Twelve years ago in Orlando, the NBA All-Star Game was a scene.

From riots at local malls to Dwyane Wade breaking Kobe Bryant‘s nose, the competition was fierce for sneakers and buckets.

On the court, King James, the Black Mamba, Flash, Superman, Melo, and the Point God were all in their playing prime, going to war with league MVP Derrick Rose and an ascending Russell Westbrook.

Off the court, the “Galaxy” Nike Air Foamposite One broke banks, malls, and the Internet.

The Big Bang of modern clout created a constellation of collectible colorways for Nike Basketball, quickly making hoop shoes a status symbol again, exploding the resale market as we know it.

In the middle of it all was a a young Kevin Durant.

Going toe-to-toe with basketball’s best, the young forward showed out on the hardwood and in stores, winning All-Star Game MVP while debuting the “Galaxy” Nike KD 4.

Scoring 36 points in his glow-in-the-dark sneakers, the metallic makeup meant to look like a spacesuit lifted basketball’s original unicorn, only to evaporate at retail at the speed of light.

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Now, 12 years later and an All-Star for the 14th time, KD is still amongst the league leaders in scoring and still a starter in the midseason classic.

Perhaps even more exciting for fans? The Nike KD 4 “Galaxy” is releasing as a retro for the first time in history.

To culminate the comeback, Boardroom breaks down the nuance and nostalgia of this tipping-point pair.

A Category Crossover

Nike Basketball was booming heading into the spring of 2012.

After almost a decade of trying to find its footing following Michael Jordan’s final retirement, the Swoosh established a new sweet spot where the hardwood and the hallway interacted.

First, momentum mounted in 2008 with the release of the Hyperdunk: a blue-sky design drafted off technical innovation and the world’s stage of the Summer Olympics.

Though not casually lauded save the “McFly” makeup, the Hyperdunk instantly made Nike credible in basketball in a way their peers couldn’t mirror.

The equity rolled into a hot hand of Kobe colorways and LeBron line triumphs that sold storytelling just as much as performance, creating collector cache and lifestyle appeal to shoes once reserved strictly for the court.

In that same span, Kevin Durant became a signature athlete in his own right, giving Nike Basketball three personalities and player types that they could activate around all season long or rather all year.

After the success of 2010’s Christmas “Stoplight” Pack, each event on the calendar became a catalyst for thematic footwear from Nike Basketball.

The biggest hoop holiday of them all, NBA All-Star Weekend, saw the hype hit full tilt by way of 2012’s Nike Basketball “Galaxy” Pack.

“It’s the best All-Star collection to ever go down,” Index PDX co-owner Terrance Ricketts told Boardroom. “All these guys were in their prime.”

Building outer space sneaker themes around LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, and Kevin Durant, each pair played to the idea of intergalactic travel by way of thematic signatures.

The buzz was all skyrocketed by the hysteria surrounding the “Galaxy” Nike Air Foamposite One — a Penny Hardaway retro release so hot it caused chaos and sold for the price of a car.

Sitting at the sweet spot of Nike’s constellation collection was the KD 4: a $95 novelty capable of breaking ankles on the court and breaking necks at the mall without breaking the bank.

Because of the affordable price point and the halo effect of the pack’s hype, it quickly became the crowd favorite for those wanting in on the action.

“I saw so many people wearing those when they first came out, and I thought it was the coolest thing,” said Ricketts. “The KD 4 goes down as one of the best basketball shoes as well. The aesthetics and the time? It was iconic.”

To add to the energy, the “Galaxy” KD 4 was not only the most accessible pair but also endorsed by the youngest star of stars.

Heading into the 2012 NBA All-Star Weekend, Kevin Durant was only 23 years old.

The starting small forward for the West squad would enter the game by giving daps to Drake and Lil Wayne before going head-to-head with the likes of LeBron and Carmelo.

He’d exit the exhibition with a win and a game-high 36 points, hoisting the All-Star Game MVP trophy above his head with the “Galaxy” KD 4s on his feet.

That spring, Durant would ride that hot hand to the NBA Finals and Summer Olympics.

When it was all said and done, the Nike KD 4 had a run that touched all corners of hoop culture.

The transcendent silhouette was just as visible in Larry O’Brien bouts as it was in AAU action. At only $95, the model was favored by kids just starting to collect sneakers just as much as it was by veteran sneakerheads like Wale and PJ Tucker.

To this day, the KD 4 remains revered.

Still, the “Galaxy” makeup is as much of a unicorn as the player they were inspired by. Even at Index — a consignment shop in Nike’s backyard — the “Galaxy” 4 registers as a rarity in modern times.

“Impossible to get,” Ricketts said. “We get a lot of sneakers. I rarely see that shoe.”

Gone But Not Forgotten

The 2010s were an era in which Kevin Durant rose from NBA All-Star to international superstar.

Winning Finals MVPs and scoring titles alike, the decade of dominance solidified Easy Money Sniper as an all-timer and member of the NBA’s 75th Anniversary Team.

“Kevin Durant is supernatural,” Sheck Wes recently shared on Boardroom’s Aux Money. “He defies the odds.”

Stylistically, KD’s positionless play and shape-shifting sneakers score a time that still strikes a nerve with those currently in their 20s and 30s.

“The Year 2010 to the Year 2020 was very important to the growth of the game,” Wes said. “I grew up in that era.”

Though it may seem strange to some that the ’10s are already nostalgic, they very much are to those who came of age in the last decade. Speaking to that time and that talent is the Nike KD 4.

While Wes keeps a pair of OG KDs in his rotation, he’s not alone. Lately, the NBA’s young elite has showcased the same affinity for the vault style.

From Ja Morant to LaMelo Ball, Josh Giddey to Derrick Jones Jr., original pairs of the Nike KD 4 have remained relevant by today’s talent both in league action or on their come-up.

All the while, the KD 4 has remained rare because they’ve never received the proper retro treatment.

In 2024, that all changes with the return of the “Galaxy” Nike KD 4 Retro.

Coming off the heels of a lifetime deal with Durant and Nike, the spaced-out sneakers are back again and just in time for KD’s 14th All-Star selection.

Back on Earth

As early as 2019, fans and peers of Kevin Durant have been begging for a Nike KD 4 retro release. In Feb. 2024, it’s finally happening.

First previewed back in Dec. 2023 on the feet of the University of Texas Longhorn’s women’s and men’s basketball teams, the Nike KD 4 Retro “Galaxy” is officially landing in stores.

Launching at both boutiques and via SNKRS on Feb. 15, the flight suit sneakers will return for an MSRP of $130.

Sporting a silver upper, glow-in-the-dark sole, and unicorn logo on the tongue, the return reception is already red hot as most collectors still holding onto the originals have already worn through their 2012 pair.

“I’m never mad at Nike for re-retroing legend’s shoes,” Ricketts said. “The ‘Galaxy’ KD 4? I’m definitely getting those.”

From store owners to pro hoopers, adults to adolescents, the “Galaxy” KD 4 is ripe for a return.

Following a 12-year wait, the retro retail version sports the same styling as the original worn in Orlando by KD en route to his first All-Star Game MVP.

Set to start the 2024 NBA All-Star Game in Indianapolis, the 35-year-old swingman can achieve the same accolade for the third time.

For fans of basketball and collectors of sneakers, the “Galaxy” KD 4 Retro shines a light on a golden era for Nike Basketball.

As the KD, Kobe, and LeBron lines remain relevant all these years later, the hope for a new wave of energy on the court and at retail remains.

From Friday night’s Rising Stars Challenge to Sunday night’s main event, unicorns of every era and origin will try to make their mark at the midseason spectacle much like KD did back in 2012.

The explosive energy of that Orlando exhibition will be felt from the floor up, thanks to the timely return of the “Galaxy” KD sneakers that still stand as out of this world.

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The post The Return of the Nike KD 4 ‘Galaxy’ appeared first on Boardroom.

In 2023, Jordan Brand became the second-biggest footwear company in the world, raking in a whopping $6.6 billion in revenue.

Twenty-three years prior, it was in a different space.

Adjusting to life without Michael Jordan in Chicago, the upstart subsidiary was losing traction like, well, an old pair of sneakers.

”The formula was to create this cool shoe, advertise with Bugs Bunny or Spike Lee, and then Michael plays 82 games into the playoffs in that shoe,” Jordan Brand chairman Larry Miller told Boardroom in 2022.

“Now you’re taking a big piece of that formula out with Michael not playing in that shoe.”

Leaving the game behind, a new class of endorsers was tasked to fill Mike’s shoes.

While it was enough to keep the brand’s lifeblood alive on-court, it wasn’t enough to bounce back the bottom line.

Appearing dead on arrival in only its infancy, Jordan Brand became blessed by a new narrative right when it needed it the most.

Michael Jordan was back — again.

Following our three-part oral history of Michael Jordan’s rise from NBA MVP to NBA owner, Boardroom offers a bonus chapter of how the GOAT’s days in DC kept his footwear franchise alive when it was on life support.

Hear from Mike’s peers, industry execs, and ambassadors on how the Wizards’ comeback changed the trajectory of the Jordan Brand.

How Jordan Revived DC & the NBA

In the second chapter of our three-part oral history on MJ’s rise from MVP to owner, Boardroom dives deep into Mike’s economically explosive first season playing for the Wizards.

Check it out!

MVP to CEO

When Michael Jordan prepared for his Last Dance in Chicago, the Bulls had no succession plan that involved their franchise player.

Nike, on the other hand, had it all figured out.

Ahead of MJ’s last season in Chicago, Nike launched Brand Jordan: a Swoosh subsidiary made in the image of Michael.

Expanding beyond signature sneakers to sponsored schools, team shoes, and enhanced apparel, the Jumpman label was predicted to do $300 million in its first year.

A storybook ending kept Jordan Brand hot throughout 1998, but sales started to shudder after his retirement in 1999.

Larry Miller (Jordan Brand Chairman): When we launched the [Air Jordan] 15 without Michael playing in that shoe, it was a big deal for us.

The formula was to create this cool shoe, advertise with Bugs Bunny or Spike Lee, and then Michael plays 82 games into the playoffs in that shoe.

Now, you’re taking a big piece of that formula out with Michael not playing in that shoe.

Inspired by a women’s watch from Paris and designed by the great Tinker Hatfield, the avant-garde Air Jordan 15 failed to connect with a global audience the same way its predecessors provoked sales.

With MJ no longer competing in NBA action, the shoes were seeded to college talent at Cincinnati and North Carolina while worn by the likes of Mike Bibby, Ray Allen, and Reggie Miller at the pro level.

Michael Jordan and thus the 15 were sold as an overarching theme of greatness guiding basketball rather than a boots-on-the-ground race towards innovation.

Elegance, grace, and maturing were the calling cards for the early era of Jordan Brand, soundtracked by Mary J. Blige’s renditions of Stevie Wonder classics.

In 1999 and into 2000, the 15 played the forefront while MJ played the background.

Team bank styles moved the model out of the modern signature slot, while moccasin makeups alluded to transitioning into a more sophisticated space.

In a matter of months, each SKU was on sale with new energy, sensing fresh blood in the once Nike-owned market.

At rival Adidas, the Three Stripes looked to draft design language signatures for rising stars such as Kobe Bryant and Tracy McGrady.

Over at Reebok, Allen Iverson was becoming a cultural phenomenon much like Mike before.

Because of this, Nike, Inc. as a whole was trend-chasing versus trend-setting for the first time in decades.

“When I showed up as an intern, Nike Basketball was not in good shape,” Maverick Carter told Boardroom in 2022. “People don’t remember, but AND1 was kicking ass with The Mixtape Tour.”

Suddenly, both product and advertising were appealing to Timberland aesthetics and streetball steeze — lanes lauded by Iverson and AND1.

Earning reports reflected the dire times in Beaverton.

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Ahead of taking the front office job with Washington in January 2000, reports stated that Air Jordan sales had fallen 42% the previous fall, making for “its weakest showing ever.“

Quickly, the competition seized on the opportunity.

In 2001, Adidas inked McGrady to a multi-million-dollar extension, claiming his first signature shoe sent their basketball business up 40% in sales.

That same year, Reebok cashed out Iverson by making him a lifetime partner.

Meanwhile, Nike’s cash cow was waiting in the wings and creeping on a comeback.

Guess Who’s Back

By returning to the hardwood in the fall of 2001 ahead of a hot holiday season, Jordan Brand had a chance to climb back on top.

Miller: It was an exciting time, but it was a little scary for us.

Michael coming back? We hadn’t planned on that, so we had to shift our focus and approach.

Returning to basketball in October 2001, the team at Jordan Brand had only months to get the game shoe ready for a proper rollout.

In the interim, MJ played preseason games in the “Ginger” Air Jordan 16, a lifestyle-leaning basketball shoe inspired by the suede Timberlands thanks to a mustard suede gaiter.

While basketball fans worldwide adjusted to seeing MJ suit up in blue, DC residents instantly became infatuated with Air Jordans that were suddenly their own.

Nyrik Lee (Former Wizards intern, Marketing Director at The Museum DC): The “Ginger” 16s had the [Washington, DC] on fire.

It gave us a sense of pride like Chicago people. He went to All-Star Games; he handed out buckets; and he showed y’all the old man can still do it in these shoes in this city.

It gave us a super sense of pride wearing his sneakers. The different models that he played in all did well here.

Soon, the fervor spread to major markets.

For the 2001-02 NBA season opener in NYC, Michael Jordan debuted the Air Jordan 17 on national television.

Taking place weeks before Christmas, it would be months before fans could call them their own as the shoes released in February 2002 in accordance with All-Star Weekend.

Retailing for $200 and packaged in a silver suitcase, they were far and away the most expensive Air Jordan to date.

For the first time in years, the Jordan Brand game shoe was validated by the GOAT, making the heavy price tag all the more aspirational.

Miller: We launched the 17, and it launched successfully. It was a challenge, but it was a good challenge.

Lee: The 16s, 17s, and 18s? Those were big-deal sneakers because he was here. It feels like now we’re a part of his legacy.

Jordans were already super big here. If you hear a person like Kanye talk about coming to the DMV area and Jordans, it was already a thing.

The 17s and all the joints that he played in here? It made us feel like we were a part of this thing.

Operating in Three Time Zones

When working on the original rollout for the Air Jordan 17, there was no confirmation Michael Jordan would be back in action.

Aiming to add youthful energy to the brand very much in flux, Jordan Brand aligned Los Angeles Clippers stars Quentin Richardson and Darius Miles with the shoe.

Having run with MJ at Hoops Chicago, the Midwest kids were tapped to lead the shoe ahead of the confirmed comeback.

Quentin Richardson (NBA veteran, Jordan Brand ambassador, Knuckleheads co-host): It was a dream come true. You grow up wanting to have a commercial and a shoe endorsement.

When we got that call that Jordan Brand was doing a commercial with us? We were over the moon.

We had to fly to New York. Once we got there, wait a minute, Spike Lee — Mars Blackmon — is about to direct the commercial?! We had our own individual trailers; we thought we were movie stars.

You couldn’t tell us nothing. Literally. That was one of those “we’ve arrived” moments where you’re just feeling yourself on a whole different level.

After starting a new millennium coming off a weak Q4 in 1999, Jordan Brand was suddenly mounting momentum from all angles.

In LA, the brand had two young superstars who could juice modern models and retro releases alike.

Over in DC, the GOAT was back on court, adding credibility to new designs and new colorways.

Back in Beaverton, the execs instrumental in all of it were seeing the future of their business take proper shape.

Miller: The folks who were a part of the team and truly believed in what we were trying to do? MJ was on board, Phil Knight was on board and incredibly supportive, and that allowed us to get through some of the issues to get to the point where the brand’s been able to accomplish what it has so far.

Gentry Humphrey (Former Jordan Brand VP): As rough as people think MJ’s Wizards days were, they forget there were some pretty phenomenal moments.

At 40 years old, he’s giving folks 50 and 51, doing the things that he did. He still was able to keep people on the edge of their seats each and every night he hit the court.

Across the NBA, the fanfare of being able to play against Michael Jordan in Air Jordans ramped up interest in retros.

For the likes of Richardson, Ron Artest, and eventual footwear free agent Kobe Bryant, the same shoes they wore while dreaming of lining up against MJ as kids could now be realized as reality when going toe-to-toe with the GOAT.

Metta Sandiford-Artest (NBA champion, NBA Defensive Player of the Year): I remember trying to get Jordans because I was a Nike guy, and I got product. I was in Indiana, and Michael was coming into town, and they wouldn’t give me Jordans because Reggie Miller was our Jordan guy.

I needed the Jordans ASAP, so I drove to Chicago to Nike Town after a shootaround in Indiana.

I got to the game late, but I wore the Jordans. I wasn’t about to miss out on playing against MJ in the MJs. I was trying to lock him up in his own shoes. That was difficult.

Richardson: You have the photographers at every game, and I went up to one of them that I was familiar with. I said, “Yo, I don’t care what’s going on, every time I’m there with Mike take pictures!” I needed that, and I’ve got some of them still.

The one home game I wore the “True Blue” 3s because those were Clippers colors. I’ve got a picture in my house on a mantel of him driving by me in 17s.

During the DC days, game recognized game, as players instantly gravitated to Air Jordans of the new and retro variety.

In the industry, it still took buyers and execs time to realize the secret sauce of what would soon be a billion-dollar business.

Miller: We were in the process of building a brand and there were a lot of people internally and externally that didn’t think we could do it.

There was one retailer in particular who said, “You know what? This will never work. But I’m going to go with you guys because you’re Nike, and I feel like I have to, but it’s not going to work.”

Two years later, I see the same guy at the Magic Show in Las Vegas. He came up and said, “You know what, I owe you an apology. I didn’t believe in you guys and what you’ve done has been great. By the way, can I get some more Jordans?”

Throughout two seasons back on the court, MJ was able to add inordinate energy to various releases of the retro, performance, and team variety.

It was Jordan’s DC days that brought proof of concept to new colors on old shoes — namely, the “Cool Grey” Air Jordan 11 Retro.

Humphrey: To have him validate the colorway with the level of respect he had with consumers was huge. You’ve got a great product, and the guy who sparked the whole interest in them? That’s nothing but positive.

Richardson: That “Cool Grey” 11 stood out and went harder than anything I’d ever seen. [When Mike wore them], it confirmed that we were right because everybody else felt how we felt. 

For the last two decades, the holiday Air Jordan 11 release has become an annual event.

At retail, the model drives nearly one million sales units worldwide while amassing roughly $1 million of aftermarket value through resale transactions.

As a member of the Washington Wizards, Jordan wore retro releases of the Air Jordan 3, Air Jordan 7, Air Jordan 9, and Air Jordan 11 — all in SKUs unseen during his Chicago reign.

Beyond Basketball

Upon exiting DC, MJ was able to hand off a $40 million baton to Carmelo Anthony, tasked with leading Jordan performance in his absence.

The early 2000s paved the way for the brand’s retro business to totally take flight, allowing the company to hit $800 million in sales by 2007 — over 2.5x times their projected earnings when launched in 1997.

All these years later, Jordan Brand brings in well over $6 billion annually.

Already in 2024, nearly a quarter century since sales slumped beyond belief, Jordan Brand is outfitting college football’s best and doing $1 billion in Remix products alone.

The Jumpman is worn by basketball’s best in America and abroad, outfitting NASCAR vehicles and Parisian futbol powerhouses alike.

It’s a testament to an athlete-turned-entrepreneur willing to take risks in new markets and see tough times through.

David Falk (Legendary Agent): I think Michael is singularly in a class by himself of any player in probably any sport as far as being marketable over a long period of time. The fact that Jordan Brand is approaching $6 billion years after he retired is a testament to his long-term popularity. It’s become like an institution.

Michael changed the game for today’s generation of players. I’m looking for the next person who’s going to ratchet that up to the next level, who’s going to do something really revolutionary.

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The post How MJ’s Washington Comeback Sparked a Jordan Brand Boost appeared first on Boardroom.

On Jan. 1, 2024, the world woke up motivated, hungover, or on their phones.

Playboi Carti never went to sleep.

The Atlanta artist has lived in the shadows and the mosh pit since releasing 2020’s Whole Lotta Red — an abrasive album that debuted at No. 1 on Billboard.

Avoiding public appearances and mainstream media, Carti’s star has skyrocketed on streaming while remaining mysterious through message boards.

He’s become hip-hop’s anti-hero in aesthetic and advertising, inverting commercial channels like an upside-down bat. At one moment, he appears faceless in a viral Givenchy campaign; the next, he relays random mug shots for his self-branded merch.

His elusive nature reflects the marketing means of his Opium imprint, defying laws of labor and industry brand-building alike. By not being overtly pushed, Carti’s constantly sought after.

The more his wings spread, the harder he is to find.

Since WLR, Count Carti has dove deeper into his Dracula depths, canceling concerts and recording in Parisian caves. It’s made tracking his music and moves more difficult than Frank Ocean.

“The Carti tour? There’s still an air of what exactly is going on here,” Jon Caramanica recently said on Popcast Deluxe. “It’s the only arena tour of last year that I was absolutely like, ‘I must see this.’ More than SZA, more than Travis — I have to see the Playboi Carti tour, which does not exist.”

