James Worthy.

It's like it became an edict from the coach

that it was time for you to leave

because it was too risky for you to stay otherwise.

You're ready for the NBA.

Today, live from the Felt Forum in New York City,

The USA Network presents

the 1984 NBA College Draft.

And in that draft you had the number one pick

in the NBA, Hakeem Olajuwon from Nigeria.

The number two pick was Sam Bowie,

drafted by the Portland Trailblazers.

And that left us with Michael.

The Chicago Bulls...

pick Michael Jordan

from the University of North Carolina.

There were people who would tell you

that they thought Michael Jordan

was the best player in the 1984 draft,

but he was a six-foot-six shooting guard.

You drafted centers. If there was an available center

that you thought could be a game changer,

that would be who you would take.

I think if we had the first pick,

we might have taken Olajuwon.

1984 Olympics were here.

The United States Olympic basketball team was here.

Michael Jordan was playing on that basketball team.

George Raveling was an assistant coach of that team.

And his best friend was Sonny Vaccaro.

They went to Tony Roma's in Santa Monica.

David Falk, Michael Jordan's agent was there

and they started to talk.

We didn't know anything about Michael Jordan.

All I knew about Jordan

is he's the son of a bitch who shot the shot

that beat Georgetown, which was

our school, you know.

So why are we gonna go get this guy?

And your only wisdom was,

"Well, let's get three of them."

You know, Olajuwon was the number one pick.

Barkley was the most fun-looking guy

in all of college basketball.

And then you have a little white guy

from Gonzaga, John Stockton.

I had seen Jordan beat Georgetown.

I don't understand Nostradamus thing.

Except I knew he was right. I said, "It's Jordan."

And they were, "Okay, well, we got this much money,

we'll give them this much.

And we'll give Barkley this much

and we'll give this guy that much."

And I said, "No.

Give 'em all the money you have. Go all in.

You got to give the kid everything you got.

You know, he's worn Converse in college.

It's acknowledged he wants to be an Adidas guy

because they have these flashy sweatsuits

and all that sort of stuff.

So you knew he wasn't waking up

wanting to be a Nike guy."

So we start finding out about him.

We watched him after the games, and he had a great smile

and he looked like a good kid.

Competitive like hell.

Coming into this world, he was very, very naive.

He had his parents and David Falk

negotiating for him.

We ended up going to Converse,

and Converse presented their image.

And Michael would be just like everybody else.

And his dad asked the famous question,

"Don't you have any new creative ideas?"

And they looked around at each other like,

"What does that mean?

Like we're gonna treat him like Bernard King or Dr. J?

Isn't that enough?"

The answer was no. It wasn't enough.

We wanted to be different.

He just didn't like division.

They won the Olympics.

And then he was coming out with his parents and his agent.

And he had proclaimed to, "Hey, you know what?

Why don't you all just go out there,

and tell me what you saw.

I'm tired, been traveling."

He said he wasn't gonna sign.

He didn't wanna come to Nike.

He didn't wanna come out to Portland, Oregon.

And the insistence of his parents.

"No. You are going out there."

And they came.

I told him that

he wouldn't have their level of artistic freedom,

at a very established company,

he'd have at a younger entrepreneurial company.

In '84, you didn't make presentations to athletes.

What we did is we showed his mom and dad, him,

things that they've never seen before.

They made a music video

where they put together a series of highlights

from college and the Olympics.

Michael didn't crack a smile the whole time.

He looked like he was hating it.

The shoe money is the fuel that pumps college basketball.

It's because one great basketball player

can have such an effect on the bottom line.

My name is Bomani Jones and I work at ESPN.

You look in the 1980's,

the idea seems to make a lot of sense.

Okay, we got a star, he's wearing our shoes,

we'll be able to move a lot of shoes.

But it wasn't yet at that point

where it was such a variable that pushed everything

as it is right now.

But Larry Bird, Magic Johnson,

these players, they were as big of names

in that era as anybody.

The most anybody ever made in a shoe deal,

might have been $100,000.

Maybe a little less for Kareem,

even though he was a six-time NBA MVP.

Didn't matter because it didn't mean anything.

Somebody had to come up with an idea.

We worked very hard. We campaigned.

We had to woo the agent.

We had to woo the parents. Then we had to woo the man.

And the one thing the guy could really do

was he could jump.

I mean he could really jump.

He could jump out of a gym.

He's a flyer.

♪ New York London, Tokyo ♪

♪ We're flying over the world Conveying the globe ♪

♪ We got worldwide status Wherever we go ♪

♪ Hot, cold, 57, Man, you already know ♪

♪ Whatever, man, You already know ♪

Jordan speeding into ball game.

Jordan, look at that!

Holy cow!

That connected to air.

As a matter of fact, some of the negotiations

with David Falk began

in a place called the museum of flight.

Well as soon as we walk into the room,

Falk, he's got all kinds of ideas for us and Jordan.

Nike, this air thing is pretty big.

And there this new this new guy, Jordan.

One of his ideas was that he thinks

we oughta call him Air Jordan.

You know, I'm like, that kinda has a little ring to it.

Air Jordan by Nike.

Rebound Jordan. He changed hands...

That took Mr. Knight a while to get used to,

because he didn't like that much at all.

So I'm flying home with Rob.

I see the stewardess

give a kid a set of wings.

I start sketching on a cocktail napkin

this airline's wings with a basketball in the middle.

When we showed him the shoes and showed him the apparel,

it was all gonna be built around Air Jordan.

We wanna make you the shoe.

Not, "How'd you like to endorse a shoe?"

"How'd you like to have your own shoe?"

I mean, this never been done before.

Phil Knight was told...

that it'll be the death of Nike...

to have a black man as the face of your company,

that white America...

would not come to terms...

or purchase... Nike products.

Like, it goes back to like back when they used to say,

"Well, we can't sell--

we can't sell records

with putting a black face on the cover."

I mean, what kind of shit is that?

You know 30 years ago people were a lot

more narrow-minded and they thought

that there was only an appetite for a certain perspective.

They didn't know what they were getting into.

And then they executed shit and took chances,

and were like, "Fuck it, let's go for it."

He didn't know it then what that meant.

He hasn't bounced a ball in the NBA yet.

The definition of visionary,

people see something,

but other people can't see it yet.

You really couldn't put it-- You know, no one--

Oh, yeah. This is what we gonna do.

We gonna build this up. We gonna make this.

Yeah, okay, great.

You know, it's-- it's kind of like Michelangelo.

You know, he really did not want to do

the Sistine Chapel.

And he considered himself this sculptor.

And Pope asked him about painting the chapel,

and he said, "No. That's just not who I am."

I think there's an inherent pressure

on that too, by the way.

"Hey, my shoes are gonna be named after me?"

