Nike's Kobe IV Not So New and Unusual

Read the article linked below and I will tell you what is wrong with it.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=3761462&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab6pos2

Thank goodness I am here to right the wrongs in this story. Contrary to what Nike is saying, or what ESPN is saying, the Kobe IV is not a low-top shoe. The pictures show clearly that the shoe is a mid-cut, which I like to refer to as a quarter-top. It is three-fourths of the height of a typical high-top. The upper on the Kobe IV simply extends too high to be considered a true low-top basketball shoe.

The Air Jordan XI LE is a true low-top basketball shoe. http://www.kicksonfire.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/02/air-jordan-11-xi-original-og-low-black-dark-grey-true-red-1.jpg

This is the shoe Michael Jordan rolled his ankle in during a playoff game. He had to abandon them for a high-top XI for the rest of the season. The XI LE was a disaster. The shoe had little to no ankle support and was the most structurally unsound, misdesigned Nike basketball shoe that I have ever used. I rolled my ankle in a pair during a pickup game. This happened a week or so before Jordan did his. All I was doing was setting up on defense. I took a step and my ankle buckled and rolled. I couldn't believe it. I have fairly strong ankles. My foot shouldn't have rolled like that. I swapped the shoes with a guy who wanted to get rid of a pair of brand new Air Max Uptempos. I went from a disappointing shoe that was suited better for running than basketball to the best basketball shoe I had ever worn in my life to that point.

Anyway, the Jordan XI LE was closer to a true low-top shoe than the Kobe IV, and it was a problem. I like that the Kobe IV has a higher cut than the LE. This shoe looks like it should work as a basketball shoe. But will it sell? That's tough to know right now. Basketball players are understandably skeptical of low-cut shoes, and Nike is marketing the Kobe IV as a low-top. I do not believe it is wise to refer to it as a low-top. It really isn't one.

Still, with a little tape around the ankles, Kobe Bryant should be fine. The only problem I see with his latest sig shoe is if he lands on another player's foot. He needs to be judicious about where he lands. That is the only problem I see with the Kobe IV. Of course, one could make the same mistake in a high top shoe and still roll an ankle. Understandably, Bryant says practically the same thing in the article.

If Bryant wants to play in a lower-cut shoe, then fine. Since he already plays in a Hyperdunk, he won't concede much when he switches to the Kobe IV. The Hyperdunk provides less ankle support compared to other basketball shoes.

I just wish folks would understand, contrary to what one ESPN article says, that this has been done before. Nike invented the quarter-top shoe years ago. One of Nike's first quarter-top shoes was called the Sky Force. Later, in 1986, Nike launched the Big Nike. The Big Nike came in three varieties, low-top, high-top and quarter-top. The quarter-top Big Nike was the least popular version of the three. It was a relatively obsolete sneaker since it was so similar to the high-top. Nike should reissue Big Nikes. It has reissued nearly everything else.

The Air Jordan III was the first quarter-top sneaker with visible Max Air. Do you catch the implication here? Michael Jordan competed in a quarter-top sig when Bryant was a young boy. The III had the same bottom as the high-top Air Revolution and was every bit as comfortable. In many ways, the Air Jordan III could have been considered the best basketball sneaker on the market in 1987. There was competition from the Revolution and the Air Force II. All three were great basketball shoes in their heyday.

Anyway, back to the article. It weighs the trade off of performance versus risk of injury. Is a lower-cut shoe safe? I played basketball in a low to mid Nike cross trainer once and was surprised at how well it performed. It was designed to accommodate lateral movement and it worked on the basketball court just fine. My foot was locked into the shoe. It felt very light and responsive. It moved with my foot just fine. Plus I felt safe.

The Kobe IV should work the same way. The engineering knowhow has existed for over a decade. But remember, nothing revolutionary is happening here.