From calendar to catalog, everything surrounding Carti is equally chaotic and can’t be missed.

While most modern entertainers can only operate in the spotlight, Carti keeps creating in the dark as he’s built both anticipation and a world while all waited.

In the last 31 days, he’s emerged from his haute tomb, dropping four new tracks that defy genre and subvert streaming.

Releasing “2024,” “H00dByAir,” “BACKR00MS,” and “EVILJ0RDAN,” Carti’s been able to create excitement and urgency around his impending album without uploading a single song to Spotify, Apple Music, or SoundCloud.

Each track has come without warning — save a screaming Instagram story from Blackhaine — but has come with a very visceral visual.

The songs, along with their matching music videos, are said to spawn somewhat spontaneously even if the ideas are months, if not years, in the making.

“It’s been heavily intense,” Grammy award-winning producer Cardo told Boardroom with a laugh when discussing the recording process and the rollout.

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“Even me talking with Carti? He doesn’t indicate anything coming,” said Cardo.

In only a month, Playboi Carti’s unorthodox approach to marketing is anti-establishment and even anti-algorithm. It’s paying off in an era defined by fan engagement.

The early returns are a buzz no peer could capture, melting mood boards across Instagram and amassing millions on millions of YouTube views.

Coming back in the new year with new voices, new visuals, and new music, Boardroom explores the ascent and apex of the gothic genius flocked on the runway and the trenches alike.

The Chosen One

At only 28 years of age, Playboi Carti is already a decade deep in the game.

The teen talent joined Awful Records in 2014, working with Atlanta’s experimental underbelly of Father, iLoveMakonnen, and Key!. Quickly, his coordinates expanded beyond the Peach State and through SoundCloud, attracting the interest of A$AP Rocky and Interscope.

Backed by the industry’s most rebellious major label and hip-hop‘s most heralded young tastemaker, Carti’s charisma made his self-titled mixtape an attention magnet for A-list and ascending producers like Hit-Boy, Harry Fraud, Jake One, and Southside.

The mixtape’s lead single, “Magnolia,” made stars out of Carti and producer Pierre Bourne. Moreover, it legitimatized Rocky’s AWGE as a creative agency capable of courting talent and creating acclaimed visuals.

To this day, “Magnolia” has over 195 million video views on YouTube alone.

Rather than stay the course, Carti went left.

After early co-signs from Awful and A$AP affiliates, Carti’s turned up all dials on his debut album, Die Lit. Primarily produced by Bourne, the 2018 project pulled Travis Scott, Skepta, and Bryson Tiller into the fold.

The heavyweight co-signs catapulted Carti into the pop pendulum but by his own aesthetic. Each radio resident brought their talents to his world rather than vice versa.

At once, Carti was rocking punk clubs in Scottland while performing alongside Nicki Minaj on SNL.

The momentum was enough to lead Carti to start his agency/label, Opium, in 2019, bringing on acts such as Ken Carson and Destroy Lonely since.

Like Jay-Z, Kanye West, Drake, and other artists before him, the Carti umbrella was big enough to break new talent while simultaneously creating new sonics.

The sum of all parts proved highly flammable and original when Carti released Whole Lotta Red on Christmas Day 2020.

Executive-produced by Ye and designer Matthew M. Williams, the DONDA descendants defied odds and convention by assisting Carti on a sophomore album adored by The Washington Post, FADER, and Pitchfork.

While the architects behind Graduation and Haus of Gaga provided pillars for world-building, it was the young vamp providing the lifeblood for all things Red.

“Carti is his own creative director,” Williams told Highsnobiety in 2021. “He has his own vision. He can’t be anything but himself.”

The dark and daring departure from mumble rap or anything akin to radio relevance was a big risk with immediate consequences.

“When Whole Lotta Red came out? Some people probably didn’t understand where he was coming from,” said Cardo. “It was a whole different sound. He’s an artist. He’s pushing the envelope, for sure.”

Despite co-signs from the fashion and design worlds, the album was panned mercilessly by music scholars and hip-hop purists. For any critics waiting on another “Magnolia,” the third formal project from Playboi Carti was instead an informal debut.

“I hate that I waited so long to be myself,” Carti told Highsnobiety. “I wish I came in like this.”

Making Magic City into Transylvania, the blended brilliance of baby voices, heavy metal distortion, and demonic shrieking was a far cry from Milly Rocking.

It was also a testament to Carti’s entire catalog being not just drastically different but inordinately popular despite next to no conventional marketing push.

Less than a decade in the game, each of Carti’s albums has hit 2.5 billion streams on Spotify — a title only touched in rap by the late, great Juice WRLD.

Since debuting at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 200, Whole Lotta Red has charted for 137 weeks, occupying a top-selling/stream album list for the better part of four years that accounts for all artists and genres.

The gothic genre-bender is stretching the music and marketing even more for his next project, tentatively titled I Am Music.

“Production is important to me,” Carti told Crack Magazine in 2021. “Every project, I just like to show my audience something different … we looking for the next sound at all times.”

To do so, he’s double-downed his Opium inner circle and brought on one of hip-hop’s most trusted and agile talents.

Cardo Season

Few producers are as instrumental in the evolving sound of modern music as Cardo Got Wings.

Born Ronald Nathan LaTour Jr. in St. Paul, Minn., the Texas transplant deep in Dallas has been shaping the sound of Chevrolet speakers, hip-hop heavyweights, and Hot 100 radio for over a decade.

Famously, Cardo came to fame by bringing breezy beats to once-indie upstart Wiz Khalifa.

Fresh out of label limbo, Wiz worked with Cardo to craft a sunny, celebratory sound spotlighted on 2010’s Kush & Orange Juice.

Releasing at a time when hip-hop was dominated by Lex Luger trap anthems like “B.M.F.” and emotionally heavy hybrid cuts from Kid Cudi and Drake, Wiz won over the Internet and the youth with songs that were light and fun.

Through Cardo’s contributions to Kush & Orange Juice, Wiz Khalifa rose as an icon, covering magazines and dominating radio. It also made Taylor Gang a movement.

“That project alone signified bringing back feel-good music,” said Cardo. “Which was missing from rap music at that time.”

The mixtape shifted party sonics and adolescent aesthetics.

“We had little kids putting blonde streaks in their hair and wearing cargo shorts with Chuck Taylors,” Cardo said. “We took the world by storm and saw it break the Internet.”

Since shaping Wiz’s most praised project, Cardo has stayed consistent but far from predictable.

From Travis Scott‘s “Goosebumps” and ScHoolboy Q’s “That Part” up to Jeezy’s “Seen It All” and Meek Mill’s “Levels,” the ‘Cardo sound’ is not just daring; it’s undefined.

For the last decade, Cardo’s kept busy capturing emotions and moments rather than hammering home a formula.

It all resulted in Diamond singles for Drake and deep album cuts for Kendrick Lamar. In 2024, Skepta calls Cardo for international anthems while Baby Keem seeks his sonics for his sophomore effort.

Already, Cardo is seemingly everywhere at once. However, the shared spirit of Cardo’s catalog is making music that’s missing. Records that are unorthodox and unexpected.

“With sound? I’m very experimental,” said Cardo. “There’s a big void in rap. I won’t say that people are afraid to be themselves, but they kind of are.”

When it comes to hip-hop — or more music in 2024 — no one is less afraid to be who they are than Playboi Carti.

In turn, that’s why Count Carti has counted on Cardo consistently since Whole Lotta Red for spark and spontaneity.

“Me and Carti have been working for some time, almost four years on and off,” said Cardo, who partook in production on Carti’s recent run of “EVILJ0RDAN,” “BACKR00MS,” and “H00dByAir.”

“It’s my job as a composer to take artists to another level, especially with the sound,” Cardo continued. “Carti came to that naturally.”

Like Wiz on the cusp of superstardom, Carti is working with Cardo to create music in opposition to all that’s happening in hip-hop. It all aligns with Playboi’s mission statement when it comes to creating.

“Change the sound of music,” Carti told XXL’s Vanessa Satten in 2022. “Every time.”

That new sound is centuries away from the Kush & Orange Juice cuts that put Cardo on but are exactly what his collaborator — and perhaps music as a whole — needs right now.

Leaning into the horrorcore chords of vintage Three 6 Mafia, Cardo’s drafting off a deep love of DJ Paul and Juicy J without simply recycling an old record.

When crafted with Carti’s cult and synced to his cinema scare? The results cut through like Wes Craven, bleeding through speakers and all listeners’ veins.

“Even though it sounds dark as hell? It has that level that turns you up,” Cardo said. “It makes you buck.”

Facing and voicing it all is Playboi Carti — an elusive artist oozing with charisma who once described himself as “adorable but evil.”

Before this rollout, you could count Carti’s music video catalog on one hand. In 2024, he’s sinking his fangs into each visual, not just starring in said clip but inviting fans into his occult lens.

“If you want to be a bad guy, there’s no days off,” Carti told Highsnobiety. “You commit to whatever your vision is and make it every day, every time someone sees you.”

Instantly, it’s resonating.

“If you just show people your mind and how it works? You can go somewhere,” said Cardo. “It’s a shock every time. I want to share that feeling with the world.”

Thus far, the world and the web are feeling — and craving — it.

Market Tested

Many moons ago, Lil Wayne became the world’s biggest rap star by breaking the biggest rule in rap.

He gave his music away for free.

Flooding the Internet and the streets with uncleared freestyles and stream-of-consciousness songs, Weezy F. Baby went from forgotten Hot Boy to the hottest rapper alive. As time passed, his genius proved in both his music and marketing.

Able to balance two opposing ideas on a TRL tightrope, Wayne won over D-boys with A+ bars, melting ice grills with Monroe piercings atop his shiny smile.

Wayne was prolific and provocative at once. He was outworking the competition in the name of creativity and capitalism, all while donating the bulk of his punchlines.

In 2024, Playboi Carti is not entirely different.

Operating with a similar sense of danger and recklessness, fans clamor for Carti, not just because of his boundary-pushing confidence but a sense of discovery.

Since 2020’s Whole Lotta Red, Carti has not sent a single song of his own Opium output to the iTunes Store or even SoundCloud.

Still, thousands of fans upload rips of countless Carti leaks to Spotify. Millions more follow fake Playboi Carti accounts just to hear the unreleased work, often disguised on streaming platforms as podcast episodes or uploaded under faux names in coded language.

This counter-culture, or even counter-commerce approach, makes Carti more interesting than any traditional marketing plan ever could. It has fans, collaborators, and even Carti himself swimming in curiosity.

“What Carti’s doing? I feel like he’s building out his traction through himself and socials versus going to Billboard or DSPs,” said Cardo. “You’ve gotta respect it because he’s testing the waters, trying to see where everybody is at as far as music or listening.”

Who, what, when, and why are all integral in an album rollout. With Carti, he’s taken it to another level by implementing where.

Around the web, Playboi Carti claims 3.5 million followers on YouTube. More mysteriously, he has 11.6 million followers on Instagram, despite one single feed post.

Building by way of the chase, his label Opium has surpassed the 1 million follower mark since uploading the “EVILJ0RDAN” video.

Already, that individual post boasts more than 780,000 likes and over 55,000 comments. However, it’s not just social media where Carti singles are resonating.

If suits aren’t convinced a song can cross over without being on a DSP, consider the fanfare in Toronto when Carti collaborator Travis Scott played “BACKR00MS” at Scotiabank Arena within a week of its release.

The sold-out show — the second of two T. Dot dates — went wild from moshpit to nosebleeds when Chase B played the Carti cut.

The viral moment was only a week after Scott shut down Barclays in Brooklyn, playing the Playboi-featuring “FE!N” — a song now at over 300 million Spotify streams — an outlandish 10 times in a row. The energy was only amplified when Carti himself came out for a cameo in Cali.

It’s all adding to the legend of an artist already on the cusp of merging and melting underground gore with stadium-status ticket sales.

An idol capable of appearing in the front row at Paris Fashion Week while going viral through camcorder footage.

“BACKR00MS is at 12 million,” Cardo said, with the number now eclipsing the 16 million mark. “I just looked yesterday because I thought Carti was going to drop [“EVILJ0RDAN”] on YouTube, and I saw it was 12 million in two weeks! It’s crazy.”

Even still, it’s not streaming on any DSPs or charting on Billboard because of its off-kilter rollout. Ironically enough, avoiding Spotify and Apple Music may be a better business strategy than following the old model.

This proves true for the artist and his partners.

“It does a lot because YouTube pays a lot more,” says Cardo. “Their payouts are on the spot damn near.”

From viral online one day to the Spring/Summer 2024 Louis Vuitton show the next, day nor night exist for the one they call King Vamp.

The mix of social media music uploads, horrorcore camcorder videos, and fashion house hype all point to the year of Playboi Carti.

Sleepless studio sessions in 2023 are already showing early returns in 2024 for rap’s Nosferatu, who is already anointed as the punk prince among pop royalty.

Pharrell is a fan, and The Weeknd is a collaborator. Madonna is both. The rebellious rock star has been knighted by his predecessors while chosen by the new crop of kids looking for a counterculture hero.

Like those before him, he’s unlike those around him. Any artist of change has to possess both outsider appeal and insider intrigue. In less than a decade, Carti has owned exactly that. He has enough talent to appear on singles alongside Tyler the Creator and Lana Del Rey, yet channels Tech N9ne when it comes to fan forming.

Carti is other, no different than Pharrell, Kanye, Wayne, Tyler, or Travis before them. Still, he’s speaking to an audience never fully embraced by hip-hop.

“You got rock stars, punks, emos, goths,” Carti told XXL in 2022. “I’m just being myself and I feel like it’s a lot of people who really want to be themselves and do a lot of different things. That’s the reason why it’s a cult because everybody is not going to understand and I understand. When they see me, especially when I was coming up? ‘Damn, Carti look just like me.'”

“Everybody has that motivation and ambition to be unique,” said Cardo. “They just have to bring that up out of them.”

Carti is unique and all out there. All the while, the new album is without title, tour, or release date.

Fans can’t legally stream the songs on Spotify or properly predict when the next single, viral video, or full-fledged project will arrive. Perhaps that’s precisely what they want and exactly what he has planned.

“That’s my theory: he wants people to be intrigued or shocked by what’s coming next,” Cardo said. “Even though people might not understand right then and there? You have to let it sit with you.”

As Carti cuts up the sonics and aesthetics for the next drop, one can imagine the crucible of Ojivolta, Swamp Izzo, Sex Is Death, Earl on the Beat, Johnny Juliano, and Cardo will all be involved.

Still, even those closest to Carti expect the unexpected.

“I like the element of surprise, the shock value,” said Cardo. “That’s what makes you feel like a kid again. When you wake up on Christmas to open a present but don’t know what it is? You know it’s something.”

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The post The Marketing Mayhem of Playboi Carti & Cardo appeared first on Boardroom.

On Sep. 11, 2001, Michael Jordan was supposed to announce his return to basketball.

On Sep. 11, 2002, Michael Jordan announced a move no one saw coming.

Having finished his first season outside of the playoffs as an active member of the Washington Wizards, MJ sent the blossoming Rip Hamilton to the Detroit Pistons in exchange for the established Jerry Stackhouse.

On the surface, moving a 23-year-old talent for an active All-Star was a win-now move meant to ramp up a postseason push for MJ’s last season in DC as a player and exec.

Behind the scenes, the intentions were more chess than checkers.

“People don’t understand the Rip Hamilton trade and why Michael did that,” Michael Wilbon told Boardroom. “The Kobe Bryant thing was very real.”

Clearing cap space as tensions rose in Los Angeles, MJ traded away a promising young talent to take on an expiring contract. Making the playoffs was a priority, but building a dynasty in DC was the bigger bet.

The major move was made in hopes of MJ signing his own Air Apparent the following summer.

“When Michael was an executive, Kobe wanted to come to DC when the whole thing was going south in LA,” said Wilbon. “It would’ve changed the story in basketball if Kobe wound up in Washington playing for Michael.”

How Michael Jordan Revived DC & the NBA with Wizards Comeback

ICYMI: In the second chapter of our three-part oral history on MJ’s rise from MVP to owner, Boardroom dives deep into Jordan’s economically explosive first season playing for the Wizards.

Check it out!

In the third and final chapter of this deep-dive oral history, Boardroom breaks down MJ’s final season in DC on the court and across commerce.

Learn how MJ’s run in Washington prepared him for team ownership in Charlotte and almost changed the entire landscape of the NBA.

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Closing Time

Backed by a veteran ensemble, the 2002-03 NBA season would be Michael Jordan’s last hurrah as a hooper.

Turning 40, he played all 82 games — the only Wizard to do so.

Perhaps more impressive? He played 37 minutes a night.

In his Iron Man exit, he averaged 20 points, backed by nearly seven rebounds, four assists, and two steals a night.

Those counting numbers are roughly right on par with what Scottie Barnes, Jalen Williams, or RJ Barrett are each putting up this season in their early 20s.

While talking heads and online memes may debunk his output, those in attendance remember differently.

Kevin Garnett (NBA champion, Hall of Famer, Host of KG Certified): He played 82 games that year. Mike was a motherfucker both times. He was still talking that shit. He was still skilled.

Michael Wilbon (Award-winning Journalist, ESPN analyst): Michael played all 82 at 40 years old. That was the culture. Michael was gonna play 82 games; it was an affront to him if you suggested that he not.

That’s the culture of the league he grew up in and believed in. Bringing that to Washington was a big deal — and I wish they had it subsequently.

Quentin Richardson (NBA veteran, Jordan Brand ambassador, Knuckleheads co-host): He’s 40 then, and I’m 41 now, and I don’t play no basketball. I’m not about to do none of the shit that he was doing.

Paul Pierce (NBA champion, Hall of Famer, co-host of KG Certified): I’ve been out of the league for the last six or seven years. I could give us 10 points in quality minutes.

Darren Rovell (Emmy Award-winning analyst, Sports Business Reporter): I was reporting back then. People dismiss his Wizards career despite scoring more than 20 points per game and having great games.

Brendan Haywood (NBA champion, UNC All-American, NBA TV analyst): He showed all the moves. Michael Jordan’s practices to me were sometimes better than the games because I got to see what went into it. I got to see what made greatness tick.

My second year, Byron Russell was on our team and they had a little rivalry. B Russ used to guard him in practice, and I just remember Mike consistently going at him day after day.

He was approaching practice like B Russ is still playing for the Utah Jazz, and it’s Game 6.

To see that every single day? The phenomenal footwork, the trash talk? He told B Russ, “We’re gonna start calling you ‘The Human Highlight Reel.’ Not because you have any highlights of your own, but because you’re in all of mine.” That was just consistent.

Rovell: I believe that’s where he met LeBron after a game. The fact that he played for the Wizards enabled a new group of people to see him. It enabled someone like LeBron, who was 14 at the time [Jordan retired from the Bulls], to have a different look at him.

People who didn’t get to see him with the Bulls? After someone’s career, they’re appreciated more.

He retired twice already, so it was another chance to see Jordan and how great he was. And it was slightly easier to get tickets than Bulls tickets because they weren’t winning.

Haywood: The Bulls Michael Jordan was better than the Wizards Michael Jordan. But Wizards Michael Jordan was still really, really good. And I got to see every single day why he was that good.

Rovell: Despite the fact that the Wizards weren’t that good, at every single game, celebrities had to be there.

Normally, that follows the line of a team that is great, but he had that type of following when he was playing with the Birmingham Barons — every single game was sold out.

People had gotten used to seeing Jordan in his element whether or not there was a great team around him.

Wilbon: That second year, I had hopes. The East was in between then. Indiana was still good, the Knicks were still good, the Nets with Jason Kidd, and Detroit was bouncing back.

People don’t understand the Rip Hamilton trade and why Michael did that.

Wizards What If?

The 2002-03 Washington Wizards failed to make the playoffs despite All-Star play from MJ and a veteran supporting cast.

Some blame the age and lack of continuity for the inferior ending. Few know the intentions behind switching staff midway into MJ’s Wizard reign.

Wilbon: The whole Rip Hamilton thing happened because he had to clear cap space. That’s what that was about, and I knew that in real time.

When the Lakers were going through that bump in the road, Michael wanted to be poised to take advantage, which is what good executives do.

The Rip Hamilton move happened because of that, plain and simple. He knew he was going to get killed for doing it, but that’s why he was doing it.

The Wizards pulled the plug, but it would’ve changed DC and that franchise.

Courted by his hero amid his ascent and team turmoil, Kobe had suitors in every American city.

Known to text MJ in the middle of the night for hoop advice and touted for going toe-to-toe with the GOAT at every opportunity, Bryant’s pending free agency loomed that last season.

Smartly, MJ looked to clear cap space while the Lakers looked to choose an alpha.

Ultimately, it never happened. However, the alternate reality may have been closer to coming to fruition than most know.

Wilbon: Kobe was coming to DC or wanted to. He talked to Michael all the time, and I knew that in real-time, even if it wasn’t something I could publicly report on. I talked to Kobe.