And low and behold, they convinced Michelangelo

to paint the chapel.

And he looked at his mom and said, "You know,

I still think maybe I should go to Adidas."

And she says "No, you're gonna go to Nike.

We're gonna make a shoe named after you."

So often times

when the universe is ready to create,

the party may or may not be willing...

but they come together.

And he looked at his mom and said, "Where do I sign?"

♪ Clap your hands ♪

The signing of Michael Jordan is possibly

the biggest and most important event

in Nike's history.

My favorite criticism, uh,

from the signing of Michael Jordan,

was Fortune Magazines that, uh,

there's no greater sign that Nike has lost his way

than to pay $250,000

for an untried basketball player.

African-American athletes weren't really

getting endorsement deals to the extent

that they are today.

It sounds preposterous to think.

To see somebody who you can identify with,

that looks like you, and also something that...

is going against the grain, that's not the norm.

And that could be very inspiring.

He had just come out of college.

Nike invested a lot in him.

He hadn't proven himself.

I met Michael right after the draft personally.

In them days, we didn't have great interviews.

We didn't have shooting drills before.

You didn't know how strong he was until we got him.

There was just this complete fire drill

to get a shoe put together for him really quickly.

Because we actually didn't have the shoe ready.

If you're smart and clever and efficient,

you can use existing pieces in a new way.

And Peter Moore was very efficient.

In the case of the Air Jordan I,

was to somehow infuse it with Michael Jordan's

personality and character.

It's like a Ferrari, but you still need

a great driver.

And we had a very good driver.

We wanted something distinctive.

Or really an exclamation.

I was always fascinated with the idea

that you're running on air.

The idea that you could sky, flying.

Uh, and Michael Jordan was a flyer.

All of those things together created

a new and special spirit.

You have to remember, in '84, the era of the design

hadn't happened yet.

Nike had a couple of pattern makers.

That was as close to designers as-- as it got.

Today, it's just different.

When we signed Michael,

he was very unfamiliar with Nike shoe.

Didn't like Nike shoes,

because he said that they were too high,

and he needed to feel

closer to the floor.

He had big concerns about the air

because he felt he might get too high off the ground.

Get too high off the ground,

you're gonna sprain an ankle.

And back then, shoes were pretty simple.

They were basically leather with a rubber cup sole.

Sometimes they would have some foam exposed,

but there wasn't much technology

going on in the shoe.

And then it was Peter Moore who lowered the air-bag

and he could feel that.

Nobody was worried about style

and what it looked like.

They were worried about how it worked.

So the idea of combining functionality and practicality

and the aesthetic of it all.

In the mid-80s,

all those things were coming together.

I think sneakers are the epitome

of what perfect design can wind up being.

Essentially, anyone can be wearing it

but your style ultimately determines

how it really plays out.

And one of the things that I've learned the most

about being a designer is that...

I don't wanna live within those bounds,

I wanna be able to push out those walls

because when I live within the rules

of the industry,

we all kinda go the same path.

When it came to the shoe,

I had this idea to break the color barrier.

I wanted to give these kids something that they could

sort of show their stuff with.

So I looked around with what was

going on in the industry,

what was going on with kids.

There was no color, no excitement,

no anything in these shoes.

And yet you went to the high school camps

and things like that, these kids are trying

to do 360 slam dunks. They're-- you know, they got color, man.

♪ You want it, you got it Come get it ♪

♪ Get with it, it's yours ♪

♪ Call me weak, I just peak And get stronger ♪

♪ What I'm doing Is free-styling ♪

♪ Meanwhile I'm profiling ♪

♪ Getting set and getting paid Give me some room ♪

♪ I'mma start flexing, flexing ♪

You know, the question becomes, "Can he wear this?

You know, can he pull this off?"

Because it's-- I mean, he's gonna take some shit

from other players

when he walks out there like this.

And then the sneaker comes out...

that is bright and bold.

That black and red,

and looks like nothing you've ever seen before.

It's got like presence to it.

The shape of it, the look of it,

I just was like, "This is nothing I've ever seen."

It was so different that you had to like it.

It was game-changing.

♪ I predicted it just right ♪

♪ You know the shit is tight Every time I'm on the mic ♪

♪ You see me on the stage look Around the crowed is hyped ♪

♪ This shit is regular, man This what my life's like ♪

I do remember seeing Michael's shoes come out.

And, uh, at first I think everybody thought

it was, uh, a little bit strange.

Mike Jordan, not Jackson,

he doesn't wear one white glove.

He wears strange-looking sneakers.

I saw it and I went, "Interesting."

Color was a big piece of it.

It was a little bit of irreverence

and something that no one else was doing.

This culture,

we're really kind of obsessed with nostalgia.

It's like it was way before its time.

It's gonna catch somebody's eyes.

it's gonna give you an opinion,

it's gonna have an impact on you

because it's not what you're used to seeing.

Michael Jordan did not wanna wear these colors.

He wanted to wear powder blue, North Carolina colors.

And I said, "No, you play for the Chicago Bulls.

That's got to be between you and Mr. Reinsdorf, you know.

I can't change the colors of the basketball team."

It was actually this really clever marriage

of shoe and athlete,

and how there was a story now to tell.

It just felt like the--

he was doing what he was doing because of the shoe.

Nobody has ever taken a team player

and turned them into...

a personality

that you could market around.

So we were gonna break some rules

to get him there.

In this conversation with Michael,

I started to realize that not only am I talking to the best

young basketball player,

I'm also talking to somebody who actually had

a really good eye, a really good fashion sense.

It was the first time you saw a person,

on a court, look just as good off the court.

And kids in the street gonna look like that person.

I couldn't dress like Dr. J. Dr. J was in a suit.

I couldn't dress like some of the heroes from the 70s.

It was totally different.

You know, no one else had worn colored shoes before,

and I felt like I wanted to be different.

♪ One, two, get down ♪

I think it only enhanced my game.

You know my game at that time was...

very unique within itself.

Played in the air. Unafraid.

Looked in the face of adversity

to try to overcome.

It just felt authentic to the style of play,

to the way the sport had been played

up to that point, and to a guy

that sort of said, "Oh, what about this?"

But really it's like, that's the beginning

of trendsetters.

I think a lot of people around the NBA

are talking about Michael Jordan.

Michael got to realize that he's not seven foot,

so he's not gonna carry a team in the NBA.

In the NBA, there's really not

any such thing as a one-man team.

And I don't think that you can come in expecting

one guy to turn the whole thing around.

♪ Paid the cost to be the boss ♪

Turns out he was exactly the guy

who could pull it off.

Unbelievable. Larry Bird at the buzzer.

I can't imagine what it must have been like

if you were an established NBA player

and then this dude walks in here,

and he's taking on everybody.