The Kobe Bryant thing was very real. Very real. Free agency is mysterious to most people, but the NBA free agency is about three markets: Florida and Southern California, and they don’t even go to New York!

Free agents go to a couple of places, and that’s it. But Washington, with Michael owning it, might have changed all that.

There was times I’d do a Lakers game, and after the game, people from [the] media are lined up to go in the locker room. Kobe would sort of wander past me and elbow me in the ribs, lean down, and say, “Would the old man of gotten 40 tonight? Could the old man have stopped me tonight?”

And it was only in that way of complete and udder adoration. He would say it with such joy.

I’ve only told those stories since then so people could get a sense of what they meant to each other.

Jay Williams (Duke National Champion, ESPN Analyst, Businessman): I had a close connection with KB. If Mike had a chance to mold Kobe? I think Kobe would’ve been even more different than he already was.

Kobe was able to do that from afar because he had this relentless nature and studied the techniques and moves. But I think that would’ve been different with Kobe being under his wing. I think Mike would’ve seen it differently and that would’ve escalated Kobe even earlier in his career.

When you’re young, you have a vet that says, “He’s different.” I don’t think Kobe had that right out of the gate, and he would’ve had that with Mike.

Kobe would’ve tried to bust his ass every day. And Michael would’ve tried to bust his ass every day.

Growing up in Philadelphia, Rip Hamilton and Kobe Bryant played AAU basketball together, remaining friends and competitors for decades.

In 2002, the trajectories of each Philly phenom and a looming summer sweepstakes almost changed the course of hoops history.

Wilbon: When Michael was an executive, Kobe wanted to come to DC while things were going south in LA. I’m sure he’s glad it turned out the way it turned out; everybody is except the people in Washington.

But it would’ve changed the story in basketball if Kobe wound up in Washington playing for Michael.

Metta Sandiford-Artest (NBA champion, NBA Defensive Player of the Year): It would’ve changed everything. Kobe would’ve taken over that team. He would’ve listened, and Kobe is already bringing that intensity. Mike would’ve had an opportunity to take his hand off the wheel and give that driver’s seat to Kobe.

Williams: Kobe would’ve not backed down from Michael. Michael wouldn’t have acquiesced, but he was ready to move on to ownership. He would’ve known that the keys to that Ferrari were in good hands.

Artest: Mike worked hard, even as a general manager. Mike still had that player passion in him, even when he was in a suit! If he had Kobe, he would’ve been more relaxed because Kobe would’ve taken that upon himself.

Rachel Nichols (Award-winning Journalist, Host of Headliners): It was a speculation, for sure, and something that everyone couldn’t have been more hopeful about.

That move in itself is such a window inside of MJ. Rip Hamilton was an incredible young talent. He was young but still forming. He saw Jerry Stackhouse, who he knew was a finished product.

Haywood: I wasn’t privy to those conversations. I liked playing with Rip, so I was sad to see him go. He was young, coming into his own and, selfishly? Anytime I set Rip a good screen, I’d get wide open for a dunk because his mid-range game was so cold.

In the end, both Kobe and Rip won championships and remained mentored by Mike.

Rip credits MJ for developing his midrange game that made him a three-time NBA All-Star and NBA champion in Detroit.

Their relationship reigns beyond basketball as Hamilton stands as one of the longest-tenured tentacles of the Jordan Brand family.

Though the Kobe signing never happened in DC, the potential pressure of moving cross country worked well for the Air Apparent.

Staying in Los Angeles, Kobe became the full-time face of the franchise. Bryant went on to win two more championships to take his total to five — just one less than Mike — and made more than $323 million as a Laker.

While the 2002 trade and 2003 would-be summer signing spawn the biggest what-ifs in DC, sliding doors regarding the 2001 NBA Draft also prove interesting.

DC Draft Capital

As legend has it, Michael Jordan desired to draft Duke phenom Jay Williams in 2001, hoping he’d declare early so the Wizards could take him first overall.

Months after taking the front office job in DC, Jordan met Williams when he was beginning to blossom as a Blue Devil great.

Williams: My first real encounter with Mike was right before my sophomore year of college. I got invited to his Flight Camp out in Santa Barabra.

I was nervous to meet him because I’m a fucking Dukie! That’s how he talked to me! But you could tell there was love and camaraderie there because I was super competitive. I think that was the bridge that allowed us to build a relationship.

That was the year I blew up — Flight Camp, USA Basketball, and staying in the gym. Mike inspired me. In order to be different, I have to act different — every single day. I started getting up 700 made shots every single day. That became the barometer of my work ethic … from him.

One week in Santa Barbra with MJ ignited a run from the Tobacco Road rival like none other.

Williams: In USA Basketball, I went against Jason Kidd, Gary Payton, and Ray Allen. I not only held my own; I excelled. So, going into my sophomore year, I felt like I was him. If I can do it against GP or Jason Kidd in their prime? Then, no one in college could stop me.

That set the tone for my sophomore year: winning the chip, winning the National Player of the Year award, having the chance to leave school early, and potentially being drafted by the Washington Wizards? You can’t make that up.

Notably, Williams returned to Durham for his senior season, winning Naismith Player of the Year and going No. 2 overall to the Chicago Bulls in 2002.

While he had a fan in MJ, he had unfinished business back at Cameron Indoor Arena.

Williams: This was during a different time in the Duke era. We had just come off ’99 when there was a mass exodus. You didn’t have a consistent nature of players leaving school early. Retrospectively? In today’s game, I would’ve left after a sophomore when we won the chip.

But at the same time, what it did for my brand coming back to school? I was on the cover of every magazine. I was Preseason Player of the Year. Every one of our games was on national TV.

If I was coming back to a team where I was the only guy? That would have been one thing. But I was coming back to a team with Mike Dunleavy, Carlos Boozer, Chris Duhon, and Dahntay Jones. We were absolutely loaded.

Though Williams was high on MJ’s draft board, another All-Star akin to Kobe almost changed the course of DC.

Wilbon: Michael flew Pau Gasol in and worked him out before the draft. Nobody had taken a foreign-born player or a high school guy with the first pick. But it wasn’t automatic that year, the one time the Wizards got the first pick.

Think of how great he would’ve been in the triangle. And he was, obviously.

Williams: Pau would’ve been great. As a scoring guard? The triangle wasn’t built for me to succeed.

But for wings and bigs? The triangle is set for them to succeed with the amount of times they touch [the ball] in the pinch post and the actions that come out of it. It’s perfectly set.

Having Pau Gasol coming from Europe? A lot of guys coming from Europe have basketball IQs that are so advanced. It would’ve been perfectly suited for him.

Playing along Mike, who masterminded it? That would’ve leveraged Pau very quickly.

The Business Behind Michael Jordan’s Front Office Ascent

From A-list pickup runs to driving DC commerce, catch up with Part 1 of Boardroom’s three-part oral history of MJ’s journey from NBA champion to NBA owner.

Check it out!

Wilbon: I remember Michael telling me one time, “Man, this kid from Spain…” I go, “The kid from Spain who looked like Big Bird at the time?” He was like, “Yeah, he’s incredible. He’s very talented.” You go back to knowing what you know now.

Those first few years for Pau weren’t all kisses and candy, but Memphis won 50 games. They were a playoff team. I’m a big Pau guy. It could’ve been so different.

There are a couple of ifs on that one. Jay Williams is my dear friend, but he should’ve taken Pau Gasol instead of Kwame.

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Williams: I was already on course to graduate from Duke in three years and would be the first basketball player to ever do that. But trust me, I think about that moment and the trajectory of my career.

I paid attention to the Wizards and Mike. Going back to school, I started reaching out to a lot of powerful alumni and started to kind of create my own board. Dan Levington was on my board; he did the IPO for Starbucks with Howard Schultz. I was connecting on a very high level. But it was my last year in school, so I had to pay attention to who the worst teams in the league were and where these lottery balls were going.

I wanted to see if I could still go back to Washington or if I’d end up somewhere else.

I got drafted by the Bulls, had Mike’s locker, and had my accident. I wonder what my career would’ve been like if I was under his tutelage and left school early. They took Kwame Brown that year, but I didn’t think there was any doubt that I would’ve been the first pick in that draft going to DC.

Heading into the 2001 NBA Draft, the rising tide of high school standouts far surpassed that of international prospects regarding resumes and public opinion.

Put into an impossible situation, Brown struggled with early expectations but managed to become a valuable veteran, solid starter, and reputable role player throughout his 12-year NBA career.

Brown played for seven franchises, with his longest stint coming in DC.

Regardless of expectations, Kwame changed the life of his family and likely played a role in the NBA’s implementation of the age limit. Over his career, he made over $64 million.

Wilbon: Kwame? The league wasn’t ready for it yet. People don’t realize that Kevin Garnett and Kobe were drafted a little lower in the first round. I remember Doug Collins saying, “He’s still got acne. He’s like my kid.”

They were shaking their heads at the time because nobody was ready for him to be plug and play; there was zero chance of that, and that’s still too bad. I still blame the Wizards for that.

Nichols: The Kwame Brown decision stands out as the worst mistake MJ made as an executive, but he did have some incredible physical gifts, and he was projected by draft experts as a top-three pick.

MJ didn’t pluck him out of nowhere; there were plenty of basketball experts who thought he would succeed in the NBA.

The draft is a dicey business. If you end up with a 50% success rate in the draft, you’re a good executive. It’s tough.

That’s a decision I know, for a fact, he would love to have back.

Passing the Torch

On April 16, 2003, Michael Jordan played his last NBA game.

The very next day, he hosted the nation’s top talent at the Jordan Brand Classic at the MCI Center.

It was one of many moves Mike made in DC to grow the game, though most were less publicized.

Nyrik Lee (Former Wizards intern, Marketing Director at The Museum DC): Around that time, the Wizards as an organization made an effort to step up their community relations at the rec centers and in the inner city. Just knowing that the GOAT was in your backyard was enough for everybody.

Every gym was more competitive because the one that everybody looks to was here.

We knew from a national perspective that the world was looking at the area because Mike was playing here. So good or bad? Media attention was going to be here. That means it goes to college players and high school athletes.

We’ve always had a rich hoop scene, but Mike being here took the top off to look at us because they had to come here because of him. Now, the media can check out a game at a high school gym because they’re here so much to cover Mike.

The national media being here more brought a whole lot of attention to what was going on here from a grassroots level.

Offering his answer to the McDonald’s All-American Game, the Jordan Brand Classic gave fans from across DC the chance to see the next generation of basketball’s best.

The 2003 offering was both elaborate and prophetic, hosting the same kid from Akron who appeared at Hoops Chicago amid MJ’s private runs as only an underclassman.

In front of MJ at the MCI, an 18-year-old LeBron James dropped 34 points, grabbed 12 boards, and dished out six assists.

Heading into the 2003 NBA Draft Lottery, the Wizards had a 1.4% chance of landing the No. 1 Pick and scooping James.

Instead, they fell to No. 10, selecting Jarvis Hayes and missing out on LeBron or a chance at Carmelo Anthony or Dwyane Wade in the top five.

In due time, both Melo and Wade did business with MJ as Air Jordan athletes. All the while, LeBron remained loved by MJ just the same.

Wilbon: People don’t realize how much LeBron loves basketball. We could argue GOAT shit all we want, but LeBron loves Michael! And vice versa!

There’s been times I picked up the phone, and there’s been something nationally, and Mike’s said, “Get people off LeBron. What’s that about? Leave that kid alone.”

Particularly when he was younger, people don’t realize that all these icons followed Jordan more closely than almost all the rest of us — with real stakes!

Weeks after winning co-MVP at the Jordan Brand Classic, LeBron James signed a record-setting $90 million deal with Nike and declared for the NBA Draft.

In that same span, the Wizards made a move just as newsworthy.

Exit Wounds

In MJ’s two seasons on the court in DC, the Wizards rose to the top three in NBA attendance, including a franchise-record streak of 82 straight home sellouts.

On May 7, 2003, Abe Pollin fired Michael Jordan as team president.

“I agonized over it for days and nights, thinking, ‘What is it that I have to do?'” Pollin told the AP in October 2003. “I’m going to think very hard about these decisions and make the best decisions that I think are best for the franchise.”

Once departed, the team dropped to 21st in fanfare, never touching the top five since.

Haywood: It was shocking. We all thought that once Mike retired, he was going back into that management role. It was a mixed bag of emotions because this is Jordan, and you don’t want to see him done wrong in that aspect.

Certain things were promised to him, and those promises weren’t kept.

Then we start seeing stories in the paper that make it seem like the young guys don’t want Jordan around. You see how they’re trying to put the poison pill in the media.

I saw that as a young player, like, “They would do this to Michael Jordan.” Because the young guys weren’t even in town, who are you talking to?

Brendan Haywood and Kwame Brown can’t run Michael Jordan out of town. This is crazy.

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Wilbon: He should’ve been running the franchise in the capital of the United States. Every time I drive by that building, I think about how differently it should’ve worked out. It should’ve happened.

Haywood: I started reading the articles, and to see how Mike was pushed out the door was the cold business part of the game. Obviously, there was a riff between him and Abe Pollin. They shut that door and never let him back in.

On opening night months after MJ’s exit, free agent signee Gilbert Arenas topped all Wizards at an annual salary of $8.5 million.

Michael Jordan’s reported severance package was valued at $10 million — almost enough to pay the entire Wizards bench.

Reportedly, MJ threw away the check.

In 2004, his first year in decades not tied in some shape or fashion to an NBA franchise sans his baseball break, Michael Jordan made $35 million in endorsements alone.

For reference, that’s more than Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, and Allen Iverson made on the court that NBA season.

Even after an ugly exit in DC, Mike was still the most marketable man in basketball.

David Falk (Legendary Agent): Long after he retired, he still had Hanes, he still had Gatorade, and he still had Nike. They were very, very long-term deals. When I made the deals, I never expected he would play competitive basketball for the duration of the deals, and I told that to the companies.

It didn’t matter; his popularity had endured. He was more popular when he retired than most players were at the most successful part of their active careers — and still is.

Garnett: Mike made the league a trillion, and he made Mike a trillion.

Williams: It all started with his main business, which was on the court. His dedication and attention to detail really translated to how he handled a lot of his other stuff. That set the foundation.

Falk: Michael’s unique. There’s no other player who compares to Michael in terms of marketability. I’m not saying there never will be, but there’s never been another player who’s enjoyed his success.

He’s got the Midas touch; whatever he touches turns to gold. He’s just a very astute businessman. Not only is he a great basketball player and an amazing person, but he’s a very astute businessman.

It wouldn’t be until the 2019-20 NBA Season that any Washington Wizard would make more money in annual NBA salary than MJ made off endorsements the year he left DC.

Still, the appetite for MJ and disappointment around the ending lingered.

Lee: I was in the office seeing fan mail coming … two years later! People were sending mail just hoping somebody read their letter to Michael Jordan.

Nichols: The problem is that he was in no way nearly as dominant as an executive or talent evaluator as a player.

Michael Jordan’s talent evaluation with the Bulls was not his strength. And by the way, that’s OK! You’re Michael Jordan, arguably the greatest player of all time; you don’t have to be one of the greatest talent evaluators of all time.

But if you go into a job where all you do is talent evaluation and management, that’s going to be a problem, and that was a problem with the Wizards.

Wilbon: The fact that it didn’t work? God, it makes me sick to this day because it should have.

Michael was going to run a team; we see that with Charlotte, and Washington is a much greater market than Charlotte. Washington is still untapped as a basketball place.

Hive Mind

In January 1999, Michael Jordan left the game of basketball on top.

In January 2000, he returned to it in a new city and new suite.

By October 2001, the two worlds collided in Wilmington as he came back to basketball while operating as an exec.

Years later, in 2006, all roads converged in Charlotte — just 200 miles away from the site of that first Wizards training camp.

“I’m thrilled to have my friend, Michael Jordan, join me in my business and sports pursuits,” Bobcats owner Bob Johnson said at the time in a release.

Purchasing a minority stake in the Charlotte Bobcats — later the Charlotte Hornets — from an old friend in DC, Mike was back in the ownership game only three years after departing from DC.

Rovell: He had amazing timing. I think he had a hard time believing he could be a general manager because he’s so good and so competitive that he couldn’t fairly evaluate talent without being very critical.

So, ownership was natural. Because he was Michael Jordan, he had to pay an incontestable amount down to get the piece that he got from Bob Johnson. So, he immediately used his name to essentially finance a purchase.

Haywood: Mike was a really good owner. I know that team success wasn’t always there, but you could tell he wanted to win.

He was around, and he was present. Sometimes, he’d be in the training room having conversations with guys trying to get them to understand certain things about business and basketball.

From 2006 to 2010, MJ served as a minority owner in Charlotte and business partner to billionaire Bob Johnson.

“I not only respect Michael for his basketball knowledge and expertise,” said Johnson. “But also for his business skills, particularly in branding and marketing.”

“I’m excited to join Bob and invest alongside one of the most astute businessmen I know,” Jordan said at the time.

“I am also looking forward to providing my advice, where needed, to Bobcats’ management in order to put the best possible team on the court,” Jordan said.

After building both fan bases, franchises, and economies in Chicago and DC, Mike was suddenly taking the bull by the horns in Charlotte.

“Our joint venture will allow Michael to invest in private equity, hedge funds, financial services, real estate, film production, and other business interests that my holding company is pursuing,” said Johnson.

Haywood: Everybody always wanted to know, ‘What’s Mike like? What’s his work habits like? Tell me your best Mike story.’ He’s the best player to ever do it, he’s mesmerizing.

He’s the first player to truly be branded in the correct way that made him a sports icon. So, there was always a thousand questions about who Michael Jordan was and what he was doing. I’d tell them the stories I could and keep it at that.

Artest: I would’ve loved to play for Michael Jordan. He’d of probably traded me in a week because I was more stubborn then. He would’ve loved me or had to have gotten rid of me.

If Mike would’ve called me? For sure. Imagine winning a title and playing for MJ. As a kid, that’s things you dream of.

Haywood: He didn’t like losing. Things didn’t work out in Charlotte, but it wasn’t because Mike didn’t care.

When I was playing for Charlotte, there were some dark days because the team wasn’t that good. But he was still around, lending his expertise. At the end of the day, you could tell he still really cared.

After four years, MJ was in pole position to own the Bobcats outright.

In 2010, Michael Jordan bought Bob Johnson’s Bobcats franchise for $275 million.

In 2014, he rebranded the team to its original Hornets hues and nickname.

Six years later, MJ used his equity in Charlotte to not only own the Hornets but also purchase a stake in Richard Petty Motorsports. Teaming with Denny Hamlin, Jordan became a team owner in NASCAR through 23XI Racing.

Located just outside of Charlotte, it’s a big flex for the North Carolina native who used to pull up to private pick-up runs in Chicago matching sports cars to his outfits.

Wilbon: This was going to be his second professional life, which it has been. And we’ve seen Michael in other stuff like racing, whether it was motocross or now high stakes with Bubba Wallace and Denny.

I called him to congratulate him when they won last year, and I couldn’t believe that the phone call had evolved to this place where it’s now racing! But that was not foreign to me because I could see the connection. I’d covered Joe Gibbs, and we had come back he did racing.

Today, Michael Jordan is an icon in sports and business said to be worth $3 billion.

Said to have made Chicago a trillion dollars and brought billions to downtown DC, Mike made good on his investment in Charlotte by selling his share of the Hornets for $3 billion in 2023.

His Hornets sale has offered an ownership lane for those trying to follow his footsteps and set out a blueprint for ballers looking to buy, build, and sell teams.

It’s a testament to the GOAT, not just in the NBA but in regards to ROI.

Rovell: How he did what he did — structured what he did — and how he did it? Eventually, owning the team at the valuation of $275 million at the time and getting in and seeing it grow?

The amazing thing is that it’s possible that he’ll make more from the sale of the Hornets than he will from the Jordan Brand over his lifetime. Perfect timing.

Williams: Frankly? He set the whole template for me. Understanding the story of how his mom helped him with Nike and hearing that story at a young age? It made me think about building enterprise value.

Before I had my accident, everything I wanted to do was around realizing basketball was my platform to build a portfolio company. Mike was the first to do that.

To this day, the Jordan run in Washington, DC, as part owner, president of basketball operations, and starting shooting guard for the Washington Wizards is met with more jeers than cheers.

It’s an asterisk in a spotless resume adorned by NBA championships, scoring titles, MVP trophies, and a billion-dollar brand built under Nike.

“Everyone is going to look at the short-term,” Jordan told The Washington Post in 2003. “People won’t understand.”

While his squads in DC failed to make the playoffs, MJ never failed to see the opportunities his competitive nature brought him.

“For me, I’m going to look back and say it was fun,” Jordan continued. “It was fun and something no other general manager or president of basketball operations could do. I got a chance to see some old things I used to see, some new things I’d never seen, some young talent, some old talent, so I’m satisfied.”

The “satisfying” stint in Washington built a nightlife economy in the nation’s capital. It set MJ up for full ownership in both basketball and racing, appeasing a competitive thirst that neither Nike royalties nor Gatorade residuals could ever fully quench in “retirement.“

Wilbon: The level of competition? It’s his life. The nuances, the finer points? He understands competition probably better than anybody out there with the exception of those that are also doing it at the highest level.