Larry Bird was the darling of the league, right?

Everyone loves Magic.

And then suddenly the shoes come out.

Right? Like, you've been a top basketball player.

Every room you walk into, you are the man.

Now, when this dude walks in, he's the man.

And he just showed up here.

I can't imagine how infuriating that has to be

if you're just another guy in the NBA.

There wasn't a player at that time

who had really thumbed their nose

to the league before.

And surely not a black man.

And then you understand that everybody wanted

to be in these shoes.

It doesn't matter what color you are.

I wanna be a part of that.

Well, it just opened up a whole new horizon for,

um, players to be able to express their individuality.

I think there was this...

desire...

on the part of us, and Michael,

to be different, to be leaders,

to do things differently, which...

almost always requires some breaking of rules.

What Nike and Michael Jordan

created together was a game changer.

And I think the most creative people

in any facet

are the ones that are those rebels that do that.

They don't wanna live by the rules.

They wanna understand the rules

but they don't wanna live by them.

Rod Thorn who was my general manager

came down and said he got a phone call

from the league."

Shoes were not uniform

to what's required with the NBA.

Oh, my goodness, well we screwed up now.

We have the shoe, and David Stern throws

a wrench in the thing by saying,

"You can't wear that shoe."

The turning point was when the NBA banned...

his shoes.

They were worried.

You know, he's a rookie in the league

and he's now done something against his contract.

Michael didn't wanna be a distraction.

Michael is respectful,

and his parents raised him to be that way.

Why the hell would you ban a shoe

that matches a uniform?

Or you banned it because it looks cooler

than every other shoe on the court?

Are the other guys jealous?

Are the guys on the other teams jealous?

Is it because it says his name?

Really didn't understand the ramifications

of what was really happening.

I didn't know the guidelines. I didn't know the rules.

Um, I thought, "Hey, just-- you know,

you sign a shoe contract,

you design yourself a shoe,

you go out and you play in the shoe.

We didn't start with a lot of rules.

If we came upon something that didn't exist,

we would say, "You can't do that."

Then the next year, we would put it

in the operations manuals.

Basically, we had the--

some fights with David Stern early on.

We used to have some issues with all apparel companies.

Because as we were trying to construct the league,

we became quite protective of it.

The NBA, I thought was encroaching

on our contractual rights, and they thought

we were taking over their

basketball arena, I guess.

We had a lot of problems. There were countless sponsors

who would say to us, "Well, we really don't think,

uh, the NBA can appeal to, uh-- to our market."

And we were constantly fighting against those kinds of things

in trying to upgrade the-- and the public image

of both the game and the players.

There was just a tremendous amount of attention

to this-- this new young player and this shoe

and of course Nike.

And I think it scared the NBA.

I should be careful here.

I have to kind of edit myself a little bit.

Michael Jordan was just out of his teens

when he signed this deal with Nike.

And the whole world changed for him.

I was told that we had a problem

because the shoe was-- had too much black in it.

Uh, if we weren't careful, we'd end up with, uh,

five players on the court for a team running around

in five different color shoes

and we didn't think that reflected well

on the team notion.

Uh, white or black, that's it,

or with accents of your uniform.

Outside of that, no, not gonna happen.

We're not gonna have that here.

The ban frankly was just David Stern

being David Stern.

Yes. There was a rule that the shoes

had to match the uniform, but...

...we-- we did that.

I mean, it-- it was the Bulls' colors.

It wasn't like you could do them in Carolina blue.

At the end of the day,

the Bulls' color was red and black.

I wanna make sure that the shoe

is aesthetically pleasing to the eye.

Nike was...

really confused about it at the time,

but they said, "Well, okay.

Well, we'd think about-- we'll try to find

some-- some other ways but in the meantime

just keep wearing 'em."

I don't think anybody here at that time had any idea

that it was breaking any kind of rules

as far as design code, and--

And, frankly, I don't think it did.

Rob's reaction was, "Well, we're screwed.

We're done."

Rob had ordered about 50,000 pairs

of these shoes.

They were done, being delivered.

You know, we figured we're gonna eat them.

Rob goes back to New York to meet with Stern.

I don't even remember what the motivation

might have been for the rule.

It was not a high priority at the time.

Stern's...

not sympathetic.

You know, the decision was a rule's, a rule.

We have to tell the Bulls and, I guess, Nike.

Michael wouldn't be allowed to wear the shoe.

On the way out the door, Stern says,

"But, Rob, my son thinks I'm a jerk also,

but can you send me a pair

of those shoes for my son?"

You're not gonna get David Stern on camera to say...

...to fess up on that though.

He ain't doing that.

My actions weren't the source

of great accolades in my home.

When I wore 'em the second time,

the league came back saying,

"Well, wear them again, you're gonna get fined $5000."

Well, now , obviously, I-- I didn't have $5000

to be giving to anybody at that stage in my career.

Yeah, for them it was like...

"Oh, yeah, okay. We might can work with that.

Okay, let's just pay the fine."

You have to respect how powerful that was

to culture and to the world.

It wasn't like an alternative.

And it was just money.

I mean, they didn't say, "You can't-- you can't play."

Stern was old school,

he just didn't like the idea that...

this guy was gonna stick out.

So, he understood what we were doing.

You know, he's gonna protect his league.

It wasn't that the league was saying,

"You can't wear this special tread,

or it's gonna give you a competitive advantage."

It was fashion,

and in fact, it didn't affect performance

in any way.

It was about a red pair of shoes.

And here, Michael, was living within these...

this overly restrictive league that was saying,

"You can't even wear red basketball shoes

on the court."

One of two things could've happen.

Nike could have been like, "Oh, yes.

Yes, Mr. Stern.

We're so sorry.

We'll get these to him in white tomorrow

and everything will be fine."

And they were like...

"No."

You know, because Nike was gonna pay

for the 82 games of playing with this shoe.

And the league said, "Well, we gotta stop that."

Let's not forget, like,

if Michael Jordan's making X amount of money.

The league and the powers that be

are making oo-de-lallys more,

and essentially feel like, "We can tell these motherfuckers

what to do.

When to jump, when to shoot,

when to sit down, when to talk, all of it,

because at the end of the day...

they got the keys.

Those acts are like trying to stomp out

people being individuals,

people expressing themselves.

It wasn't like athletes were able to express

who they were by their shoes.

Like, they were really cool

and they had, like, decent shoes.

No one had ever had a shoe that was a statement like,

"This is me."

What it did is it announced a new era, it was a new guard.

There was somebody that didn't care about the rules

because the rules were outdated.

Someone who doesn't want their parents,

their schools,

their job to shut them down from their dream.

It kind of exploded

because it wasn't just for us anymore.

It was like for the world.