Howard White (Vice President of Jordan Brand): Everybody has a dream, everybody has a goal, but when you’ve fallen that 50th time and your mouth is full of dirt and dust, you can hardly breathe, and your eyes are crying? You still work hard, but that dream dies.

It’s that one that’s willing to get up for the 51st, the 70th, and 80th, and that drive still permeates them. That dream doesn’t go away. Those are the people that people need to follow.

Like MJ says on that poster, “I’ve failed over and over again, and that is why I succeed.”

Larry Miller (Chairman of Jordan Brand): People a lot of times don’t understand how great of a businessman MJ is.

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The post Why Michael Jordan’s Wizards Run Set Him Up For Billions in Charlotte appeared first on Boardroom.

In the summer of 2001, all eyes were on Kwame Brown, the first high school prospect ever to be selected first overall in the NBA Draft.

Across the Association and around DC, fans had high hopes for the teen talent taken by the struggling Washington Wizards.

While the world knew Kwame would be playing for Michael Jordan, only a handful of insiders knew he’d be playing with Michael Jordan.

“The hope around the team was so palpable,” Rachel Nichols told Boardroom. “DC is a city that is just waiting for basketball success.”

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Playing private pickup games with Jamal Crawford and Antoine Walker in front of Jay-Z and Beyoncé, Michael Jordan’s covert comeback to the NBA was taking place behind the scenes at Hoops Chicago.

Ahead of the 2001-02 NBA season, the newly-named Wizards president of basketball operations and part owner was about to take on another title: starting shooting guard.

Over the last three years, Boardroom has spoken to teammates, peers, and analysts who were in the mix during Jordan’s DC days.

The Business Behind MJ’s Front Office Ascent

Part 1 of Boardroom’s oral history starts at the beginning with Mike’s 1999 retirement and star-studded comeback training sessions.

Catch up!

In Part 2 of Boardroom’s three-part oral history of MJ’s rise from MVP to owner, we dive deep into the two seasons Jordan suited up in a jersey for the Wizards.

While the Iron Man endurance and SportsCenter highlights are well known, the backstory behind the announcement and the civic explosion in downtown DC are lesser known.

Editor’s note: Interviews may have been edited for length or clarity.

I’m Back — Again

Silently, in the summer of 2001, Michael Jordan was working daily with basketball’s best to turn back the clock.

38 years of age and already out of the NBA for three whole seasons, MJ hit the gym hard with famed trainer Tim Grover and an incredibly competitive cast of All-Star starters, rising rookies, and revered veterans.

While word traveled fast, even in the era before social media, no one truly knew his Washington Wizards comeback would be official until it came out of the GOAT’s mouth.

The table was set to address the press until disaster struck.

Darren Rovell (Emmy Award-winning analyst, Sports Business Reporter): Jordan was supposed to come back on Sept. 11. I remember the day because I did a piece on the Business of Michael Jordan. I was in New York that day.

Michael Wilbon (Award-winning Journalist, ESPN analyst): It was gonna be 9/11. I wasn’t in town, but I remember him calling me and saying, “Hey, you know I can’t do this now. It’s gotta wait, and we’ve gotta push this back. We’ve gotta wait until it’s the appropriate time.”

Pivoting in respect to the tragedy, MJ announced his official comeback on Oct. 1, 2001.

Inspired by Mario Lemieux, Jordan addressed the media at the MCI Center, discussing how his pick-up play during the summer secured his confidence that he could compete at this level.

“I’m gonna have total confidence once I step on the basketball court that I can do all the things that I’m capable of doing,” Jordan told the press.

“Mentally, in terms of playing the game at the highest level? I’m going to be totally confident,” Jordan said.

Famously, Michael Jordan played his last season in Chicago for a then-record-setting single-season salary of $33.1 million.

Respectfully, he took a playing pay cut all the way down to just over $1 million a year to suit up in DC.

All of his playing salary was donated to 9/11 relief.

On the court, MJ was set up to make less money in base playing salary than he had since 1988. Off the court, he was winning regarding endorsements and the value he was building in DC.

The NBA, the nation, and the nation’s capital were all winning and cashing in the same.

Wilbon: There was a delay, not only because of what happened but because he last signed a contract where he did not sign the group licensing agreement.

You couldn’t put him in video games, so they had to figure that out, and that’s why he couldn’t come back immediately.

Rovell: He had partners that could activate him again, like Hanes and Gatorade. Obviously, it’s harder to activate an athlete that’s not active and it allowed him to redo deals.

He signed Gatorade in 1991, so it allowed him to redo long-term deals. He wouldn’t sign a deal that was less than 10 years, so it created long-term deals.

If you wanted him, you had to sign him to a big deal. It extended his endorsement life for sure.

Rachel Nichols (Award-winning Journalist, Host of Headliners): The hope around the team was so palpable. DC is a city that is just waiting for basketball success. This is a city that is so primed to love and support an NBA team culturally.

People were so eager to have a team worthy of their love and affection for the game. Every game was sold out.

As soon as he returned to play they threw Washington on the national television schedule after barely being there.

Brendan Haywood (NBA champion, UNC All-American, NBA TV analyst): I got drafted by the Cavaliers, traded to Orlando, and went through summer league with the Magic. Grant Hill was on the Magic and let me know if I needed a car or anything, he had me taken care of.

The next thing I know, I get this call: “Yo, you’re traded to DC. You’re gonna get a chance to play with Michael Jordan.”

I had my heart set on Orlando, but I’m about to play with Michael Jordan? That was surreal because, as a kid, I grew up watching him, and now I’m getting a chance to play with the best of all time.

The training camp was in Wilmington.

Wilbon: I remember going, “Oh my God, I gotta be in Wilmington!”

While Washington, DC, was quickly becoming the center of the NBA universe, Wilmington, NC, was the first stop on the comeback tour.

Taking the team partially owned to his hometown of less than 100,000 residents, the city swelled as media from around the country and the world descended on coastal North Carolina.

Whether from Paris or Tokyo, New York or LA, everyone with a mic, camera, or recorder everyone was willing to trek to Wilmington to see what Michael Jordan’s new-look Wizards were all about.

Media vets and NBA rookies soon found out.

Haywood: From Day 1 at training camp, he was ratcheting it up a level. Back then? Training camp was different; you really played.

It was a lot of scrimmaging, and Mike wanted to win everything — and he was talking to you while he was winning everything. You wanted to win because he was talking. “It’s going to be like this all day!”

In Doug Collins’ scrimmages, if you lose, you’ve got to run. So not only is Mike talking to you during scrimmages but while you’re running suicides? “Better get your track shoes on! You’re gonna be running every scrimmage if you’re not on my team.”

That’s just Mike. The competitiveness stood out from Day 1. I’ve never been around anyone that competitive at everything.

In Wilmington, the teammates and the media were feeling the fire from MJ.

Back in DC and around the NBA, fans and peers felt the same rush.

Nichols: The fact that Michael Jordan, of all people, was going to be a part of it? It was intoxicating.

Kevin Garnett (NBA champion, Hall of Famer, Host of KG Certified): When he came back? I wasn’t shocked, but I knew it would make the league hot. The Mike effect is a real effect.

It was great for the league because I think he wanted to see where he aligned with some of the younger stars. I thought it was great.

Haywood: The thing that stands out most to me is the practices. Seeing his approach to practice every day? I remember calling one of my friends and saying, “I see why he’s the greatest. He puts so much into this that when he gets on the court? He’s made the play a thousand times in practice.”

Nichols: To a fan, Michael Jordan was literal magic appearing on your court. The fact that he was going to do that in Washington, DC, was mind-blowing.

As media members from all over the world applied for training camp credentials, fans from DC and beyond bought tickets at an unruly rate.

Leaks of a possible MJ comeback had fans lining up at the box office in DC a day before tickets went on sale.

Keep in mind: The Wizards won only 19 games the previous season.

Around the NBA, road games against Washington sold out rapidly.

Commissioner David Stern phoned Lakers coach Phil Jackson to let him know he’d be skipping Ring Night at Staples Center to catch MJ’s Wizards debut in Madison Square Garden.

Rovell: I was in Chicago in ’96, ’97, and ’98, so I know how hard it was to get a ticket. The Wizards provided an opportunity that was a little easier.

The cost of the Wizards on the road would be similar to a ticket to see the best team in basketball just to see Jordan alone. And people really believed it’d be the last time they’d see him.

Nichols: It had a huge effect the entire time he played for them. Even when they were losing, even when his knee hurt, even when he was on the bench. People were devoted to being in the same room he was.

Haywood: The expectations were crazy. Even though we were a young team and just had the No. 1 pick … but just because Mike was there, people automatically thought we were going to be a playoff team.

The expectations off the jump were this is going to be a playoff team because we had Michael Jordan.

Every game was a movie. Games sold out. For me, I’m from Carolina, where all our games are sold out! But the guys from last year were like, “Nah, this ain’t how it used to be. You used to be able to walk down and sit courtside.”

Now, we’ve got nationally televised games. The Wizards were never on TV before that. Now, the games are not just sold out at home but on the road. It’s insane.

The Crowned Hero Live From Ground Zero

As alluded to, that first road game was the NBA season opener: Michael Jordan’s Washington Wizards against the New York Knicks in MSG.

Appearing at the New York Stock Exchange that morning and bowing for that night’s National Anthem with the American flag in his hands, emotions, and stakes were high for all involved.

The nationally televised outing was taking place just miles from where the World Trade Center was struck only weeks prior, with members of the US military and NYFD on court.

Among those in attendance were Stern, Spike Lee, Chris Rock, and countless other A-list attendees. Mike led the lowly Wizards in scoring, losing by a single basket to the loaded Knicks.

Though the momentum mounted on that emotional opening night, it toured the country for two years straight.

Metta Sandiford-Artest (NBA champion, NBA Defensive Player of the Year): His first year back, he played very well. He gave us 40 one day.

Garnett: He came back like cooked coke.

Sam Cassell (NBA champion, Boston Celtics assistant coach): We were trying to beat him! Michael Jordan beat you so much with the Bulls that if we got any opportunity to beat him? I don’t care who he was playing for. You still tried to beat him because he was so competitive.

Haywood: Competitive, competitive, competitive. The first thing you get is that Mike is so competitive.

The Billions Behind Mike’s Last Dance Season

How the final run for MJ in Chicago netted a record-setting salary, millions of eyeballs, and billions in economic impact.

Check it out!

Quentin Richardson (NBA veteran, Jordan Brand ambassador, Knuckleheads co-host): For me, when he came back was another dream fulfilled. I had played against him since my freshman year of college and had played against him a million times, but this was my chance to play against him on an NBA court.

Garnett: That motherfucker took that shit personally. He came out one time and shot that motherfucker so high that I jumped and was like, “Man, I can’t even get that.” He was talking crazy.

Paul Pierce (NBA champion, Hall of Famer, co-host of KG Certified): He still was giving buckets to the young kids.

Cassell: He was a bad boy. He was special.

Pierce: He was in his 40s, averaging 23 [points per game]. Mike gave me 32. I had to go back at Mike.

Artest: I was always trying to lock up Mike because I idolized him, which was really hard to do.

Garnett: I had to guard that motherfucker, and he gave us 40. And I got like 38 of that shit! He was two-dribbling, and Flip Saunders was like, “You’re the only one that can guard him.” I wasn’t tripping.

But Mike? He was like, “Too slow, ho!” They weren’t even in the triangle, and he was making it up as he was doing it.

Richardson: It was just another confirmation that he’s still a killer. He gave you glimpses all year, whether it was 50 or a game-winner.

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As alluded to, 50 points — or rather 51 — happened that first year back.

In December 2001, the Wizards were in the midst of a nine-game winning streak — the longest stretch of consecutive wins since they won it all as the Bullets back in 1979.

Sure enough, the Charlotte Hornets came into DC to snap it before they could hit ten in a row. The next night, the Indiana Pacers came to town to play spoiler, beating MJ in his own house by 27 points.

To make matters worse? Mike only scored six points — the first time ending in single digits since 1986.

Quickly, the press started to ask if the wheels were falling off.

Even faster, he answered, exploding for a season-high 51 points against the Hornets.

Baron Davis (2x NBA All-Star, Tech & Media Entrepreneur): It happened so fast. He had like 14 points in the first two minutes. He had like 25 in the first quarter.

You just fall in the trance of watching your teammate in a one-on-one battle with Michael Jordan. It’s like, “Damn, dude, that’s what it looks like!”

The coach calls a timeout and asks why you’re not helping, and it’s like, “Damn, dog that’s Michael Jordan!” I’m just sitting here watching! And then the same thing happened to me.

I finally got to see it and really get it. He was older then, but he just had a crazy ass motor. He knew how to score and get to his money.

The next month, the old man started the new year with the same game.

Playing his old franchise, the Chicago Bulls, for the first time as an opponent, Michael Jordan made history not once but twice.

Artest: He hit his 30,000th point against me. I’m really prideful on defense, and I’m like, “Damn, I’m about to be on a photo for the rest of my life with MJ getting 30,000 points on me.”

So I fouled him, and before he even shot the free throw, I punched the scorer’s table.

I was pissed, and it made a loud sound. I see MJ look at me because the sound was loud, and I’m like, “Oh shit, you just embarrassed yourself.”

The accolade was important, but a win mattered more.

Still fighting for seeding, the Wizards needed a W, and the Bulls were bottom of the barrel.

With 24 seconds left in the fourth quarter of a tight game, MJ went to his bread-and-butter midrange fadeaway.

All the sessions at Hoops Chicago paid off for a young Ron Artest as he blocked what would’ve been a big bucket.

In the blink of an eye, a bigger block happened.

Haywood: That Ron Mercer play always sticks with me. You’re almost 40 years old, and you hustle like that? Mike had got a shot blocked, and it had him ticked.

He catches Ron Mercer’s shot against the glass with two hands.

Most people would be over the moon over that type of play, but he expected to do that.

If you pan to the bench, we’re all over there going crazy. But that’s just Mike being Mike.

Artest: Mike was a great defender. Mike might be [one of the] top two wing defenders of all time.

That’s what really inspired me. I watched Mike’s defense more than his offense. I’d watch Mike’s feet and how he denied the post. Mike locked a lot of people up.

The Wizards won, with MJ’s two-handed snatch block making the rounds on SportsCenter even more than his 30,000th point.

He defeated his old team and put the league on notice. The MCI Center was the new home of Michael Jordan, no longer just selling out but having fans on the edge of their seat.

Richardson: I remember seeing it, then I would just laugh. It was ridiculous, and he even looked at him. This was just another instance of showing it.

It was Mike, that’s the GOAT and that’s just what he does. It was sick.

Haywood: This is when I knew Michael Jordan was a next-level superstar. After the games, I’d see the stars I just played against lined up outside the locker room with gear to get signed like fans.

That’s crazy to me because you weren’t used to seeing that aspect of the game.

You were just competing, and now you’re waiting outside to get some shoes signed? This was before the jersey swap stuff; this was not done in 2001.

Doing Numbers

From 2001 to 2003, fans across the nation were swapping cold, hard cash for Michael Jordan jerseys.

In MJ’s second season in DC, his No. 23 Wizards jersey was the fourth highest-selling tank top across the Association, bested by only Kobe Bryant, Allen Iverson, and Tracy McGrady.

Around Washington, DC, No. 23 was still No. 1.

Nyrik Lee (Former Wizards intern, Marketing Director at The Museum DC): It was booming. At the time, I worked at Head to Head Sports. There were about eight or nine of them in the area, and I worked with a guy named Kyle Kemp, who was the owner, and I was his manager at the busiest location.

I saw firsthand the amount of jerseys sold. When they did that Bullets one? We sold so much Wizards apparel — period.

When MJ previously retired in 1999, it was said that the NBA made 20% of its revenue from licensing fees.

Ahead of his 1984 NBA arrival, the league made roughly $44 million off of merchandise. By the time MJ won his first ring, that number hit $1.56 billion.

By the time Mike won his fourth, fifth, and sixth rings, that number eclipsed $3 billion annually.

Make no mistake, the 2002 Wizards were not the 1996 Bulls.

However, for two straight seasons, the Michael Jordan effect made NBA merchandise sales go crazy, helping the league revenue from apparel come closer to the days of Jordan’s dominance.

The league won with more exposure and sales worldwide. Locally, it made the Wizards bankable back at home base.

Lee: Jordan made the merchandise an easy sale to the point where if we didn’t have Mike, they’d buy anybody on the team. I remember selling a Laron Profit jersey. Whoever was on the mob that we had? They were buying it.

The Bullets and Wizards Mike jersey was damn near impossible to keep on the shelves. We sold a lot of Wizards products around that time.

That Bullets authentic Michael Jordan jersey was one of the hottest and hardest things to get your hands on. People started bootlegging it because they only did it for one year, and everybody couldn’t get it.

The swingmans were selling out, the authentics were selling out, and the replicas were selling out.

Capital Investment

If you are judging by the final standings, the 2001-02 Washington Wizards were not a success.

Despite All-Star play from Jordan, the team finished below .500 and missed the playoffs.

Inside the MCI Center, the team still sold out all 41 home games.

Just outside of the MCI Center, the Jordan effect proved even stronger than tickets, jerseys, and popcorn sales.

Cassell: That arena was packed every night. Downtown DC? The businesses, the restaurants, and the nightlife were better because Jordan was there.

Wilbon: I was writing for the Washington Post then and had broken the story that he was coming to DC. The MCI Arena was only a few years old, and it was the centerpiece of downtown DC’s civic renovation.

Lee: It developed everything around there. They had just got into the MCI Center in 1998. I was at the first game, but when Mike comes some years later? His presence had all types of restaurants opening out there.

Wilbon: It was a scene and largely because the Wizards mattered. That whole 7th Street area changed dramatically overnight.

Downtown Washington is now terrific. But anybody who thinks that didn’t start with Michael coming there doesn’t know what they’re talking about.

Lee: It made Chinatown in DC a thing. It made the local economy jump. Ticket sales? Every night was a sellout because everybody was trying to see Mike. It boomed everything.

When Michael Jordan officially arrived in DC as a part owner in 2000, the city had just begun its $300 million economic development plan, the 2000 DC Downtown Action Agenda.

By the time MJ was in DC as a player, the locale was on the up-and-up regarding resources but still without a main attraction.

For 82 nights in two years, every restaurant ate off the Jordan and the Wizards selling out games.

Wilbon: Downtown DC was nothing, and it couldn’t have been planned that way when they built the arena because nobody knew he was coming. Downtown DC was sleepy.

There was no retail, there was no shopping, it wasn’t happening. That kicked it off.

People came to downtown DC because of Michael Freaking Jordan.

For every off night in that two-year window, various bars, nightclubs, and restaurants earned traffic just off the off chance of seeing Michael Jordan.

Lee: Any place that he frequented in his personal time? Their business quadrupled. There was no social media, but when word got out that Mike went somewhere, those businesses popped off crazy. It did really well for the economy here.

Wilbon: Zola’s was one of his spots, and I certainly had a few dinners there with him after games.

The restaurant scene was very provincial before then. It was driven by Howard, Georgetown, and the federal government. But people didn’t stay who worked in the federal government and go to dinner. That wasn’t the social way of Washington.

But Michael’s presence 41 times a year changed that. Instantly.

Haywood: I was a big video game guy. Mike was 40 years old; he wasn’t playing video games. A lot of times at the hotels, they were gambling, but I stayed away because my money wasn’t long enough. So, I didn’t really hang with him a lot outside of practice.

But me and Jared Jeffries? One time, we all went out, and Mike was with us. The music was playing at this club, and all the Wizards were there. Jared’s my guy, and we’re beside Jordan. The music’s playing, it’s popping, but the whole club is staring at Michael Jordan.

I see why this dude doesn’t go out like that. Everything’s popping, everybody’s dressed up, but everybody’s just staring at this guy.

After a while, he didn’t feel comfortable, so he ended up leaving. The pressure of being Michael Jordan must be crazy. I couldn’t imagine going up and the whole room just staring at me.

The wildest part was when he left, he didn’t pay his bill, so they thought me and Jared were going to pay it. [Laughs] I was like, “Y’all are crazy, we can’t afford that! You better call Mike and get him back here ’cause I ain’t paying that!”

How Michael Jordan Became a Billion-Dollar Brand

Learn how MJ leveraged his worldwide cachet during his Last Dance season to launch a billion-dollar brand off the court.

Check it out!

Lee: He definitely was a sing-along type, not much dancing. When The Last Dance came out, and you see him pregaming to Kenny Lattimore, I knew firsthand that he was an R&B guy.

Me and my guy Greg used to do these R&B events called R&B Live DC. What I didn’t know was that MJ and Bob Johnson owned the venue we used to do them at. At one of our events, Mike, Bob, and Charles Oakley came to our event.

We didn’t know they were the landlords of the venue. We were promoting the event, so for us to have that on our resume? It was crazy.

Howard Hewett was the headliner, and the venue was called Posh. It was a business venture that Mike and Bob had together before the Bobcats. We had been doing the events for a year and got a call that Jordan was coming.

I came out to take a picture with Charles Oakley — because I know Mike doesn’t do pictures — and Charles was giving Mike hell, just joking on him. It was just us outside, and it was amazing.

Before 2020, Washington DC’s nightlife economy was said to earn over $7 billion in annual revenue.

More than that, it provided nearly 65,000 jobs and spanned over 2,400 businesses.

A study by Jon Stover & Associates places the 20-year turn at the same time Michael Jordan became both a resident and an attraction.

Wilbon: I had lived in DC for 22 years by then. I was downtown every day because I worked there, and I’m from Chicago — I know what downtown ought to be!

Downtown DC was sleepy, but the energy that Michael brought to that? It was organic; the energy was created because he came.

Tune in on Friday for the final piece of Boardrom’s three-part oral history. If you missed Part 1, be sure to catch up here.

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The post How Michael Jordan Revived DC & the NBA with Wizards Comeback appeared first on Boardroom.

At 60 years of age, Michael Jordan has seen it all and done it all.

A baller, a billionaire, and a brand, His Airness has ascended to heights of ownership and affluence that kids still cling to and kings are measured by. However, 25 years ago, the world wondered what was next for No. 23.

Filling seats in Chicago for 13 lucky seasons and 610 consecutive sellouts, everything MJ touched turned to gold or green. Nike, the NBA, and the entire Windy City all relied on Jordan to make money and memories, providing hope for the hopeless and excess to the execs.

His fire-red blueprint for basketball and business is one with great risks and few blemishes.

All that equity and storybook ending hit the highest stakes in 2001 when Michael Jordan announced his return to the hardwood with the Washington Wizards.

Putting it all on the line when the nation was under attack and the league under duress, America’s hoop hero traded in his red cape and front office gig for a blue jersey and ice bags.

Leading a team that had only won 19 games the previous season, MJ bet his body, brand, and reputation for an uncanny partnership between GOAT and C-Suite, old icon and new market.

In the standings, it proved a failure. Looking beyond box scores, it was an economic event of massive proportions, reinvigorating an entire community, a global game, and a generation of athletes-turned-entrepreneurs.

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Over the last three years, Boardroom has spoken to teammates, competitors, executives, and analysts who were around MJ’s transition from the backcourt to the front office.

This week, Boardroom offers a three-part oral history of MJ’s reign in Washington DC, beginning with his 1999 retirement and star-studded comeback training sessions.

A Cold Day in The Chi

25 years ago, hoops hell froze over.

“I think we were in a state of denial,” Dan Patrick told David Aldridge on ESPN. “Just like this city is.”

It was a frigid and fitting 23 degrees outside in Chicago. Inside the United Center, things were just as icy.

On Jan. 13, 1999, Michael Jordan announced his retirement from the NBA.

It was only days before the lockout officially ended and only months after he downed the Utah Jazz for his sixth NBA title.

“You just can’t believe somebody would go out on top,” Patrick said.

“We’re not used to athletes doing that. Here’s a guy who hit the Last Shot, won a title, was the MVP, and he says, ‘That’s it, I’ll step down.'”

“I thought about saying just two words, ‘I’m gone,'” the 35-year-old Jordan told the 800 media members in attendance.

“But I thought I owed my fans a lot more than that. Mentally, I’m exhausted, I don’t feel I have a challenge.”

Still, a .01% chance of return remained in sight.

“Physically, I feel great.”

Kevin Garnett (NBA champion, Hall of Famer, Host of KG Certified): When MJ retired? I was shocked because I knew he had a bunch of basketball left in him. He must be super bored, leaving the game?

Rachel Nichols (Award-winning Journalist, Host of Headliners): In the industry? We all knew it was coming. It still remains one of the biggest what-ifs in sports history.

Paul Pierce (NBA champion, Hall of Famer, co-host of KG Certified): I was sick. I always wanted to play against MJ and that was the year I got drafted.

My dream was to play at The Forum in Inglewood and to play against Mike. As soon as I come in? No Forum, no Mike.

Metta Sandiford-Artest (NBA champion, 1999 Chicago Bulls first-round pick): I was one year away and had the opportunity to play against MJ, Pippen, Rodman, Kukoc, BJ Armstrong … my favorite Bulls that I grew up idolizing.

But when Jordan retired? I just missed it and had to move on.

Garnett: It fucked up everybody because we were all fans — and still are — of Michael Jordan. He’s the GOAT of GOATs, the king of kings.

Everybody was looking around like, “Who’s gonna be the face of the league?” There were like seven or eight guys, and if I’m keeping it 100? Allen Iverson was kind of the face because he had so much influence on culture.

Nichols: For years, there was the question: who’s the next Michael Jordan? Harold Miner was Baby Jordan, Grant Hill — you could list off 10 people who were anointed the “Next Jordan,” which tells you just how desperately people were missing Michael Jordan.

The league office had declining television ratings to deal with.

Darren Rovell (Emmy Award-winning analyst, Sports Business Reporter): Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals was the most-watched NBA game ever. And then you head straight into the lockout. That’s a bad run.

In 2000 and 2001? I think it took LeBron’s draft in 2003 to get people going even though you had the Lakers titles. I think the lockout pissed people off and there was some attrition in NBA fandom.

Nichols: It was a huge hit. You had a league where the players weren’t playing and suddenly didn’t have Michael Jordan.

There was this feeling that a league that had exploded in popularity with Magic Johnson and Larry Bird and moved seamlessly there to the Michael Jordan years.

Suddenly, it didn’t have one of these gods of Olympus to carry it through the next era. It was a problem. It had an effect on the league economically, and it had an effect on the league in terms of culture dominance and where the NBA stood.

When MJ retired in 1999, the revolution was televised as ESPN aired the announcement, only to follow the live coverage with a 24-hour marathon of Michael Jordan highlights and homages.

According to The Chicago Tribune, economic experts estimated the league would lose anywhere between $100 million and $200 million due to MJ’s departure.

Rovell: The Bulls were the traveling Beatles, and then all of a sudden, it was John Lennon or Paul McCartney by himself.

Michael Wilbon (Award-winning Journalist, ESPN analyst): It was an event every night that he played for 15 years. It changed everything about the civic nature of the city. It changed race relations. It changed everything.

And more than that, it defined a lot of things about the city. It eliminated the second-city feel. We felt inferior to New York; Michael changed that and the energy of the city reflected that in his time there.

Nichols: The whole city ran through Michael Jordan. The fact that Michael Jordan was playing there was a claim to fame for the city globally. More so than anything that happened in that city prior, more than the World’s Fair! What city wouldn’t want to see itself in Michael Jordan?

You could see the way it changed where Chicago felt it was on the national scale compared to New York or Los Angeles.

Wilbon: The Chicago Tribune once did a story that Michael meant a trillion dollars to the economy of Chicago. A trillion! And it quantified it with economists and financial experts explaining why.

Having that type of presence converting a place 40-plus times a year? That’s a significant number of nights and days.

Rovell: When the Bulls became who they were, that’s when an economy popped up around the United Center — otherwise, it’s just in the middle of nowhere.

So, the economic impact is not only felt inside the arena but on the outskirts two hours before a game when people go to a bar before they go in. Or when people come into town just hoping they can scalp a ticket, just the demand to want to be in the arena or close to the arena.

Wilbon: There was nothing like the electricity that it brought to the city. Nothing.

You didn’t see the Bears in town, you saw Michael, Scottie, and Horace. Their presence just lit the place up and this happened for 15 years.

The Billions Behind MJ’s Last Dance Season

Boardroom breaks down how MJ’s final run in Chicago netted a record-setting salary, millions of eyeballs, and billions in economic impact.

Check it out!

Rovell: The craziest thing that happened? Steve Schanwald, who was a top executive for the Bulls, basically manned the mailing list for the Bulls. The mailing list was of all the people who once got in or couldn’t get in.

It meant that when the Bulls were horrible for years and years after Jordan left the Bulls could come back to the mailing list and say, ‘Hey, you haven’t had a chance to come to the United Center, now come.’

Sandiford-Artest: We were losing games and it was packed.

Rovell: They led the league in attendance for years and years just from the Jordan halo that existed. If you look back at the early ’00s, the Bulls were still drawing 22,000 as they sucked.

Sandiford-Artest: The first year? Our plane was incredible. We had the leftovers from the championship team and each seat was a suite. It was incredible, it was the best plane I’d been on in the NBA — even better than the Dallas Mavericks plane. That Chicago Bulls plane was sick.

Garnett: All the luxuries we have today? All the structure we have in a lot of businesses? He initiated all that. He broke that boundary for us.

I know a lot of people will go back to Bill Russell, but Michael Jordan took us from where Bill Russell and Oscar Robertson took us to be universal. We were not only household names, but licensing went to another level.

The business of basketball went to another level because of Mike.

The Wizard of Ops

Michael Jordan started the new millennium in the front office AND the box office.

Months after retiring, MJ jumped to the biggest of big screens by brokering a deal with IMAX.

“Ultimate Jordan” aired in over 50 IMAX locations globally, making over $21 million as an art project and propelling his Chicago Bulls highlight reel across a 79-foot screen.

Back in America’s capital, the popcorn had long been popping.

On Jan. 19, 2000 — almost exactly a year after retiring from the Bulls — the GOATed guard was brought on as a part owner and president of operations for the Washington Wizards.

Among the worst teams in the entire NBA and amid a five-game losing streak, the announcement shocked former foes and peers alike.

At the same time the basketball world was questioning Michael’s move, he was challenging his new team, calling the Wizards rosters “underachievers.”

The next night, the lowly team got their first win in 10 days.

Nichols: It was pretty shocking that he was going to be with a team that in no way was synonymous with greatness. This is a team that last appeared in the NBA Finals in 1979! And had been on a downward trajectory ever since.

Wilbon: I was covering the league then, so I was around the flow of conversation. I wrote about it in The Washington Post from the Super Bowl. The news and buzz of it was crazy.

David Falk is my neighbor in Besdea. I was a member of one of the courses that Michael joined, Four Streams. Because of what I did and having the Chicago part in common already, he let me in on what was happening.

People thought it was going to change everything — and it should have — but it was temporary.

Garnett: Mike had on suits and gave a whole different perception. He determined how you came into camp and your whole mentality.

Nichols: Abe Pollin was an old-guard NBA owner who was a real fabric of the league establishment at that point.

He and Michael had some pretty contentious moments across the bargaining table during a previous lockout, so that surprised everyone. But he was someone who knew MJ well during their mutual time in power positions around the league.

Wilbon: I knew from the Wizards’ end of it that it was possible and it just made sense to me. When he came back and wasn’t playing — just being an executive — it made sense that the franchise needed the juice that he could bring to it.

Nichols: Abe was able to see the value in having Michael around the team and was willing to give up a lot financially to do it.

Back in Chicago, writers, fans, and friends felt Michael Jordan should’ve been given a job — or a piece — of the Bulls.

Finding greener pastures in DC, the benefit of working with the lowly Wizards was not only a front office title but a 10% ownership stake in the team. At that time, no NBA player had ever become an owner of an NBA team.

While Washington wasn’t ripe with talent as a franchise, it was a major market for basketball — and MJ.

Even after retiring from Chicago, Jordan was still the most valued endorser in America.

Before trading in his pinstriped jersey for pinstriped suits, the celebrated shooting guard signed a 10-year endorsement deal with WorldCom.

Said to pay him $2 million annually, MJ was making more a year in retirement from WorldCom than the bulk of the Bulls or Wizards were making a year from the NBA.

Slinging pre-paid calling cards and appearing ads, the 1995 signing took new shape in 1997 when WorldCom bought MCI for $41.9 billion.

Appearing in 80% of WorldCom ads, MJ was starring in phone service commercials while enjoying basketball retirement.

In the same span that WorldCom bought big on Mike, the nation’s capital opened up the $260 million MCI Center: the new home of the Washington Wizards.

Upon opening, the rebranded Bullets struggled to sell tickets due to a struggling squad.

When MCI’s main man Michael Jordan joined the front office, things suddenly shifted in the building and around the city.

Nyrik Lee (Former Wizards intern, Marketing Director at The Museum DC): For him to plant his flag in DC was crazy. It was damn near like what happened in 2008 when Obama came.

Having a figure like him in the area? Of all places to go? It was that type of feeling where everybody was shocked that this god-like figure was looming in the city. That any moment you could see him.

Nichols: A lot of times, he’d watch the games in his office on TV even though he’d be in the arena. But the times he was visible in the box? You’d have fans constantly shouting at him, “Come down on the court and play!”

He had missed being part of the game. The biggest thing about Michael’s Wizards tenure overall was that, for him, there was nothing like being part of the game night after night.

His first go was as an executive and part owner because once he retired the second time, that path was closed to him.

Nineteen years before becoming a businessman in DC, a young Mike Jordan studied cultural geography at the University of North Carolina.

Each offseason during his dominance as a pro player, he’d come back to Chapel Hill to scrimmage with NBA alumni and active members of the Tar Heel roster.

One summer after he made the move from All-Star to exec, he stopped by the Dean Dome to see some old friends and new talent.

Brendan Haywood (NBA champion, UNC All-American, NBA TV analyst): We all just knew about Michael Jordan as a player; we weren’t thinking about the front office aspect of it.

He came through on one occasion when I was in school. Mike had retired at that point, so it wasn’t like before when he was coming back all the time to stay in shape.

He was dominating the pick-up games. Jerry Stackhouse, Antawn Jamison, all these guys come back, and Mike’s out there dominating.

Afterward, we’re like, “You still been playing? You been training?” He goes, “I haven’t picked up a basketball since I retired.”

In Michael Jordan’s first two seasons in the Wizards’ front office, the team finished dead last in the Atlantic Division.

While attendance and morale were both up upon arrival, fans across the capital clamored for Mike to swap his sharp suits for a blue uniform.

Nichols: The team was not doing well, and here was a guy who could help them just by putting on a jersey.

There was a big cry in Washington to come back, and there was a big cry across the league for him to come back. There certainly was an itch with him.

He left basketball as the greatest player of all time. He wanted to get back to being the person he was when he was the greatest at something. That’s where you could start to see that he might come back.

I saw him various times over that period, and he was a little slimmer and Tim Grover was around. There were hints.

Jay Z, Beyoncé & Basketball’s Best Kept Secret

On April 18, 2001, the Washington Wizards ended a three-game losing streak.

It was only because the regular season concluded.

Downed at the hands of the Toronto Raptors, fellow North Carolina alum and Air Apparent Vince Carter controlled the game from the two-guard spot.

Scoring 34 points and sporting a shaved head and signature Nikes, he was like Mike in many manners.

The only Wizard who could stop Vinsanity was wearing not a jersey but a suit.

Perhaps it was time to grab his cape.

Antoine Walker (Three-time NBA All-Star, Chicago hoop legend): In 2001, I got a phone call back when you called people private. I was five years in the league, and I was the ringleader in Chicago as far as pickup basketball.

At this time, you’re talking about 20 or 30 pros that lived in Chicago. We all played pickup ball together. I ended up getting a call from Mike that he is thinking about coming back and wants to get in the gym.

We were playing in the park at the time. He wanted me to get the guys together and asked if we could move the run over to Hoops.

Quentin Richardson (NBA veteran, Jordan Brand ambassador, Knuckleheads co-host): We were part of the group that was in the gym when he was coming back.

There were straight killers in that building.

Pierce: I was always going to Chicago and playing in the pickup games with Mike and Antoine. Mike was playing every day.

When you have a gym with me, Toine, Shawn Marion, Jordan, Ron Artest? It was crazy in there.

Sandiford-Artest: Rookie year, I was in the gym. It was all new having pro training at the next level where players are faster, better, and bigger. I was mostly at the Berto Center.

I forget how I got the invitation, but I’m from New York City, and I’m always looking for runs.

Even in the prime of my career, I was playing on concrete multiple times a day. I never lost one game at the Rucker, and I have three championships there. I’m one of the best streetball players.

Not being in New York in the summertime was really challenging because I’m always playing basketball. In Chicago, when I got the opportunity to play in those open runs? I needed to play some basketball.

Walker: That was a surreal moment for me as a person and as a player. To be able to be with Michael Jordan on a day-to-day basis and train with him? That’s something I’ll remember for the rest of my life.

It was tough, but you had respect for what he was trying to do and accomplish. The gym was private but it was public because so many of us were from Chicago.

Despite MJ being an exec in Washington, the runs began to heat up in Chicago.

Back in DC, spirits were high. Not because of murmurs of a Michael Jordan comeback but because the Wizards won the 2001 NBA Draft Lottery, securing the No. 1 overall pick for the first time since becoming the Baltimore Bullets back in 1963.

All the while, MJ was doing his own evaluation of what basketball’s next generation was made of at Hoops Chicago.

To no surprise, the young guns were sizing up the old exec just the same.

Sandiford-Artest: He was very physical, and that’s about how it was playing streetball in New York City.

Guys like DP, The Predator, and The Terminator were super physical in New York. But Michael was psychical.

Now, everybody else in those runs? They were definitely not as physical as MJ.

Pierce: I was matching up with him. I wasn’t really talking, but he was. I was loving the fact that I had a chance to play against him because that was my dream since he retired.

Walker: He was 38. The competitive drive that he had to get back in great shape and compete? That was something special.

I think we all learned a lot from that. We learned a lot about that game of basketball and the passion it takes to win.

Sandiford-Artest: At 19 years old, my mindset was in a different place. I wasn’t really interested in much besides basketball.

He played well against me lots of times, and I played well against him a few times. It was always physical. Mike was older, and I was at my prime defensively. He had games where he played very well.

Antoine Walker was looking really good. Michael Finley was playing well, and Jerry Stackhouse played well. Corey Benjamin was there and a few big guys from the Bulls. Jamal Crawford was younger.

Jamal Crawford (Three-time NBA Sixth Man of the Year, TNT analyst): My dad had told me that Michael Jordan liked my game. But I didn’t believe him. How would he know?

We’re playing against Antoine Walker, Michael Finley, Penny Hardaway, Ray Allen, and Tim Hardaway.

One day, we had Charles Barkley on our team because at the time, he was thinking about making a comeback.

Sandiford-Artest: I played against Barkley one day. I don’t know if he was coming back, he was a little bigger and getting a run in.

LeBron James was younger — he fit in very well. I think he was 15; he got a test of the waters. I remember him attacking the basket, and I was like, “Wow.” I was 19 and I was not as athletic as him at 15.

LeBron had no problem. He didn’t have all the skills but in terms of attacking the basket on the fastbreak? I don’t recall anybody getting in his way.

Walker: Those runs were super competitive. Everything was well organized, well run, and we played with referees.

There were days when there were 35 pros! If you lose a game, you may have to sit two games to get back on the court. That’s how deep the competition [was].

So many guys in the gym could do so many things, but it was still traditional because, at that time, centers were still relevant. Mike picked his team, we’d pick our team, and it’s let’s go.

Sandiford-Artest: That was MJ and Tim Grover’s gym, so I’m assuming they made the rules — definitely even teams.

Crawford: I’m just a young dude; it wasn’t like he was stacking his team. I would’ve been one of the last picks just based on how young I was.

The next time I went, Tim Grover was calling me saying, “MJ’s waiting on you. He’s waiting to start the game until you get here.”

From that moment on? We didn’t lose one single game for two straight summers. We never lost. Never.

Richardson: I can neither confirm nor deny that. It got competitive.

Walker: [Laughs] Nah, they lost, but Mike won a lot. The days that Jamal was there? Now, that could be true. But I took pride; I wasn’t going to lose every day. But I got a few wins, too, now.

Sandiford-Artest: Mike was winning games for sure. He averaged 25! But that first year? You should’ve seen him in the gym; I thought he was going to average 35. That’s how nice MJ was in the gym.

Walker: We played every day at 2 p.m. for two or three hours. People would want to come in and watch, but Tim Grover ran the gym with an iron fist. He was really big on who we brought in, so we had to create a list.

Pierce: We would play cards after at Antoine’s house, and he was talking about it. Him and Oakley were in the gym, and he was looking like he was gonna come back. It was every day. Weights, pickup games. He was killing.

Walker: It was shit-talking and great basketball. You looked forward to getting up in the morning because you wanted to have bragging rights for that day. The friendships and relationships that were built from that? We spent a lot of time off the court.

Even as a salaried executive and part-owner of the Washington Wizards, Chicago was still home for Michael Jordan.

Having spent 15 years in the Windy City as a player, fans could still sometimes catch Mike flying around town in a sports car, traveling from his historic mansion to the private runs at Hoops Chicago.

While those around town had no idea just what Mike was up to back home, those at the gym were well aware that Mike was all the way back to being Mike.

Crawford: He was just on a whole different level, and you could walk into the gym and see that.

One day, MJ wore an all-yellow Jordan outfit with some yellow Jordans that probably still haven’t come out with a yellow Ferrari outside to match.

Walker: I don’t know if he did that purposely, but Mike was always one of those ones with 20 cars. We all had different cars, but nobody had the Michael Jordan collection.