It's like we wanted the world-- we wanted to be heard,

and that was something that we felt like could really

sort of speak to the world, and say, "We're here."

Because every other part of-- at least American culture,

was sort of trying to silence a people.

Understanding everybody's point of view, the differences,

accept that...

and be aware of that,

and be aware of where we are today.

It's not too far off.

It's a problem when you're that good.

There's really not any such thing

-as a one-man team. -You're that special.

I don't think anybody had any idea

that it was breaking any kind of rules.

-You're that defined. -We've got 50,000 of them

-on the water. -Nike was really

-pissed off about it. -And you're that different.

-You're that other. -They held their breath

at Nike. What did we do?

-Why the shoe get banned? -How you gonna ban

-greatness? -You just have to understand

-the-- the context. -You know,

he violated the rules. He wore the shoes.

Michael Jordan was so powerful.

There'd be some appropriate penalty

to make sure that the rule wasn't violated.

There was concern that it was too much.

You just can't be regular.

So then, you stand at the crossroads...

You know what, this thing

right here might be something.

Might be something just a little special.

But this was one of those holy shit moments.

Something different is happening here,

and I wanna be a part of it.

There's all these, like...

weird things that all layered up perfectly

for where the world was at

in some, like, NBD, never been done before,

to change the direction

of an entire society.

I was just reading a little article

about the NBA banning, uh, Jordan's shoes.

It just clicked for me.

Well, it was Rob Strasser that got the letter,

and when I finished the letter,

I said, "Yes."

I wrote this simple spot,

and so I took that into my creative director.

And he said, "Hey, I love it."

But they don't have any more money,

their whole budget's been spent.

So, he told me to fly up to Beaverton

and see if you can sell it to them.

I'd never directed a commercial on my own before.

I said, "Look, give me thirty grand,

and I'll make it happen."

On September 15th,

Nike created a revolutionary new basketball shoe.

On October 18th,

the NBA threw them out of the game.

Fortunately, the NBA can't stop you

from wearing them.

Air Jordans from Nike.

The NBA can ban it,

but they can't stop you from getting it.

Phew.

Brilliant.

The only thing that you get

from trying to silence something is that

you make it even more colossal,

and more impactful.

When you're 14, 13 years old,

those...

I want those.

It's-- It's liberating.

The league says,

I can't wear this, they like, fuck them.

I'm getting a pair."

I'm rolling with Mike.

It was a statement anti-establishment.

We don't need to play by the rules.

We're bigger than the rules.

A spirit of rebellion, a spirit of youth,

a spirit of individuality.

You can't knock me down, you can't make me feel inferior,

and, like, not only am I dressed like you,

but I'm-- I'm also wearing cooler sneakers than you.

That's what I like, man.

The kids that say, "Fuck it, I'm gonna do it my way."

I'm not gonna follow all the peers

and follow all of the-- the bullshit.

Being unique to who you are.

Make your own mark on the world.

You don't wanna be just like them.

They were banned.

Outlawed, you know, counter culture.

Stand up against the man, you know.

That's the way it was interpreted.

Oh, left hand. Hey, K.O. by love.

I think the rebel part of it is about change.

We're gonna power our way into culture.

We're gonna yell as loud as we can,

and hold our Johnsons.

To be a part of that,

just by having the pair of shoes.

Oh shit, like,

The AJ 1 is it.

This is the sneaker.

Then it just became this thing, it was like The Grail.

"Holy shit, man, you got-- oh, my God."

You know, it just-- it became lore.

It became that thing that you had to have.

You know, as a young kid who didn't want what was hot?

The 50,000 pairs were gone like that.

Every night, I'm gonna lace up these shoes,

and I'm gonna do things...

that are so beautifully fucked up

in them, artistry,

you really can't tell me shit.

Before you know it...

what's David Stern gonna do

when Michael Jordan has the whole planet

behind him.

I thought it was a...

a genius marketing campaign,

but they were never banned.

Once anything gets banned

it becomes the coolest thing in the world, right?

It doesn't matter what it is.

Once somebody says,

"You're not supposed to have it."

Then all of a sudden, everybody has to have it.

And then, it becomes easier for an urban legend

to start around.

They had so much of a frightening dare,

and ego and exuberance that the NBA had to put

bans on the players expressions.

I was under the impression that he wore them every game,

they were banned because of the colors.

They were banned because there wasn't enough white in them.

The league sent a letter to Nike, saying that

they were getting fined because it wasn't approved.

And he's continued to wear them every game

and Nike was fined $5000.

And we were more than willing to pay the fines.

I knew more about the fine, like, later in life.

Like, that became part of, like, the legend.

The shoe was brought to the NBA for approval

because his-- the season was starting right there.

I remember being brought into an office

where I was shown the shoe,

and I was told that we had a problem.

I don't have any recollection

of, uh, when I first saw them.

Now, for some reason that I-- I really don't recollect.

I authored a, uh-- and signed a letter...

uh, to Nike

that advised them that the shoe was, uh,

was not-- did not meet our rules.

It was banned by the NBA.

David Stern banned the Air Jordan,

there's no question.

They didn't comply with league rules,

but they were never banned.

They were never banned.

We've been talking about them a lot recently.

There's been a lot of noise

-in the history of the shoe. -Arguably,

the most important factor in its colorway's appeal,

is the fact that it's banned by the NBA, or so we thought.

And many believed the Airship is actually the shoe

that was banned by the NBA.

Ban name on these and help it sell, but what happened...

But many of you heard the story...

...but none of that has been confirmed.

However, it seems the colors were accurate

in regards to being banned by the NBA,

but not the shoe itself. In our Complex article

Russ Bengston explains in detail how the Nike Airship

was a catalyst for the NBA's ban on the colorway.

As you can see in this video, MJ is sporting

the Nike Airship during pregame

prior to his Madison Square Garden debut.

Maybe it's the Airship that's banned,

or it might be the Air Jordan I.

Right? We don't know exactly which one.

No one really is right.

I think if anyone tries to overthink

what happened back then,

they're missing the point.

The beauty of the urban legend

is it can be basically for whatever you want it to be.

It almost doesn't matter after that point.

Designing a physical product

for an athlete is what my background is focused on.

Basic timeline for that process

is anywhere from 18 months,

all the way out to five years.

Uh, the meeting that we had

and, uh, with Falk, was in August,

and we wanted him to play basketball

in the product in the end of September,

or first part of October.

So, we had to get...

all of this done.

We couldn't do that with a brand new shoe,

we didn't have enough time.

You know, it was, uh...

an impossible task, frankly.

So, Airship became the shoes that he would wear

while his shoe was being prepared.

And we colored the Airship in red, black, and white.