Mike had the first Ferraris, Porsches, and all that stuff. I don’t think he ever said it was color-coordinated, but it probably seemed that way. I’m not gonna lie; he had all the fancy cars.

Jay-Z and Beyoncé came into town, and they ended up spending the weekend with us. Worldwide Wes brought them to the gym, and they hung out and watched us work out.

Crawford: Uncle Wes was sitting outside of a black truck. When I finally got to him, a window rolled down, and it’s Jay-Z. I literally backed up and said, “Oh, shit!“

Walker: Mike would have them back at the house, and we’d have a little cookout. Since 2001, Jay-Z kept Michael Jordan’s name in a verse. I think it’s because they built a relationship after that.

Mike was more of a people person then. He felt very comfortable at the time. He wasn’t walking around with security guards.

Crawford: His restaurant was next door, and he’d walk with no security. People would drive by and almost crash, screaming, “There’s MJ!”

I loved other players, but nobody like him. It still doesn’t seem real.

Walker: Those are moments that we’ll remember for the rest of our lives.

Nichols: Once he started the practices and invite-only workouts? You kind of knew.

Be sure to tune in on Wednesday for Part 2 of Boardroom’s deep dive into Michael Jordan’s ascension into the Wizards front office.

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LSU’s Mikaylah Williams is Jordan Brand’s Newest Face of NIL 

The post No Bull: The Business Behind Michael Jordan’s Front Office Ascent appeared first on Boardroom.

Last offseason, NBA executives, media moguls, and prized prospects descended on Las Vegas in the heat of free agency.

As July temperatures topped 115°, players of All-Star status and admins with six-figure salaries sweated out pitch meetings, setting up contract conversations and icy negotiations inside air-conditioned hotel suites.

All the while, Adam Silver and his colleagues waited with bated breath as Victor Wembenyama took center stage at the NBA Summer League, televised on ESPN and streaming on the $24 billion network’s app.

For those sporting suits that Nevada night, the stakes were higher than 7-5. An impending NBA TV deal rumored to touch $75 billion was — and still is — on the table for Silver and execs at Amazon, Apple, ESPN, and any bidder willing to spend.

While the world watched Wemby take his first shots in a Spurs uniform, talent scouts in the broadcast business centered on another viral sensation. Standing shy of 6 feet and having no college experience, Chicago’s own Kenny Beecham became the belle of the ball behind the scenes in Vegas.

“This was our first time to be free agents,” Beecham told Boardroom when recalling his hot months on the open market.

For those wondering why a Summer League soiree would take place over a 26-year-old talent in street clothes, it’s time to get familiar.

Making a name for himself as a YouTube creator and building his brand in Enjoy Basketball, Beecham is a 10-year veteran in the content space. Across channels, he’s created over 2,000 videos and amassed a billion views.

Because of this, Beecham became the center of attention for notable networks looking to put their best foot forward when entering basketball’s big bidding war over TV and streaming rights. That summer in Vegas, big wigs across cable, audio, and all platforms met with Beecham’s team to strike a deal dead set on securing hoop content’s King of Gen Z.

“We spent a considerable amount of time speaking to different networks and production companies,” Enjoy Basketball co-founder Cody Hock told Boardroom. “Those conversations started months ago and culminated relatively recently with Omaha and ESPN.”

Agreeing to a partnership with Peyton Manning‘s production company and Walt Disney’s $24 billion sports network, Kenny Beecham and Enjoy Basketball’s Through the Wire podcast will be rebranded as Numbers on the Board. Bringing along his friends, Kenny’s camp will work directly with Omaha Productions — a content company oozing with momentum.

“They just came off the success of Quarterback on Netflix,” Enjoy Basketball co-founder Cole Hock told Boardroom. “The more we kept talking, the more it made sense.”

Additionally, the distribution deal puts them under an ESPN umbrella, rapidly expanding into alternative broadcasts, branded content, and other new media avenues.

“The opportunities are endless,” Cody said.

Speaking to the power players at Enjoy Basketball, Boardroom breaks down what the year of leveling up looks like for Kenny Beecham and his prized partners.

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Windy City Content Machine

Kenny Beecham was born on Oct. 4, 1996, in Chicago.

Completing his first sentences by the time the Bulls had won their last championship, basketball was long in the blood of the young creative.

“I’ve been making content for over a decade at this point,” Kenny said. “Originally, it was just for the fun of it. There was no YouTube partnership program; I just watched other people make content, and it was mostly around gaming.”

Now 27 years old, the man behind a billion video views is still the same kid creating content in his basement.

“Traditionally, you go to college for a journalism degree,” said Kenny. “You start in a film room, and you do that for 10 years before you even get a shot at linear or radio. I don’t have a college degree. I didn’t do any internship.”

Such a path to online fame is not unusual in today’s creator economy. Still, it’s one of organic growth that rarely bears meaningful fruit in the sports media landscape dominated mostly by major networks, player podcasts, and storied newspapers.

It’s a path particular to Kenny, and likely that of future creators to follow.

“I know for sure that there are people that come after me that are going to be ten times better than me,” Kenny said. “But I want people to know there are different ways to get into the space.”

No doubt, plenty of people know Kenny’s content and creative path. Over a million subscribers can count on new uploads from Kenny multiple times a week.

Just like the league he covers, the broadcast business has gotten younger and faster.

“Every single day, we’re doing something new,” said Kenny. “A new follower, a new DM, a new company. It’s going really, really fast.”

The pace of play is real for someone constantly feeding fans and tirelessly keeping up with 30 franchises partaking in an 82-game season. Every evening at 6 p.m. sharp, Kenny’s bunkered down in his office or basement, zeroed in on at least two live games. When the sun rises the following morning, he’s back at it, catching up on the other 12 outings.

When it all adds up, that’s 2,460 games in an NBA campaign, plus the playoffs. That’s not even accounting for all the time spent filming, editing, unboxing partner packages, and ensuring his skills on the sticks in 2K are sharp.

Despite his various creative endeavors, it’s still ball above all.

“I have an entire document of every single game I’ve watched this season,” said Kenny. “I take notes, put questions I might want to see answered, and I dive into a few games a night.”

All the hours of watching game tapes and doing research have paid off. In a YouTube economy that sees creators steadily sprinting up a treadmill on an incline, Kenny’s not huffing and puffing out of fatigue or for attention. His honest opinions and appreciation for the game’s intricacies have created a community that tunes into every video, even if they don’t align with each angle.

“It’s hard to have an NBA opinion or sports fan base that rocks with your content to a whole new level,” said Kenny. “I see so many times, ‘Kenny, I don’t agree with you. But I respect what you’re saying.’ I read through my comments all the time.”

Already a decade in the game, Kenny’s come to a point where he doesn’t harp on the negative noise, nor does he put it out.

“I try to be constructive but recognize all the cool things,” Kenny said. “I’ve found a viewer base that shares that same sentiment.”

A viewer base that includes thousands of Gen Z hoop fans, dozens of NBA All-Stars, and a handful of execs at ESPN.

Eyeballs in Bristol

When ESPN chairman Joe Pitaro thumbs through First Take ratings and streaming subscribers, viral video statistics that once seemed vapid suddenly hold more weight.

Amid a cord-cutting era, networks like ESPN rely on new platforms, alternate broadcasts, and personality-driven programming to remain relevant to fragmented audiences and potential partners. Adam Silver and Kenny Beecham are sitting on opposite ends of the same list of partners.

The NBA is nearing the end of a $24 billion deal with Walt Disney that grants broadcast rights to ESPN and ABC. Already, both networks are utilizing alternative broadcasting streams to make the most out of their 100 regular season games and their piece of the NBA Playoffs and Finals.

When it comes to linear ratings, the NBA is nowhere near the NFL in dominance as a live TV destination. However, the NBA excels in social media, streaming services, and a Gen Z audience.

“The NBA has a younger-skewing fan base that is more liable to be accessed via a streaming platform,” former NBA executive and sports media consultant Ed Desser recently told Bloomberg. “You’ve got to fish where the fish are.”

Swimming in the perfect pond is Kenny’s collective.

The Enjoy Basketball brand itself boasts over half a million fans, proving profitable through merchandise, YouTube revenue, and branded content. Additionally, it circulates a three-times-a-week newsletter that points to the potential of Kenny’s fans aging gracefully with his youthful content.

It’s a territory that even basketball’s highest-profile talking heads heading into 2024 weren’t building when they were in their 20s.

“Kenny owns that Gen Z demographic,” Cody said. “The rest of those guys? They have an audience that skews a little bit older. He’s done a great job of building a community and developing that deep parasocial relationship online.”

Since declaring the partnership with ESPN and Omaha, the announcement video has already amassed over one million views in less than 24 hours. These are figures not new to Kenny and Enjoy Basketball but instantly exciting for the bosses back in Bristol.

“Everyone we talked to believed in us as a show,” Kenny said. “When you create content, you get numbers, but you don’t always internalize that there are actual people behind the numbers, and some of those people might be higher-ups at companies.”

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“ESPN was a massive draw for Kenny and the guys,” said Cody. “It was something we always wanted to do. Surrounding Kenny with a brand was the natural move for his career.”

For Kenny and Enjoy Basketball, the ESPN backing brings in a wealth of licensed NBA highlights and access to a Rolodex of podcast guests.

“The resources go up,” said Kenny. “We have the opportunity to use more game footage. We’re still trying to figure out the levels to the new resources, but what we’ve seen so far? It’s pretty cool.”

For ESPN, Kenny offers an invaluable co-sign and perspective as they continue to grow their audience and content concerning the massive NBA media rights deal. So far, leaning left has already proved fruitful for football and ratings, as a whole.

“The McAfee signing has been a revelation for them,” Cody said. “The new wave of sports media is personality-driven, bringing alternative audiences into their mainstream audience.”

Industry Audible

In February 2022, Omaha Productions inked an agreement with ESPN and The Walt Disney Company.

Led by Peyton Manning — a talent who’s had tremendous success as a quarterback in the NFL and a host on SNL — the Hall of Famer’s ability to improvise on the fly found new form through the breakout success of Monday Night Football with Peyton and Eli in 2021.

Since then, the Super Bowl champ has continued to climb creatively. At ESPN, Omaha has helped ideate alternate broadcasts for UFC, college football, and even golf. Outside of Bristol, the production company caught fire through 2023’s Quarterback on Netflix.

When it came to courting basketball’s most creative content creator, game instantly recognized game.

“We clicked immediately,” Kenny said.

“They understand the power of creators today,” said Cody. “For them to add production value and a lens on distribution? It’s very mutually beneficial.”

On the outside, a 47-year-old football great from New Orleans and a 27-year-old YouTuber from Chicago might not seem to have much in common. Dig deeper, and a shared ethos of creativity, sense of humor, and sports smarts place each entity and their respective brands as two peas in a pod.

“Our whole mission at Enjoy Basketball is no hot takes,” said Cole. “Let’s focus on the game, uplifting the players, and positivity. Omaha stands for the same values, and they loved our mission.”

Even so, it was the former NFL MVP who had to pitch a content creator 20 years his junior.

“One of the things that made us make our decision was a text message from Peyton,” said Kenny. “He mentioned how big it was for him to bring people to his team that are about empowering the game. When you watch The Manningcast and a quarterback throws an interception? They don’t look at it just like this quarterback messed up, they figure out why it happened and praise the defensive scheme.”

This fall, the stars aligned.

Months after the free agency frenzy in Vegas, the Through the Wire cast and Omaha founder met in Colorado to produce their first project: the trailer for Numbers on the Board.

“We were in Denver for the ring ceremony for the Nuggets, and we got the opportunity to shoot with Peyton,” begins Kenny. “Me and all the guys were nervous because Peyton is one of the greatest of all time. He one-taked every single line.”

After the shoot in the Mile High City, Peyton chopped it up with Kenny and crew about hoops, football, and life. From there, the set was stamped, but the expectations also became real.

“Most people recognize that Omaha and ESPN are the cream of the crop,” said Kenny. “When you grow up, you turn on the TV for sports, and ESPN is the place you go to first. It was always a childhood dream to work for the network. You see Stuart Scott, Stephen A. Smith? Man, one day, it would be cool to be in that infrastructure, and we’re there now.”

Still Striving

Kenny Beecham is officially in the big leagues, but his ascent is far from solo.

Backed by the Hock brothers, who have managed him for four years, the Enjoy Basketball x ESPN x Omaha Productions podcast, Numbers on the Board, will still feature Pierre Andresen, Mike Heard, and Darrick Miller. Though NotB in both YouTube and audio forms is the foundation of this new partnership, the creation of additional digital shows, alternate broadcasts, and branded content is also on the table.

“We’re going to play our strengths first and foremost, and that’s YouTube,” Cody said. “There’s a lot of conversations about doing interesting things on linear for the show and Kenny.”

For those unfamiliar with showbiz lingo, linear means TV. In this case, TV means the ESPN network we all grew up on.

While branching out through Beecham and his Enjoy Basketball roster are all part of the Disney company’s grander plan to remain relevant to the youth through streaming services and online platforms, the head of the 44-year-old snake is still sizzling Stephen A. Smith moments on First Take and live broadcast of NBA, NFL, and NCAA action.

Ahead of the deal, Kenny has already appeared alongside Stephen A. on First Take after guesting on the industry vet’s podcast. The 12 minutes on TV still register as groundbreaking and surreal to Kenny, though his performance proved him right at home.

Like Smith, the team at Enjoy Basketball already views Kenny as a franchise player on any platform.

“We see him as a generational talent,” Cody said. “The distribution and eyeballs we’re going to attract going forward? The rest of the world that doesn’t know him already is going to be like, ‘This is my guy.’ The way he’s covering the game is really unique, he’s a special talent.”

In recent years, Kenny and his team at Enjoy Basketball have built a brand that not only hits homers on YouTube videos but has grown massively through newsletters and branded apparel. For the Hock brothers, the ultimate goal is to make Kenny the North Star of Enjoy Basketball and create a universe similar to The Ringer or Meadowlark Media.

“Most of them are personality-driven at the top,” said Cody. “We see similarities between Kenny sitting in that same position and building a network and distribution center around him. How do we put a brand around him similar to Pat McAfee, Bill Simmons, and Dan LeBetard? How do we build his career sitting atop as the talent but allow a platform for him to produce and direct?”

By working with ESPN and Omaha, Kenny will be front-facing on a bigger stage while still having the space to curate Enjoy Basketball content behind the scenes.

It’s the next chapter in elevating Enjoy Basketball as a business and Kenny Beecham as a thought leader.

“I’ve always strived for what seem like unattainable goals,” Kenny said. “Now, my goal is to be one of the top minds in the basketball world. I think that having these ties to Omaha and ESPN is the best way to make that a reality. There’s only so much I can do without a larger platform, and ESPN is the largest platform I can get.”

With the backing of ESPN, he has a chance to be recognized as one of roundball’s best philosophers in 2024. Perhaps “one of” isn’t ambitious enough.

“I want to be No. 1,” said Kenny. “It’s gonna be a journey, it’s gonna be extremely hard, and it’s gonna be extremely unlikely. But I feel like if I don’t have a goal that’s unlikely? Then I’m selling myself short.”

To be No. 1, he’ll have to continue to outwork and outpace the competition. To be recognized as No. 1 by industry peers and national media, he’ll have to increase his airtime on ESPN’s most prized live TV real estate.

The latter is perhaps the biggest challenge in a space dominated by journalists twice his age and athletes already known nationally for their court resumes. Kenny is cognizant of the challenge but not deterred.

“I didn’t go to school to be a journalist; I’m just an NBA fan that makes videos in my basement,” said Kenny. “I don’t know how much I’ll be respected in the linear world, considering I don’t have that background that most people fight for. But I’m going to try my damndest to get the respect of everybody just by being good at what I do.”

Just days into the new job, Kenny remains the same relatable hoops fan despite the elevated platform. The morning of our conversation, he’s still reviewing notes from a slate of 14 NBA games, headlined by an instant classic matchup between Victor Wembanyama and Giannis Antetokounmpo.

The generational battle brought out the best of both competitors, each elevating their intensity and debuting moves unseen thanks to the primetime platform blessed by brighter lights.

“I had a feeling it was going to be a great game,” said Kenny. “There’s something about national TV.”

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LSU’s Mikaylah Williams is Jordan Brand’s Newest Face of NIL 

The post Kenny Beecham’s Next Big Move appeared first on Boardroom.

When Michael Jordan announced Brand Jordan in September 1997, he had already won five championships in the NBA and two Olympic gold medals.

Scoring his own subsidiary under Nike’s then-$9.1 billion umbrella, Jordan Brand was primed to make it rain immediately. Upon launch, the Jumpman sought to fly higher internationally and across arenas, estimated to make $300 million alone in Mike’s first year as CEO and last season in the Windy City.

No longer would greatness sell solely from the Chicago Bulls shooting guard.

Instead, the brand would blossom beyond basketball through a slew of athletes and programs poised to carry on his legacy.

Twenty-seven years later, the master plan put together by MJ, Phil Knight, Howard White, Larry Miller, and many others came to fruition on Monday night.

The $6.6 billion sportswear brand achieved greatness in a new field as the Jordan-endorsed University of Michigan won the College Football Playoff final, winning its first national championship since 1997.

Adorning MJ’s emblem in all its glory, the title-toting team from Ann Arbor was outfitted in Air Jordan apparel as far as the eye could see.

From sideline hats to receiver gloves, bubble jackets to championship tees, maize and blue items hosted the infamous block “M” and flying Jordan silhouette from the opening kickoff to the trophy ceremony.

Every bit of benefit from the brand’s $169 million endorsement was visible and victorious on primetime television for hours on ESPN and through highlights intended to last forever.

It was the first time a Jordan Brand-repped school had taken home the trophy in collegiate football. However, it was not the only time MJ had officially outfitted champions of a new ilk.

On the heels of Jim Harbaugh‘s team winning it all in Air Jordan, Boardroom breaks down the history of Jordan Brand’s growing championship pedigree that’s expanding almost annually.

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North Carolina Tar Heels Men’s Basketball

In 1997, Michael Jordan jumped into direct competition with Converse, Adidas, Reebok, and Nike by becoming an on-court sponsor of college basketball’s best.

The inaugural Jordan Brand universities included Cincinnati, St. John’s, Cal, and North Carolina A&T. Two years later, Mike made the obvious money move by inking an agreement with his alma mater, North Carolina.

Since becoming a Brand Jordan basketball program, the Tar Heels have cut down the nets three times.

In 2005, Raymond Felton and Sean May restored powder blue prominence by beating Nike-sponsored Illinois in retro and performance offerings made by Mike.

Four years later, Tyler Hansborough helped the Heels demolish Swoosh-sponsored Michigan State for another natty title that placed Air Jordan sneakers on the ladder steps.

Recently, in 2017, it was Theo Pinson who helped UNC knock-off Nike school Gonzaga en route to the school’s sixth national championship in men’s basketball.

A year later, North Carolina re-upped with the Portland power for $60 million, ensuring that the school’s basketball and football programs would continue to wear the Jumpman.

All in all, UNC men’s basketball boasts six national championships. While the first three were won in Converse, the last three have been won in Jordan.

Over the brand’s nearly three decades, seven schools signed to Jordan Brand have competed in the men’s National Championship.

Had the Kansas Jayhawks signed with MJ as expected in 2005, that number would’ve increased to 10 of the last 18 outings.

Michigan Wolverines Men’s Football

More was at stake in the 2024 CFP National Championship than just trophies or bragging rights.

Adidas and Jordan Brand were looking to win their first NCAA football championship since the birth of the playoff era. Both brands bet big on Michigan and Washington, with said schools holding major weight regionally and nationally where the gridiron is concerned.

Ultimately, Jordan won the battle and the bragging rights, making good on their part of the $169 million Michigan endorsement deal signed in 2015.

“The first weekend that we launched, MJ and all of us were out there,” Jordan Brand chairman Larry Miller told Boardroom in 2022. “On that weekend, [Michigan] sold more products at the bookstore than they had the whole year before.”

Keep in mind, the opening weekend for the Michigan marriage with Jordan Brand was in September 2016 — just shy of two decades since Jordan Brand originally launched.

Led by defensive hybrid Jabril Peppers and coached by Jim Harbaugh, the inaugural Jumpman x UM squad was solid, going 10-3 and losing narrowly to Florida State in the Orange Bowl.

“Michigan was a perfect match for what they represent and what we brought to the table,” Miller said. “That opened up the idea of Jordan Brand on the football field.”

In the first season with Jordan Brand, Michigan’s most watched games came at the hands of losses to Ohio State and FSU. Since then, the Wolverines brand has ascended. Michigan has won four division titles, made the College Football Playoff three times, and beat rival Ohio State three straight years (after Harbaugh’s squad lost his first five matchups against the Buckeyes).

Just months ago, in 2023, that third consecutive UM win over OSU pulled in over 19 million viewers, with the Wolverines all in Jumpman gear.

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By beating both Nike-laced Alabama and Adidas-outfitted Washington in the 2024 College Football Playoff, Jordan Brand brought in eyeballs and equity to its emblem and football business. No longer is the brand known nationally for just red retros but rather for schools and sports of all sorts.

In a quarter where most companies reel after holiday shopping fatigue, Jordan Brand will move millions of units in just footwear but celebratory t-shirts and hats tied to Michigan’s wins in the Rose Bowl and National Championship.

All this begs the question: What’s the next entity to be like Mike and win it all in Air Jordan?

Who’s Next?

Like Michael Jordan himself, Jordan Brand beckoned individual accolades before attaining total team dominance.

Since MJ made the full-time transition from SG to CEO, Jordan Brand has hit home runs with athletes like Derek Jeter, Kawhi Leonard, and Maya Moore, all of whom have won Finals MVPs as Air Jordan ambassadors. In unendorsed fashion, standout collegiate athletes such as Richard Hamilton, Kemba Walker, and Anthony Davis have won NCAA Final Four MOP honors with Air Jordan sneakers on their feet.

Still, school and team-wide deals have proven to be the biggest builders regarding Jordan Brand’s expansion in the global apparel business.

Overseas, Jordan Brand has outfitted Paris Saint-Germain since 2018. Although the club has won numerous domestic titles since donning the Jumpman, an outright European championship evades them.

In racing, the Michael Jordan and Denny Hamlin-owned 23XI racing team has high hopes of taking home the NASCAR Cup Series. Bubba Wallace and Tyler Reddick remain competitive around the track, but a Driver’s Championship count still sits at zero.

Like the Michigan Wolverines on Monday night, Jordan Brand’s best chance at tasting champagne is by way of its aggressive college sponsorship strategy.

Currently, the Michigan Wolverines, North Carolina Tar Heels, Florida Gators, Oklahoma Sooners, UCLA Bruins, Morehouse Tigers, Norfolk State Spartans, Houston Cougars, Cincinnati Bearcats, San Diego State Aztecs, Marquette Golden Eagles, Georgetown Hoyas, and Howard Bison all wear Jordan Brand in basketball competition.

Of that group, Michigan, North Carolina, Florida, Howard, and Oklahoma all lace up Jordan Brand for football. Heading into 2024, Oklahoma, Michigan, Florida, and North Carolina all have Top 40 recruiting classes.

Still, time and talent suggest that another natty on the hardwood could come first.

As of January 2024, the UCLA Bruins women’s basketball team and Houston Cougars men’s basketball team are both ranked No. 2 in the nation, respectively. The Lady Bruins have never won a national title, nor has Jordan Brand ever claimed top team honors in the women’s collegiate game. Led by Kiki Rice — Jordan Brand’s first NIL athlete — both notions could change come April.

On the men’s side, Jordan Brand currently claims a quarter of the Top 25 rankings in NCAA basketball. In a year where the field appears wide open, a school styled in Air Jordans could certainly run the table, with Houston, UCLA, and North Carolina all appearing in the Final Four in the last three seasons.

Theoretically, talent on the NCAA hardwood will, in some part, be fed by the likes of Link and Oak Hill Academy — both national champions on the high school level backed by Jordan Brand.

To start 2024, Jordan Brand proves brilliant beyond basketball by winning the college football championship.

Endorsing a school miles away from where the Bad Boys Pistons play and taking home the title in Texas, where football is king, nothing about Michael Jordan’s competitive appetite suggests he’s satisfied.

Flanked by Travis Scott, Derek Jeter, Anthony DiCosmo, Reggie Saunders, and Stephen A. Smith, MJ’s rare public appearance at the bowl game in Houston highlights winning it all still matters most.

Coming off a year when Jordan Brand soared to No. 2 in the global sportswear market and amassed $6.6 billion in revenue, it’s a gigantic leap since the first steps taken during that Last Dance season.

Already tackling football and ascending in basketball, MJ’s love for golf, racing, baseball, and business continues to drive a billionaire who hasn’t hit the hardwood in over 20 years.

It’s another championship ring for the hero who retired with a handful.

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The post Jordan Brand’s Booming Championship Roster appeared first on Boardroom.

On Monday night, the Michigan Wolverines and Washington Huskies face off in Houston for the College Football Championship.

Back in Portland, much more is at stake.

For the first time ever, Jordan Brand and Adidas will battle head-to-head for football bragging rights. Despite the Swoosh subsidiary’s start on the Chicago courts and the German juggernaut’s soccer pitch prominence, both billion-dollar brands have invested hundreds of millions in American football.

Since reuniting with Nike, Inc. in 2015 for a then record-setting $169 million deal, the Jumpman-branded Michigan football team has won four division titles and made the College Football Playoffs three times.

On Monday night, the Wolverines have a chance to hoist the national title trophy for the first time since 1997 — the same year Charles Woodson won the Heisman trophy and the same year Nike introduced Jordan Brand.

Across the gridiron, the stakes are just as high.

In 2019, the Washington Huskies left a long-term partnership with Nike in favor of $119 million from Adidas. Since then, they’ve won two division titles and find themselves in the national title game for the first time since 1991.

Just the same, Adidas is back in the conversation with college football’s best for the first time since Tee Martin led Tennessee in 1998.

Over the last quarter century, it’s been an uphill battle for both brands trying to gain traction in the amateur trenches.

For decades, Nike has dominated the Saturday sport, absolutely owning the college game to the tune of outfitting 23 of the last 24 National Championship teams. The lone exception during said stint was Under Armour, sneaking in a single title by way of Cam Newton and an Auburn deal then valued at over $36 million.

In a playoff landscape loaded with sizeable schools and lucrative fan bases, the No. 2 and No. 3 footwear companies in the world have already upset No. 1 Nike.

In last week’s semi-final, Michigan dethroned an Alabama squad backed by a $63 million Nike deal — one validated by six national titles in the Nick Saban era.

Later that night, Washington did their part as they defeated a Texas team that possesses a $250 million partnership with Nike — once reported to be the biggest deal in collegiate athletics history.

So, just what does Monday night’s matchup mean to the most powerful executives in sportswear? Boardroom breaks down the game within the game.

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Midwest Swing

Throughout its 25-year history, few endorsement deals have paid off for Jordan Brand as well as that of the Michigan Wolverines.

While signature shoe deals with Carmelo Anthony and b-ball buildouts for Cincinnati have kept the legacy line young and relevant since MJ’s retirement, the brand’s big-picture vision to expand beyond basketball is crystalized on a mass scale by that of The Victors.

In 2015 when Jordan signed Michigan away from Adidas, the Jumpman umbrella entered the wild world of college football by way of a ravenous fanbase rich with history.

The returns were immediate.

“One thing that jumps out is the whole Michigan deal,” Jordan Brand chairman Larry Miller told Boardroom in 2022. “That helped us move the needle when it came to football because up to that point, we had football athletes that were signed but our logo couldn’t show up on the NFL field. When the Michigan deal happened, that opened up the idea of Jordan Brand on the football field.”

While the Air Jordan empire had long-laced NFL superstars such as Randy Moss, Warren Sapp, and Terrell Owens, inking the Ann Arbor institution meant more than signing on a traditional talent or even a mega-market team.

“Michigan was a perfect match for what they represent and what we brought to the table,” Miller said. “The first weekend that we launched, MJ and all of us were out there. On that weekend, they sold more products at the bookstore than they had the whole year before.”

Since the days of Desmond Howard, the University of Michigan has remained resident in the top ten merchandise sales among schools, ascending in recent years thanks to prominent programs on the gridiron and a loyal base beyond its college town corridors.

Simultaneously, the parallel rise of Jordan Brand as not just a footwear purveyor but a lifestyle brand in both a fashion and licensed sense has only added buzz to the multi-million dollar union.

To see both the block ‘M’ and Jumpman logo on National Championship t-shirts, hats, and hoodies, Jim Harbaugh and Jordan will have to take down an undefeated squad from Seattle.

West Coast Bias

For 20 years, the University of Washington was a Nike school.

Located 180 miles from the Beaverton brand’s campus, the Huskies sported the Swoosh, outfitting the likes of Budda Baker, Corey Dillon, and Lawyer Milloy. The Swoosh was synonymous with Washington’s purple and gold until only years ago.

In 2019, Adidas spent $119 million on making the Huskies their West Coast flagship.

No longer outfitting UCLA and having an extra $80 million freed up thanks to Michigan jumping ship, the Three Stripes sought UW to restore order for the brand in their US backyard of the Pacific Northwest. Thus far, the big bet has been worthwhile on the field as the Huskies have gone 40-16 in Adidas.

Timing, as they say, is everything as Adidas arrived at Husky Stadium right on the eve of NIL and transfer portal prospect Michael Penix Jr.

Already an Adidas athlete by way of playing previously at the Three Stripes-sponsored Indiana University, the star quarterback hit the ground running at Washington, leading the FBS in passing yards in 2022.

That single season in Seattle proved enough for Adidas to invest even more green in purple when they signed Penix the following fall as the brand’s first football student-athlete endorser.

“I couldn’t be happier to be teaming up with the Adidas family, I’ve been in the Three Stripes my entire college career,” Penix said in a statement at the time. “I’m appreciative of their investment in my university, my teammates, and myself.”

Joined in NIL royalty by his favorite target, Huskie wideout Rome Odunze, Penix Jr. and his teammate both balled out in their first official season as individual Adidas athletes, climbing NFL draft boards while seeing their purple Adidas jerseys sold at student bookstores.

Though Washington may lack the national fanfare and apparel sales of its opponent across the field on Monday, they have something Michigan does not: three future first-round picks projected to make major noise on Sundays.

For the Huskies, it all starts and ends with Penix.

For both brands, the battle in the trenches has been taking place for decades before the Monday night matchup.

Eye for an Eye

As idealized in big-screen fashion by Ben Affleck, Adidas infamously missed out on Michael Jordan in 1984, paving the way for Nike to become the $162 billion brand it is today.

While that battle was lost in the boardroom and thus the basketball court, the Swoosh’s massive market share has allowed them to own sportswear across categories, namely college football as seen by the last 25 years of dominance.

On Monday night, the Phil Knight proper will not be represented in Swoosh styling thanks to Washington defeating Texas and Michigan magnifying the Jumpman logo.

The sliding doors scenario of Mike not joining Adidas in ’84 and Michigan leaving the Three Stripes in 2015 all set the stage for the brand battles that took place in 2023 and show no signs of cooling down in 2024.

In August 2023, Statista published data stating that Jordan had leaped Adidas as the second most popular footwear brand regarding global market share.

Across categories, Jordan Brand’s big bet on youth, fashion, and, yes, even football, had paid off in a big way on a global scale. MJ’s empire posted a career-high in revenue, racking up $6.6 billion on the way to overtaking Adidas.

Despite the Three Stripes coming in third, the brand was not without wins.

In November 2023, Adidas CEO Bjørn Gulden turned the Footwear News Awards into The Source Awards. Stepping on stage to accept honors for the Adidas Samba winning Shoe of the Year, the man in the Stripes sent out shots.

“To the people from Nike here: Watch out,” Gulden warned. “We have a lot in the pipeline.”

Following Gulden’s swipe at the Swoosh, Jordan Brand quickly proved their brother’s keeper.

“I want to say to the brands and folks that called us out earlier: Bring it on,” Jordan Brand chairman Larry Miller retorted. “We’re ready for you.”

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On Monday night, the battle between the basketball brand and fútbol force will enter a new arena.

It’s an odd twist in a 40-year rivalry that’s touched Michael Jordan and Patrick Ewing, Landon Donovan and David Beckham, and even Pusha-T and Drake.

It’s a chance for two titans that have fought over the No. 2 spot for the last decade to become No. 1 in a space neither know as native.

It’s a war in which no exec will take a single snap, but all employees will take personally.

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The post The $300 Million Michigan vs. Washington Sneaker War appeared first on Boardroom.

‘Hybrid work’ has multiple meanings in 2023.

For the most influential icons in pop culture, it means making moves and making bank in industries or arenas non-native to what made them famous. This past year, said partnerships took new shapes and took new heights.

From Travis Scott taking over the country club to Taylor Swift becoming the biggest name in football, 2023’s bingo card was more bizarre and brilliant than any analyst could’ve predicted.

To celebrate the year that just was, Boardroom breaks down eight of the biggest crossover moments in culture and commerce that defied expectations and creatively paved new ways for how icons operate in business.

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Pharrell’s Ascension at Louis Vuitton

When business was done on Blackberriess and Motorola Two-Way Pagers, high fashion was already calling Pharrell Williams.

Buzzed by Marc Jacobs — then creative director at Louis Vuitton — the musical multi-hyphenate was chosen to collaborate on a range of Millionaire sunglasses. Twenty years later, a new lens at LVMH finds Pharrell as the fearless leader for the heralded house.

Following the footsteps of the late, great Virgil Abloh, Pharrell’s appointment as LV leadership speaks to many shifts since his mid-aughts shades.

The rise of American — and African American — design directors at European luxury brands has been bubbling over the last decade, with Pharrell leading a list that still needs to grow.

Importantly, the appointment aligns with a more connected world where fashion and culture are less separated by hue or hemisphere.

Additionally, it erases the stigma that ‘celebrity’ is indignant to high fashion, proving all arts are the arts.

Always having an ear for what’s next sonically, Pharrell’s feel for what’s next aesthetically has positioned him as an ideal figurehead for where Louis Vuitton is now and where it’s going.

His ability to see past gender and genre has already led to creative campaigns, spot-on seedings, and an introductory show soundtracked by The Clipse.

Just as Abloh knew the symbiotic relationship between music and fashion far better than pattern-cutting or a Central Saint Martin’s degree could’ve got him, Pharrell’s exposure to creatives of all ilks is reshaping a $407 billion brand at the speed of sound.

The Family Business of Rihanna & A$AP Rocky

Bad Girl RiRi and Pretty Flacko have been making babies and millions for the past two years.

All the while, fans of each artist anxiously await albums with no release date in sight for either. Nevertheless, the two touted musicians have made more noise than most despite the power couple releasing fewer singles than almost all.

Simply put, it’s in their genes — or rather, their jeans.

In 2023, Rihanna and A$AP Rocky dominated headlines and affected bottom lines by both how they dress and the way they dress. Historically, no two artists have been better at mixing high and low fashion in the most influential of manners.

The same can be said for the deals, moments, and moves they make as a power couple.

Example: Rihanna performed two times in 2023: the Super Bowl Halftime Show and the Oscars. At half field, draped in Loewe and Alaïa, the stage and apparel were both mass and avant-garde all at once. The medley of hits was enough to skyrocket streams, sell collaborations, and roll out the red carpet for a return to PUMA.

That same energy is epitomized by her proud partner. While fans didn’t get Don’t Be Dumb in 2023, Rocky’s lone music video for the Pharrell-produced “RIOT” doubled down as a creative campaign for Beats by Dre. The meme-inspired visual was vanguard per usual, once again proving that Rocky’s release method and partnership approach are always off-kilter. This proved poetic when a series of paparazzi photos involving the PMF was reappropriated as a campaign for Bottega Veneta.

So, will 2024 see new music or new children for Rihanna and Rocky? That remains unknown. What we can expect from both is high-level PUMA partnerships that span fútbol to Formula 1, more money from FENTY and Gucci, and visual moments – both candid and campaign – that move the needle as much or more than record residuals will.

AIR Hits a Critical Mass

When word got out that Ben Affleck and Matt Damon were making a movie about Nike courting Michael Jordan, the jury was hung among sneakerheads and casuals as if it’d be any good.

Surprise, surprise, it was awesome.

Amassing a 98% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes and critical acclaim, AIR rose to the ranks of one of the most loved movies of 2023.

By investing heavily in casting and set design, the sneaker story served as a time machine back to the ’80s that was fun, fast, and just accurate enough. It appealed to fanatics and average watchers alike, casting a wide net despite being what was once considered a niche story.

Audience aside, AIR also made its mark in how it was released. Scoring well at SXSW, the $90 million project was shown at major theatres in an era where only Marvel movies are meant to perform. Additionally, Amazon streaming support provided another income and viewing lane.

Like The Last Dance, another wrinkle in the Michael Jordan legacy provided even more energy to shoe sales in a halo sense as Jordan Brand eclipsed $6.6 billion in its most recent fiscal report.

Nike Basketball’s NYC Takeover

Events and apparel are seemingly where the money is at in 2023.

Nike — the world’s most famous footwear brand — may not be selling out arenas but they are going big where IRL moments are concerned. From pop-up activations across the world to grassroots sweat sessions in major markets, the Swoosh knows that to matter most to its core customers they have to exist more than just online.

Ironically enough, the 2023 Nike World Basketball Festival was the exclamation point and antithesis of it all.

Hosting hoops’ next generation of boys and girls in tournament play in the Big Apple, the $186 billion brand built a hardwood court in front of the Lincoln Center, showcasing the past, present, and future of basketball products while streaming the games.

Though the action on the court was worth watching in person, it was one viral moment online that set it all off.

Taking a photo for the ages, the likes of Kevin Durant, Victor Wembanyama, Dawn Staley, Travis Scott, Devin Booker, Rakim, Dirk Nowitzki, Scoop Jackson, Jason Kidd, Chase B, Lil Yachty, Sue Bird, Ja Morant, Jadakiss, and dozens of other legends all posed on center court.

It was a moment no one saw coming, bringing together decades of influential figures in hoops, hip-hop, and culture in one marquee event.

At a time when advertising feels like a lost art, Nike just did it in the most meta of ways.

Taylor Swift Sweeps the Nation

Men lie, women lie, numbers don’t.

If that’s the case, then Taylor Swift is the truth.

Hate it or love it, the country kid turned pop princess is the queen of selling out stadiums and making money off of music. She continues to crush physical sales at a time when even the biggest acts attain pennies off streams. The Eras Tour sold out more dates in the Superdome than the Saints did this season, set to amass even more money internationally in 2024.

While the music and theatrics were already enough to break the bank and amplify economies in every market she stopped at, the entire world stopped when America’s Sweetheart became entrenched in America’s Game.

Already infamous for dating A-list actors and Grammy Award-winning musicians, fans and bystanders collectively lost their minds when Swift began dating Travis Kelce. From a ratings standpoint, everyone ate — especially the star subject.

In today’s fragmented media landscape, most artists only own the timeline the day their album drops. Taylor on the other hand had national outlets covering her every move in a year where she only put out reissued releases.

Not too mention, it was all an encore to a $1 billion tour. Think selling out stadiums is impressive? Imagine making more noise nationally when appearing in the stands. Think the merch margins are good? Consider casually wearing a pair of New Balance 550s and stores selling out their stock.

When looking back at all the partnerships in 2023, Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce, or rather Taylor Swift x NFL, is about as big as it gets.

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Harlem Beats Bristol

Active athletes, retired rappers, and C-list comedians all have podcasts in 2023.

What few of them have is a studio show that positions them as pundits in a field they didn’t find fame in. In Feb. 2023, Cam’ron and Mase made a lane all their own in launching It Is What Is: an independently-produced sports’ news talk show that’s already incited a bidding war among buyers and a frenzy online.

By flipping the formula of First Take and Undisputed, Killa Cam and Murda Ma$e are giving fans exactly what they want but network TV could never provide: uncensored commentary cut with humor and context.

Rather than yell at each other for ratings or ride an agenda for acceptance, the Children of the Corn turned men on the mic are telling it like it is. Approaching half a million followers for the show’s IG account and the Come Talk 2 Me YouTube channel in less than ten months, the “Horse & Carriage” collaborators continue to rise to the top.

Music’s Superstars Takeover the Silver Screen

Superheroes and sequels are the surest things smoking when it comes to burning down the box office.

In 2023, another earner entered the chat: concert films.

Both Taylor Swift and Beyoncé rocked arenas all year long, creating commerce in every city they stopped in. While members of the Beyhive were known to budget thousands of dollars on flights, hotels, and outfits to see Mrs. Carter live, the long tail effect for those in attendance or living vicariously through social media was the return of the concert film.

This year, both Bey and Swift broke the bank by turning footage from their acclaimed tours to box office gold. Just the same, Travis Scott reverse-engineered the process by releasing a movie in accordance with his UTOPIA album as a means to set the stage for his CIRCUS MAXIMUS Tour.

Truth be told, the concept of a concert film had been around long before Beyoncé, Taylor, or Travis were born. However, the new stars putting a new spin on the old concept is a new business and perhaps a new precedent. Expect this trend to continue on the road, in theaters, and on streaming.

Cactus Jack Jumps into the Country Club

From Fortnite to Happy Meals, Travis Scott’s bread and butter in recent years has been feeding the youth collaborative product that applied his taste to consumer goods and experiences.

This year, Day 1 fans and new attendees to the party got their fix from concerts to clothing, music to movies. While the annual Air Jordan activations appealed to kids and adults alike, Travis’ most momentous collaborations in 2023 were targeted to a much more mature audience than those of previous years.

As a Nike partner, Travis parlayed his influence outside of the moshpit to take on tennis classics and golf spikes. From volleying with John McEnroe to taking swing lessons from Brooks Koepka, La Flame is slowly blazing a trail in markets saturated in wealth and staying power.