So he was gonna have to start to play in look-a-likes

because I didn't want him wearing white shoes

then all of a sudden, showing up in colored shoes.

The idea was that this colorways was his shoe.

I think the-- the reason why so much is made

about what could or couldn't be,

or will or won't be true,

or what day or who said, and why

was because it's this rookie,

this brand-new shoe that looks totally different

than everything else,

and it's breaking the rules,

and he's not even two months in.

When you don't understand something,

there's gonna be controversy around it,

but it wasn't about a date,

it wasn't about who banned it,

it wasn't about a reason why.

All that matters is,

this shoe was...

out of this world.

This particular sneaker

brought with it a kind of heroicism

that made it desirable at an unprecedented level.

Hello, again, everybody,

and welcome to the 1985 NBA Slam Dunk Championship.

It wasn't as if that Air Jordan

never was seen on a stage.

He wore them in the dunk contest

of 1985's All Star Weekend.

All right, here's Michael Jordan

of the Chicago Bulls. Six-six rookie.

Slam, beautiful. Out of sight.

You know, he showed up as this brash rookie,

and he had, like, this special warm up suit

and he has his Air Jordan s,

and he had some gold chains on and the earring.

In 1985,

and to a bunch of ten-year-old kids,

like, dunking became,

like, the thing to do

in Kansas.

It's not a dunking state,

we're a jump shot state.

I just was like, "I wish I could do that.

I wish I could do that."

I wish I could do that.

Like the flare on the dunk contest,

you know what I'm saying? You just can't not see that.

You can't take it back, you know?

You see those shoes flare, and you're just like,

"Oh, they're wings."

Look at this. Now he's putting down--

Tape on the foul line.

That's for the old take-off.

That's what-- Yeah, he wants to indicate

where he's going to take off on this dunk.

-Fly! Slam it! -Whoo!

Hey Marvin, sure that's Michael Jordan?

And his foot was honest to that tape.

That's a ten to me.

Michael wore the shoe.

I heard about it, somebody put it in front of me,

I saw it, I wanted to create that.

So, the AJ1's reverence

lead to this series of events where people like me

were able to find this artifact

that encouraged us to pursue our own destiny.

There are a number of creation myths

around the NBA, of the way things have happened,

that don't quite match up with historical facts.

And we all sort of got to chuckle about that,

and we thought that was pretty innovative,

what they had done with the circumstances.

Remember, red and black on their away uniform...

then white was like their home uniform.

First thing I remember about the real shoe was

we made some samples

and showed those to him, and he picked three.

Either way he was gonna stand out.

It was the guy that nobody was ever gonna be like.

You're gonna have a bunch of guys

that are gonna come close, gonna...

"Oh, oh, man, he reminds me of MJ."

You can remind as much as you want.

You're not MJ.

Hate it, love it, believe it, discredit it, it still happened.

And so, that's what I take away from it,

is being yourself on purpose in public all the time

is the most important thing you can do as a human being,

and Michael did it on the grandest stage.

I don't believe what I just saw!

I saw a man fly!

Hip hop was the first co-signer of,

"This sneaker is what you wanna wear."

Hip hop being graffiti...

break dancing, and MCs rapping over beats.

People were doing it, and they expressed themselves.

The whole spirit of what those sneakers meant

really spoke to this rebelliousness

that was like, "Damn."

That really just changed the entire course.

You know, in hip hop, we talk about

what's going on in our lives,

and we're telling stories of our perspective.

We have an outlet where we can express our passion.

I think that was an important thing

about the Jordan,

that it had a story right from the beginning.

And that's connected to hip hop. So, it's all about stories.

I got a little story to tell you.

And it's very much like they've been in step

with each other in that respect.

I'm telling you, every pair of Jordans comes with a story,

A million stories, even.

Everybody that has them

wanted them for some real reason.

I remember sitting in our house, and my brother brought home

NWA's record, Straight Outta Compton.

♪ Straight Outta Compton ♪

♪ Crazy motherfucker named Ice Cube ♪

♪ From the gang called Niggaz With Attitudes ♪

And we were listening to it on a record player.

And my mother just lost it.

She was like, "What the fuck is this?

Turn that shit off. Are you out of your mind?"

♪ Goin' off on the Motherfucker like that ♪

And we just thought it was

the greatest thing we ever heard.

I saw Eazy-E wearing Jordans,

and you know, I'm like, "Dang, that's dope!"

Like, look at how cool this guy looks.

♪ ...for the one they call Eazy But here's a flash... ♪

But, like, some of the first albums I had

growing up were N.W.A., The Chronic, Doggystyle.

And seeing a lot of things, like,

from the Public Enemy videos, and still, the stuff

that I wouldn't even imagine people doing on videos today.

♪ I'm countin' down To the day, deservin' ♪

♪ Fittin' for a king ♪

♪ I'm waiting for the time When I can get to Arizona ♪

♪ 'Cause my money's spent... ♪

Politically, it was very much awake.

You know, you were faced with the circumstances,

and it come from the presidential switch,

but the strength of the music and the culture

gave us some hope, something to look forward to.

And then, fight those situations that try to keep you back.

Growing up in Compton in that era,

and listening to what they were reporting,

because they were talking about and hitting points

that we weren't seeing

in the mainstream media.

And all those things that were swirling at that time,

it helped me write "Fight the Power".

♪ Fight the power ♪

♪ Fight the power ♪

And "Fight the Power" doesn't become an anthem

without Spike Lee.

Spike Lee's Mars Blackmon character

for She's Gotta Have It was the first b-boy

that got, you know, cinema play.

What about Nola Darling? What do you wanna know?

I thought she was a freak.

Mars is a b-boy, loved ball,

and so it's just natural...

for Mars to wear Jordans.

Mars loves his Jordans so much.

When he's making love with Nola, he still has his Jordans on.

Spike had that hat flipped up with the AJ1s,

and it was just, like, this iconic look.

I helped bring it into the mainstream.

Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, In the House,

LL, we did everything we could to bring it in

because I believed in it.

And that really took hip hop

and the style of music to a whole 'nother level.

In terms of revolutionary dress, or...

saying what you feel politically...

I'm not guessing.

Bebop, doo-wop, hip hop, laptop, okay.

Before social media, you saw these outfits

and these footwear moments during music videos,

whether it was Jay-Z,

Nas, or Wu-Tang,

these guys all worshipped the Jordan brand.

It's a lifestyle, it's a culture,

it's powerful.

♪ And I'm cool like that ♪

♪ I'm cool like that I'm cool like that ♪

♪ I'm cool like that I'm cool like that ♪

♪ I'm cool like that ♪

I think that's when Jordans really took a turn

and, like, really became this different thing

where graffiti artists or artists in general

started to implement that.

To have the opportunity to wear something that said,

"I'm cool, I have style, I care about fashion,

and my game is better than yours"...

This was something that that shoe said

without you having to say it out loud.

You started seeing all the cross-pollination,

and basketball players wanted to be rappers and do rap videos

and, you know, every entertainer and rapper

now wanted to be a basketball player,

or get involved in sports.

And, you know, the shoes were the catalyst

for creating this culture.

Look at what it did for basketball!

That all happened because of Air Jordan.

The league has been both a leader,

but also a beneficiary of those changes in culture.

And made it the premiere sport

of the United States of America overnight.

Michael, is this the shoe--

Of course, we can't show what kind of shoe this is.

That's okay, the colors stand for it.

But is this the shoe that the NBA

-wouldn't let you wear? -Yeah.

The shoe...

was a foundational part

in the way our society sort of changed

and how people felt.

Like, I wanna embrace other things.

This one shoe changed

fashion and culture.

And I think it changed

the way being a young urban kid was something that was desirable

for people who weren't young urban kids.

I think I'm the living embodiment,

from the suburbs, when in fourth grade,

I knew... Like, that coming basketball season

I got Air Jordan 1s.

With the AJ1, it's a shoe that you can wear,

obviously, on a court, and off the floor.

And it can go play on both sides of the field.

And as fashion has evolved, and...

people paid more attention to it,

and now people see the greatness of the shoe,

and why it was so important, especially back in the day.

I think when you're looking good and feeling good,

then everything else is good, you know?

[Sal, everyone was like,

"Shit, I wanna look like that."

I wanna dress like those dudes.

that's true, artists like Run-DMC to Eazy-E,

you'd have to have the flyest hat and jacket,

and it goes down to the feet.

It became kind of the badge of honor,

that if you wore that, you had the stature

that you wanted,

and you had a style swagger

that the guys around you didn't have.

Fashion is fascinating because if you follow it,

it tells a bigger anthropological story.

I think people assume it's a commodity.

But no, the hood just made it, you know,

a part of the culture. It made it popular.

Like, people looked at the hood to see what to do

and what to wear and what to say

-and how to dress. -And it changed the perspective

on how you could wear clothes.

You know, back in the day,

the way that your apparel would lay on the footwear,

like, didn't really lend itself to amplifying

or highlighting the footwear that you were wearing

at the time.

And as things started to taper down,

and pants got tighter,

because people wanted to show off the footwear...

The shoes really changed

the way I wanted to wear clothes and my appearance, you know,

It kinda just started from the ground up with the shoes.

But there was never,

besides that kind of anti-fashion Converse sneaker,

there was never really another sneaker

that truly became a significant part of the fashion world,

and this became...

pure fashion.

What we choose to wear

says a lot about how we want to be perceived in society.

So, by wearing a certain pair of sneakers,

or a certain colorway,

it's a sort of non-verbal communication

to other people about how we want them to perceive us.

You can wear the Jordan 1 with a pair of denim,

you can wear 'em with shorts, you can wear 'em with sweats,

you can wear 'em on the basketball court,

you can get the all-black pair and wear 'em out at night,

with the all-white pair and wear 'em to the beach.

You can wear the red or the royals,

and that's your flex for the outfit.

It's just one of those shoes you can do anything in.

That's the silhouette for a lot of shoes that are out right now.

That's the beginning...

of the beginning.

It's just this incredible moment

in sneaker culture.

Sneakers hadn't come out in that kind of serial way,

and so, I think it also helped to till the ground

for this idea of collecting.

You didn't chase anybody else's sneakers,

but then these AJs come.

Now you gotta have every pair.

♪ One, ain’t no missing On my mission ♪

♪ Oh, my, did my shit With no permission ♪

♪ No, I hate to wait Uh, uh, take your place ♪

♪ Uh, uh, make a break ♪

♪ Uh, uh, made a play ♪

♪ Woo, put ’em high ♪

♪ I can fly and feel the sky ♪

♪ Ain’t no stopping Feel the drive ♪

♪ In my way You feel the fight ♪

♪ From the side Yo, they said we was a vibe ♪

♪ No, we tell ’em At the side, no ♪

♪ Let me see you put Your fingers high ♪

♪ One time ’cause we made it ♪

♪ One time for the greatest ♪

♪ One time for the haters ♪

♪ Gon’ put your fingers high ♪

♪ One time ♪

-Am I making myself clear? -Uh-uh.

The new Air Jordans from Nike are here.

If you wanna look at what would be called

the sneaker culture and say what was the thing

that changed everything,

it's when Spike Lee made the shoe a character.

Mars Blackmon chillin', chillin', chillin'

with Air Jordan, Air Jordan, Air Jordan,

who's been serving them hard jams, jams, jams all day.

Spike's the reason I'm doing what I'm doing.

Spike was the first black dude that was like,

"Oh, you can tell black stories, but they can speak to everybody,

and if it's real and honest, people will sort of get it,"

because Spike represented the same spirit

that the Jordan 1 did.

Proprietary, rebellious,

could not be held back, you know what I'm saying? The--

You knew he was gonna try to be the best.

"Money, is it the shoes?"

Sorry. That's it.

"It's gotta be the shoe."

"It's gotta be the shoes."

Like, yeah, motherfucker, it is the shoes!

Money's gotta be the shoes!

Shoes! Shoes! Shoes! Shoes!

-You sure it's not the shoes? -I'm sure, Mars.

The commercials in and of themselves

were events. It was like someone droppin' a mixtape,

or an album or a movie.

Finding out these cool ways to, like...

inject some social commentary,

none of that existed before.

And there was a sense that...

what happened off the court

affected what happened on the court.

It was transcending basketball.

It was one of the very first basketball shoes

that somehow jumped out of basketball.

And it got blended with modern youth culture,

but also, it did jump into skateboarding.

♪ R ♪

♪ E ♪

♪ S ♪

♪ I-S-T, yeah! ♪

♪ R ♪

♪ E ♪

We started when we were kids

and we cared only about skateboarders,

and that's it. Everything else was terrible.

The industry was pretty desolate,

and Vans stopped sponsoring all the skateboarders.

So, all the kids that were sponsored by Vans

went looking for shoes.

When it came to make Animal Chin,

we kind of altered them in a way.

Like, I would always wear mismatched pairs.

A couple of friends would always paint 'em.

We wanted to modify this thing

and say it wasn't a basketball thing,

it's a skateboard thing.

I remember tying in

the Jordan 1 on the skateboarders,

and a Jordan 1 on a hip-hop kid.

So here is this other...

up-and-becoming entity

that spawns corporate America to say, "Hey,

we gonna do this thing our way."

And their shoe of choice became...

the Jordan 1.

I've met all the kids that grew up on us

wearing them, that that's their world.

♪ R ♪

♪ E ♪

♪ S ♪

♪ I-S-T, yeah! ♪

♪ R ♪

We wanted to be Jordan...

in skateboarding.

We truly did.

It was sports tied in with skate,

tied in with high fashion, and...

Just put it in a blender,

and that's kinda how you created, you know,

what you see today.

Now it's just culture.

It's basketball and music, and...

you know, movies and television.

It culminated with both, you know, my--

the way that I play the game of basketball

and this whole...

style thing of what was being established with the shoe.

And almost invariably, you could just see this

sort of tidal wave of acceptance

sort of build, and just boom,

and then everybody wants the shoe.

♪ Get, get, get loud for me ♪

It's hip-hop, it's gospel.

-It's surf culture. -It's rock and roll.

on GQ, it's on Esquire.

It's high fashion...

This deal reinvigorates people.

They're works of art.

Gets people's hearts throbbin'.

♪ Heart of a lion ♪

♪ Fire inside me Blaze like a siren ♪

♪ Why would you try it? ♪

♪ Wake up the beast... ♪

You can see a skater in Jordans.

It's in Spanish, in Japanese, it...

-A nerdy kid in Jordans. -So it crosses races.

It's all one, it's all unity.

It was the role model for your kids.

It's... It's everything.

I mean, it's fucking powerful, man.

None of that happens without this guy.

None of that happens without this.

And this doesn't happen...

if Michael can't play.

After one season, Michael Jordan skyrocketed

to the most elite of the NBA.

But in his third game this season,

Air Jordan suffered the first injury of his career.

When he got hurt, when he broke his foot...

you know what, might as well sit the year out.

You know. You're not going anywhere.

We can't win a championship. Let's just sit it out.

They held their breathe at Nike.

They really did, that first year.

"What did we do? This guy's hurt."

And they're worried that maybe this investment's

gonna go into the toilet.

What if this guy has a chronic foot problem?

Boy, it's a different ball game.

Jordans were certainly popular,

but I think they were a little bit worried

that maybe the business was not going to be the same

-now that he wasn't playing. -Well, I remember

it wasn't a very happy day.

As soon as that happened, they sat on shelves.

You know what I mean? They sat on shelves.

When you have to overcome something like that,

there is always a shred of doubt.

"Is it gonna be okay?

Is it gonna hold up?"

And everything...

that comes in your path...

your triumphs...

or your lows, when you're-- Especially when you're young,

those-- those-- those--

Those young ages, that's when you're impacted.

He just couldn't be amazing.

And everything just couldn't be great.

Not in America.

Something has to be wrong.

In New York, people are killing each other over shoes.

You know, you got a kid who would kill a little kid

for a shoe that's two sizes too small for him,

'cause he needs these shoes.

Kids are literally...

snatching the shoes off of other kids' feet.

It literally was like,

"I might fucking have to end someone's life...

so I can get those, for what that status,

what that power is going to give me."

That's how crazy it got!

You know, if you look at that

Sports Illustrated cover with the Air Jordan V on it,

that was kind of a turning point.

Once something hit a critical stage of consumption

to disenfranchise neighborhoods,

and the price market was sky-high

and it created issues for

young people who wanted these things,

but families that couldn't afford it,

that's when it got into the political ball park.

We're playing basketball,

stayed around at the park a little too long,

and I don't remember who got hit first.

It was me or him, but one of us got rocked.

And then, I just remember being on the ground

and these folks tugging up my feet.

I feared for, you know, my life, basically.

...off of like...

some pieces of molded...

leather and plastic, and...

assembled by...

young people in Asia.

That's...

That's wild.

Violence over a pair of sneakers.

These Air Jordans attract big crowds,

and today, things took a dangerous turn.

A local teenager killed

over a pair of shoes and...

Right now, it's a public safety issue

with children wearing those sneakers.

Here's what the problem was about those stories,

is that if you were around and you understood,

if you were from the hood, you were like, "Well,

it ain't Jordans, you get robbed and killed for anything now."

You get robbed and killed for a sheepskin coat.

You might've got your Jordans taken

while they were taking the sheepskin coat.

Before, when people were getting

shot and stabbed and killed for shell toes,

no conversations.

Shot and stabbed, and killed for Airforce 1s,

no conversations.

Anything that they were getting shot and killed for

at that precise moment, no conversations.

He happens to be Michael Jordan,

number one in the universe,

the unicorn.

Oh, now you're getting killed for Jordans.

No, stupid!

You're getting killed for sneakers!

That happened all the time.

So, to me, the stories were bullshit.

Remove shoes or sneakers away from it, it's just

a thing that means something to someone.

It may sound silly to someone, but sometimes, all you had

was these shoes, and you give them to someone,

and that means a lot.

If a kid is shot for having Jordan shoes,

I got a feeling there's something more going on

than the shoes.

There's always the other end of the coin,

where, um...

as much confidence

as a new pair of shoes has given me,

there's a kid who can't have them.

There's someone that actually feels hurt by it,

and I've been on both ends of that.

We're all striving for the same shit, you know.

We all want to better our station in life.

We all want to give our children

-more than what we had. -And so even

when you're able to make an impact,

there's generations that follow that need updating,

they need maintenance to understand

the severity of the situation that they're in.

Revolution started from the bottom,

you know, like, throughout history,

especially American history.

We saw this emergence of confidence,

not only from sports, but from culture.

You had the growth of hip-hop,

the growth of, you know, street art,

the growth of this awareness itself

that was happenin' in the collective conscious of youth,

and then you have Michael that encapsulated it all.

'Cause he looked like the unlikely candidate

to start a revolution,

which is always the likely candidate to start a revolution.

Everybody doesn't have to be out front,

yelling, screaming, fist up...

to be down.

A lot of people...

choose a different route.

A collective web of contributors

from various aspects

rose like a phoenix out of the ashes.

That gave a voice to the voiceless.

And in giving a voice to the voiceless,

then, you know, there's strength in numbers,

and then people was like, "Well, oh, shit,

if they're saying it, I can say it."

You know, "If they're not afraid to come out

and talk about this thing,

you know, why should I be?"

The voices get louder. The marches get bigger.

You know, and, uh...

And the movement takes place, and then there's a shift.

I wanna make my own mark, I wanna do my own thing.

Not just for the fact of being anti-establishment,

or counter-culture.

That's one thing, but it's really about

thinking differently and being able to,

you know, follow your own path, create your own spirit.

I think some things that have happened

in the past couple of years, have sort of shown us ourselves,

whether we like the refection or not.

And it's sort of made people

go deep within to ask themselves,

"What kind of world do I wanna be a part of?

What kind of world do I wanna show my children?"

There has to be a level of unification

amongst people. Athletes alike,

artists alike, entertainers alike,

politicians alike. There has to be some type of...

stance.

Yes, it was basketball,

but it also was a reality

of unlocking something that was deep inside.

And that was kind of the spirit of the 1.

He said, "Don't you believe?

Don't you believe in me?" Yeah.

"You know what? Yeah.

I believe in you. Go for it."

When Michael faces the Boston Celtics,

you didn't think all those people were looking at his feet

at that time?

Almost the universe painting this moment in time.

With these magical shoes on,

we can do things.

And when he actually has that move at the Boston Garden,

when he shuffles, people are looking at his feet.

All eyes on Jordan.

Sixty-three points, and you're looking at an all-time record.

Oh, boy. Michael Jordan...

The fact that Michael Jordan is just badass

at that right time, the planets lined up. Boom.

Mission control, ready for launch.

You can hear his engine revving now...

Air Jordan, ready to take off.

Look at the air, look at the hang time,

look at the flying motion.

That shit was just powerful.

Not just for sport...

but just, like, in life.

The same way it's hard to discriminate on someone

when you're listening to the same music,

it's even harder to discriminate on someone

when you're wearing the same sneakers.

It's an instant connection.

You know, yes, we're very different.

Yes, you know, we speak different languages,

and we see the world differently, but the one thing

that unified us, and brought us together, was...

was the AJ 1.

The guy's been retired for, what, 15 years?

Something like that? Twenty? And they're still selling

these shoes like it was 1985, like he was still playing.

It's gotten to the point now where he just so happened

to have played basketball

and is the greatest player that ever lived.

But he's a global icon...

because of the damn shoes.

I think we personally immortalize it.

To see where it's at right now, and to see...

that this younger generation

understands that and is educated about that,

-that means a lot. -Something that hits that big

or that good at one time lives forever.

I think it's the same thing that, uh, allows you

to still call Elvis "The King".

It's undeniable greatness,

I think, that kinda transcends time.

Thirty years later, we actually changed the rule

that said you can in fact do

what Michael wanted to do in 1984.

You know, it changed the world. It changed the world.

For me, what it represents was the beginning

of a possibility.

You know, a possibility to say,

"You could be an athlete,

you could be a rapper, you could be an artist,

you could be whatever you want, but at the end of the day,

to be your own man is the most important piece."

You know, we can't determine

when you're born.

We can't determine...

the world you're born into.

So all that shit came together at the same time.

You're not buying the stitches,

or the leather, or the sole,

you're actually buying what it symbolizes.

And I think that's the magic,

and I think that's what's so incredibly special about it.

And I don't think we will see that again in our lifetime.

For me, it represents who I am and the way I live my life,

the kind of things that I'm into, like, uh...

It's like the flag on my hat.

It represented my youth,

it's who I was, who I wanted to be, like...

And I want to be the best.

Or at least trying to walk amongst the best in what I do.

No boundaries, no limits,

a sense that you can go out and accomplish things

beyond what you thought was possible.

It's amazing that it can all be embodied in a shoe.

Before, black people...

in this country...

We were constantly told that

we were less than, or we didn't matter.

And I think there's a direct correlation between that

and a little black boy

wanting a coveted pair of sneakers.

Because when he puts them on,

for a second, he forgets that...

the world doesn't value his life.

For a second, he feels...

more than.

He feels significant.

He feels free.

People really thought, "Wow, I can do anything."

They were wide open to...

pursue these crazy dreams.

When you think about this, sitting with a child who...

will talk about going through chemotherapy

and the only way he gets through it,

is either, you know, reading Michael's books,

or wearing his jersey,

to act like he's got the strength.

And we got a letter from the Wish family that

this little boy had passed away,

but they buried him in Michael's jersey

and his shoes.

That says how beyond... This is not just a shoe.

This is something that is a symbol for a child,

who is fighting for his life, that gave him the courage

every day to keep fighting.

That's incredible.

The inspiration, and the hope,

and the passion, and the drive

that can be attributed to a shoe.

A shoe.

You know, it's fucking crazy.

To have, like, that little bit of

hope on your feet...

There's just a good vibe coming off of them,

and I-- and I hope anybody that wears them

are wearing them to

not fill a hole, but to just sort of like

accentuate the things about them that they, you know...

That maybe they love.

I think that kind of stuff is possible, you know.

It's hope. It's just hope.

For me, when I look at this and what it means,

it means that people have the ability to dream.

And if a spirit of that 1 can do that...

to one kid, one kid that. believes that they can change

the universe...

then I believe those are the things

that make life worth living.

I don't know if I'm answering your question or whatnot,

I'm just telling you how I feel,

and what the shoe means to me, and how it affects me.

Some crazy shit to say about a fucking shoe.

♪ We did the impossible ♪

♪ Now we're unstoppable ♪

♪ This the night Every time, never quit ♪

♪ Dig deep Always fight, always win ♪

♪ Can't stop Never sleep, cause you know ♪

♪ We did the impossible Now we're unstoppable ♪

♪ This the night Every time, never quit ♪

And that was it.

I wanted to cry, but I don't...

Well, it's tough, yeah.

♪ We did the impossible ♪

♪ Now we're unstoppable ♪

When I was playing Mars,

I mean, that's the first I ever acted.

So a lot of times, I couldn't remember

the next lines. Do you know? Do you know? Do you know?

Do you know?"

That's why Mars repeated stuff!

They say, "Rob," you know,

"I don't wanna ban them. My son thinks they're great.

Just send me a pair."

I once threatened Michael with going home to put them on.

And he said, "No, no, no, please, please,"

I said, "Okay, fine."

I can't ollie. But I can stick out my tongue

and go "uhl"...

Is that a saying?

And that's Michael Jordan's fault.

Olivia doesn't mind them.

♪ We did the impossible ♪

♪ Now we're unstoppable ♪

David Stern.

AB mark.

♪ This the night Every time, never quit ♪

♪ Dig deep Always fight, always win ♪

♪ Can't stop Never sleep, cause you know ♪

♪ We did the impossible Now we're unstoppable ♪

♪ This the night Every time, never quit ♪

♪ Dig deep Always fight, always win ♪

♪ Can't stop Never sleep, cause you know ♪

♪ We did the impossible Now we're unstoppable ♪

♪ We're unstoppable ♪

♪ We're unstoppable ♪

♪ This the night Every time, never quit ♪

♪ Dig deep Always fight, always win ♪

♪ We did the impossible Now we're unstoppable ♪

♪ This the night Every time, never quit ♪

♪ Dig deep Always fight, always win ♪

♪ Can't stop Never sleep, cause you know ♪

♪ We did the impossible Now we're unstoppable ♪

♪ This the night Every time, never quit ♪

♪ We did the impossible Now we're unstoppable ♪