This timely ascent all came to a head in December by way of the Cactus Jack x Audemars Piguet Royal Oak: a $201,000 watch limited to 200 units. By adding collaborative cool to AP and amplifying it all with slightly more attainable merch, Travis proved that he could sell sneakers, sandwiches, and Swiss timepieces all in a matter of minutes.

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The post The ETCs Crossover: 2023’s Top Moments Bridging Sports, Entertainment & Fashion appeared first on Boardroom.

What do Kris Kringle, firefighters, and Kevin Durant all have in common?

They work on Christmas.

Since becoming an All-Star starter and NBA scoring champ, the league has leveraged KD as a mainstay for their marquee action each Dec. 25. This holiday season, Kevin will be partaking in his eleventh Christmas Day game.

The trend began in 2010 when the then-22-year-old talent led the Oklahoma City Thunder to a home win over the Denver Nuggets.

Playing in front of 18,000 fans in OKC and millions more on TV, Durant dominated all adversaries by dropping 44 points — the highest scoring total league-wide on the NBA’s biggest day of the year.

While KD stood out on the court and in box scores, his shoes shined even more. Debuting the Nike KD3 “Christmas” in his breakout performance, the bright yellow sneakers stamped Durant’s performance as not only a face of the league but a luminary at Nike.

Ascending as a priority at the Beaverton brand with his first signature shoe in 2008, Durant climbed the ladder at Nike each season through play and personality. It all exploded in 2010 when he opened the year with his whole roster in “Creamsicle” kicks, amplified to another level that August when he led Team USA to Gold in Turkey.

The success was christened in December when Durant formally found himself alongside Kobe Bryant and LeBron James as a member of the basketball brand’s Big Three.

The 2010 Nike Basketball “Stoplight” Pack positioned LeBron, KD, and Kobe as the crème de la crème of personality-driven performance footwear. It solidified Durant as a priority for Nike’s broader basketball business for years to come.

“It shows that he’s arrived,” Charles Terrell, then Pro Basketball Nike Field Representative, told Nick DePaula in 2010. “It’s kind of his coming out party. It’s our way of launching him internally and saying, ‘Hey, he’s our guy, and he’s prominent on holidays too.’”

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Playing off Christmas colors and inordinate drive, the LeBron 8 V2 “Run On Red,” KD3 “No Yield For Yellow,” and Kobe 6 “Green Means Go” all added to the seasonal excitement by branding basketball shoes as a Christmas gift in an on the nose sense.

In reality, it was a two-pronged play for the best marketing company in the world. Not only would the NBA’s elite debut Christmas colorways on national TV, but fans could grab or gift the same shoes as a sentimental moment.

In short order, the shoes sold out, with KD’s Yuletide yellow pair appearing under trees and on courts around the globe.

In the long run, it was a tipping point moment for a Golden Era of hardwood heat.

Although the shoes were meant to move, Nike Basketball likely didn’t expect that the coveted Christmas sneakers would hold the high ground in footwear folklore all year long and for decades to come. What they were acutely aware of was the momentum said shoes would start all season long surrounding signature shoes.

Basketball season was no longer tied to tryouts and summer camps. Rather, there were moments to celebrate all year long.

In a sense, the 2010 Nike Basketball “Stoplight” Pack set a precedent for aligning athletes on All-Star activations, Black History Month makeups, Easter iterations, and countless colorways for years to come.

For the first time since the mid-90s, Nike Basketball had the market in an absolute chokehold. The front half of the 2010s saw the Swoosh creating coveted classics that not only rose to the occasion on the court but created instant clout through casual crossover.

Over the last dozen years, the Nike KD3 “Christmas” has remained relevant and revered in OG form thanks to its rarity and aesthetic.

High-level hoopers on both sides of the ball — and in the tunnel — have dusted off the 2010 take when the lights get the brightest.

Household names from PJ Tucker to Tyler Herro have brought out original pairs to acclaim on League Fits and Kicks on Court alike. Each time a player pops up with the coveted KDs, those unable to pay resale rates or tirelessly dig in the crates start salivating over the chance of a retro release.

This holiday season, our wishes are granted as the Nike KD3 Retro “Christmas” will launch for the first time.

Following in the footsteps of the Nike Kobe 6 Protro “Green Means Go” — better known as the “Grinch” — the KD3 Retro offers a second chance at one of basketball’s best stocking stuffers.

Paving the way for nearly a half dozen “Christmas” KDs to follow, the “No Yield For Yellow” KD3 set the pace for Kevin Durant’s ascent as a face of the NBA and Nike Basketball — a mantle he’s held for the last 12 years.

In the time since the 2010 original, Durant has won two NBA Championships, two NBA Finals MVPs, and one NBA MVP. Off the court, he’s signed a lifetime contract with Nike and is already on his 16th signature model.

While his first Christmas Day Game positioned him as basketball’s best scorer and Nike’s new kid on the block, he’s kept that same energy every season since.

As this Christmas approaches, Kevin Durant is an early MVP candidate on the court and a major player in the sportswear industry in both performance and retro sneaker markets.

It’s all accolades and a status he carries at age 35 in Phoenix, starring each night for the Suns while moonlighting as a media mogul at Boardroom and executive producer for Drake.

It’s a life KD couldn’t imagine when dropping 44 points in his Christmas Day debut, let alone when opening up Christmas gifts as a kid in DC.

This holiday season is also a second chance on a Christmas classic most footwear fans thought would never return.

The Nike KD3 Retro “Christmas” is back now at select Nike Basketball accounts and on SNKRS.

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The post The Nike KD3 ‘Christmas’ Retro Revival appeared first on Boardroom.

Ten years ago, Virgil Abloh thumbed the cracked screen of an iPhone and pressed share.

Uploaded to his followers interested in architecture, skateboarding, and graphic design came a bold block of black and white striping announcing OFF-WHITE: an Italian fashion label founded by the son of Ghanaian immigrant parents.

From Milan to the Mercer, Chicago to Shanghai, the Illinois native who went from studying at Wisconsin to touring the world with Kanye West formally founded his first solo art project of scale. In less than a decade, OFF-WHITE would acquire the creative keys from Nike and a 60% ownership stake from LVMH.

But years before billion-dollar behemoths elected Abloh as auteur, the Midwest kid was piecing together a clothing collection that would ultimately become OFF-WHITE. It was a side hustle bubbling behind the scenes of his day job of art-directing albums for A$AP Rocky and John Legend.

One Abloh seemingly had no time for but had to make time for before time ran out. After all, the world was supposed to end.

See, on Dec. 12, 2012, the Mayan calendar came to a close, making philosophers and scientists alike ponder if armageddon was upon us all.

Undeterred, Abloh made another upload in the hours ahead of the would-be rapture: a Vimeo video titled: ‘A TEAM WITH NO SPORT.’

The Joy Division soundtracked short featured members of the A$AP Mob modeling screen-printed shirts, shorts, and hoodies in a vacant studio apartment. The visual publicly presented PYREX VISION, the precursor to OFF-WHITE, inspired equal parts by Pusha T, Michael Jordan, and Michelangelo.

Featuring flannels fashioned as jerseys and live spray painting by street artist Jim Joe, the showcase just short of six minutes previewed an apparel proposition that would invert a trillion-dollar industry in years to come.

Perhaps the world was coming to an end.

Speaking to contemporaries of the late visionary who were around for the unlikely uprising, Boardroom offers an oral history of PYREX VISION: the project that propelled Virgil Abloh to creative director at Louis Vuitton and solidified streetwear as gallery art.

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The Muse

In 2009, Virgil Abloh and his runway dreams were on their way to reality.

Fresh off merch design for the Glow in the Dark Tour, Virgil would return to the road for that fall’s Fame Kills Tour. Pairing Ye with Lady Gaga, the two most fashion-forward icons in modern music would perform hits on a massive Matthew M. Williams-designed set, shaped like a catwalk.

Before the first stop, West would take another stage.

“Yo, Taylor, I’m really happy for you, I’mma let you finish,” West said at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards. “But Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time!”

While no lies were told, the damage was done. The Fame Kills Tour was canceled.

Upon recommendation from Mos Def, West left the country with Abloh by his side. Instead of circling the country on a catwalk, Abloh and West would intern at Fendi for a reported $500 a month.

From fetching cappuccinos to pitching leather jogger pants, the sonic sabbatical in Rome created connections in the industry and an inside look at how it moved. More importantly, it ignited Abloh’s ability in Photoshop and West’s desire to rap.

The latter led the two to Honolulu: an island where West would work away at bars while Abloh ideated around fonts.

Pusha T (Robb Report of the Snort, 1/2 of The Clipse): My first encounters around Virgil were surrounding Hawaii while working on My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy. Virgil was very quiet, often on a laptop off to the corner.

He was this guy that Kanye seemed very interested in what was on his laptop. We could be in the middle of verses or trying to crack the code on a beat, but he would always stop to see what Virgil had going on on his laptop.

Virgil was the one who could break the flow of the music with whatever was going on with his laptop. I noticed that quickly.

You would get a glimpse of [Virgil’s laptop] and it could be a hoody, a desk, a table, or architecture.

It was so many different things that were inspiration or things that I felt he was downloading for himself and for Ye to be inspired by.

In one of the breaks, Virgil expressed to me, ‘Man, you don’t know what your music has done for me.’

Don C (Designer & former Ye manager): The name of Virgil’s line? That was inspired by a Pusha line.

‘Pyrex stirs turn into Cavalli furs?’ You know what I’m saying? He’s always been about mixing street culture, blending it with high fashion, blending it with music.

Pusha T: He was a fan of Hell Hath No Fury and was very open in speaking about Clipse music to me.

I remember it from the laptop, like the actual word and font on the screen. He was like, ‘Yo, check this out. PYREX VISION? Understand, this comes from you.’

The Tumblr

In Dec. 2010, Virgil Abloh launched the PYREX VISION Tumblr page, just weeks after My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy was released to rave reviews.

Sonically, it was considered West’s best work yet while visually the album’s praised art direction was handled by Abloh.

Pusha T: From me initially meeting him in Hawaii to all of the different inspirational pieces – fashion, architecture, sneakers, anything – it was during this time that Virgil developed this very DIY attitude. It would go from a point of inspiration to trying to get something executed.

We’d be waiting around because we couldn’t get our hands on a piece, and Virgil would take it into his own hands like, ‘Don’t worry about it, I got it.’

It was like, ‘Listen, I’m gonna start this and do it just like this.’ It happened right in front of us.

Already having equity in the apparel space due to RSVP Gallery and The Brilliance blog, PYREX VISION was a mood board of ideas and musings, highlighting streetwear pieces and runway fashion.

A photo of The Great Sphinx sat aside a picture of Hollywood Holt, positioning a rising artist from Chicago next to Egyptian elegance.

Benjamin Gott (Friend): The Tumblr came a bit later, it was called ‘So Baroque.’ He eventually switched over to PYREX VISION. He was hanging onto it, not really sure how he was going to explain it.

When he launched the video? We think about things in the realm of references. I can honestly say I don’t think he had a reference.

The Shoot

Over the next two years, the Tumblr page took a life of its own.

From detailing Abloh’s work on the road with West and Jay-Z as part of the Watch the Throne tour to spotlighting street-level events back home, the page positioned Abloh as everywhere at once, posting Tom Ford quotes and Treated snapbacks in the same breath.

Soon, shots of shirts with ‘PYREX’ printed along the back began appearing on the page.

In a matter of months, the sample shirts would make the rounds from URL to IRL.

At the same time, Virgil was running the DONDA studio space in NYC.

Benjamin Gott: He was always hanging out in New York. He was well-versed in the city and had friends there. New York is, for a lot of people, the cultural center of the world.

Kanye was there all the time, the whole Mercer crew thing was happening, and the A$AP guys were starting to find their legs.

A$AP Illz (Model, Designer, Founding member of the A$AP Mob): I got a call from Bari and Nast. They were like, ‘Come down to this DONDA space with Virgil. He’s trying to do something real quick.’ We didn’t know what it was, but Virgil had just got this new spot.

Benjamin Gott: It was a very simple office. It was loosely organized and it served as a physical landing space. It was downtown, if I remember correctly.

A$AP Illz: He’d started messing with us because of Chicago and RSVP Gallery. We had been messing with him since our first tour. We had the coach jackets and t-shirts for the tour.

Benjamin Gott: Everything was kind of the same feeling and out of nowhere PYREX comes out like, ‘What the hell is this?’ Even the color palette he used was totally unexpected. He shocked everybody and per usual had impeccable timing.

A$AP Illz: Virgil had this concept about sports and being a team, so every outfit we changed was about being different teams with the colors: red, blue, black, it was all a team.

Benjamin Gott: It felt incredibly obtuse in the best way possible. It was very confusing and I think streetwear is the place to be confusing.

I think that’s why Virgil has called streetwear an art movement because art is often confusing and jarring. It’s so difficult to encapsulate, it’s like trying to describe a really great painting.

A$AP Illz: PYREX was a free job, it wasn’t something I was paid for, it was just straight art. Pure art. I wasn’t tripping because I was starting to build my resume, so I ended up doing it and going down there.

We had some pizza, kicked it with Virgil, there was skateboarding around the office, and then Jim Joe comes. I didn’t even know at that time it was Jim Joe. He was the one tagging in the background.

Benjamin Gott: It was an art project. When you look at the video he did with Jim Joe, it’s lovely to see it in museums now. When I first I saw it in a museum, I remember thinking, ‘This is where it should’ve been the whole time.’ That was his first truly personal expression project.

Since the shoot, behind-the-scenes footage showcases the models moving around the set to “Bubble Music” by Cam’ron.

Instead, the actual campaign features “Heart & Soul” by English rock band Joy Division.

Benjamin Gott: The music didn’t make sense. No one was listening to that music, now it’s totally normal to listen to more avant-garde style music. It felt so new, yet it was attached to this compelling person in Virgil, who at the time, was starting to find his ascendancy.

That’s an allegory itself: defining the grey area. Contrast was such a huge thing of his. You could listen to Joy Division and Cam’ron in the same room, the same time, back to back, and it didn’t feel incohesive.

The song was out of nowhere, Jim Joe was barely emerging and not part of the zeitgeist like he is now, and the A$AP guys were not super recognizable yet. There was no reference. I think Virgil had an idea that popped into his head and he just executed.

A$AP Illz: We were just hanging out. We created art by hanging out.

Benjamin Gott: He talked about the domino effect, ‘Just do the thing.’ This was an example of that. I don’t think anyone realized just how cohesive it would be.

Most people screen print a t-shirt and maybe a model wears it. But he made a short film. A short, visual poem that still stands the test of time.

A$AP Illz: I believe he gave us some hoodies. They were samples, there wasn’t too much out there yet.

The Chi

On Dec. 12, 2012 – the same day the world was supposed to end – Virgil Abloh was introducing the world at large to PYREX VISION from his NYC studio space.

Back home, that same vision and those same samples had been circulating for months.

Vic Lloyd (DJ & Designer): It was a moment in Chicago. When the tonal photoshoots dropped? Everybody was like, ‘That’s crazy!’

It was like, ‘Let’s put this idea and see what happens.’ I don’t think it was this long, planned-out thing. I think it was more like, ‘This will be cool.’

Benjamin Gott: There’s a special thing about Chicago where we’re not exposed to everything every single day like New York where culture is happening when you walk down the street.

Chicago’s not a snooze fest, but it’s not as intense as New York. If you’re a curious person, it boosts your curiosity because you’re perpetually looking over the fence at Paris or LA. It trains you to hone your curiosity.

Upscale Vandal (Fashion & Marketing Consultant): I’m an insider, I was wearing PYREX before that campaign came out. The first run? He actually didn’t sell any of the shirts, he was giving them away.

Vic Lloyd: Here? All the people that were supposed to have it had it. You had to know somebody because some of the first stuff you could only have it if you were gifted it.

Don C: All the movements start here in Chicago. The PYREX movement started here in Chicago.

Upscale Vandal: Instagram was brand new and Chicago was feeding me information and access. One of my boys there had a whole gang of PYREX shirts, the first run of all the colors. I was like, ‘I need those in New York.’ He said, ‘Just send me $200 and I’ll send you a couple.’

He sent me three shirts and they weren’t even my size, so I took a picture and flipped them. This dope boy I knew had seen somebody wearing it, wanted one and gave me $200 for each shirt.

I ended up buying another two from him which ended up being my first PYREX shirts.

Benjamin Gott: There’s another shirt from the party Superfun. The RSVP crew had a party at the James Hotel in Chicago. There was a shirt that had a woman’s face on the front. It had the design sensibility of PYREX VISION, but it was not PYREX VISION.

The V shirt was at RSVP Gallery. You could just go up to the counter and buy them. It had 23 on the back.

Vic Lloyd: Mike is a part of the Chicago DNA. Twenty-three and 45 are numbers that we own here in Chicago. Virgil putting that number on the hoody was the Chicago badge of honor. It carried that Mike DNA and instantly gave you something else you could wear with your Jordans.

Don C: He was inspired by the Bulls in so much of his work. 

Vic Lloyd: I knew Virgil didn’t make a lot of that stuff, so he made sure he took care of everybody in Chicago with a gift pack. It was instant. Everybody wanted them PYREX shorts. People wanted to wear them in the summer and to hoop in!

Benjamin Gott: He did the knit sock, the shorts, the t-shirts, the hoody, and the flannel print on the RL stuff.

The Flannel

In the months following flow product sent around Chicago and the weeks after “A TEAM WITH NO SPORT” went live on Vimeo, PYREX VISION went viral thanks to the launch of a $550 flannel.

Taking traditional flannel shirts made by Ralph Lauren’s defunct Rugby line and screen-printing ‘PYREX 23’ on the back, the piece was both a status symbol and a subject of investigative journalism. Back home and online, it was an early case study on DIY ethos and positioning.

Vic Lloyd: Chicago had a Rugby store. We all were going to buy those flannels because everything went on sale for like 70% off. That store closed ten years ago and the flannels Virgil used were the Rugby flannels.

Benjamin Gott: He was always a Ralph Lauren guy. We were always referencing Ralph or wearing Ralph. One of his first posts on The Brilliance was about the Ralph Lauren restaurant here in Chicago.

Vic Lloyd: I can honestly say he might’ve made 30 flannels. That was more so a statement piece.

You’ve got a Ralph flannel? I’ll print on it. It could’ve been that type of thing.

Upscale Vandal: PYREX was the antithesis of snooty high fashion. It was high fashion, made in a basement, with printables that you know how much I paid for them.

But it’s so lit, it’s so rare, it’s so hard to get, and it’s worn by so many of the people that you fuck with that either you pay this much or you don’t.

Vic Lloyd: It empowered a lot of younger designers to go do it and understand the power of printables.

A lot of the OG streetwear brands had transitioned to cut-and-sew, but this inspired the next wave to take their designs and put them out.

It expanded the idea of what you could print on because for so long people just thought t-shirts and hoodies.

Mamadou Bah (Owner & Creative Director of C’est Bon): My intro was the campaign they shot in the gallery space. I was into clothing at the time, but I didn’t know the process of getting a brand off the ground.

That was my segue into learning to start a business in a way. It was learning on the go. You’d wonder, ‘Who designed that?’ You do the research and find out it’s this kid from Chicago.

Vic Lloyd: With that flannel and the basketball shorts? You could give your printable brand an elevation whether it was shorts, a Dickie’s jacket, or vintage jeans. It gave people another outlet and lane.

You might not have been able to go to the prices that he did, but it made people start thinking about the $40, $50 or $60 t-shirt as far as a printable went. It got more people comfortable with that price point.

Mamadou Bah: At that time the price points did not make sense to me. Like, ‘Yo, why are you selling a Rugby at $700?!’ But now looking back at it? It makes sense because you see the progression that it led to.

Pusha T: It is supposed to be aspirational. It’s crazy, because when I think about his price point at that particular time and whatever people had to say about it? It just took me back to the time when I was buying Snow Beach Polo fleeces that were $350. I’d put it on and wear it every day.

It was a hard-earned $350 but you knew the USA fleece was coming out next week. You found your way to doing it and it made you appreciate and love the clothes that much more.

Those rap moments, the video moments, and the magazine moments all shaped me. Yo! MTV Raps was teaching me how to dress. Without those historic moments, album covers, and videos it’s no telling where we would be.

Upscale Vandal: This is the shit to be wearing and that attitude carried over into all of our brands. Just Don is a $500 hat with snakeskin on it! You either buy it or you don’t. I don’t give a fuck because this is the only shit that’s moving right now that people care about.

You couldn’t go anywhere for two years without seeing someone with snakeskin on their hat.

The Wave

Throughout 2012 and 2013, PYREX VISION went from ‘if you know, you know’ to ‘if you don’t know, why don’t you?’

From A$AP Rocky to Rita Ora, Kim Kardashian to Jay-Z, the biggest stars in the world were wearing Virgil Abloh’s art project with the same reverence they had for Balmain and Givenchy.

While status symbol association added to the intrigue, it was underground energy from the cultural touchpoints of the streets and the art that made it all pop.

Chase B (DJ, Producer, AUX MONEY host): I was broke as hell in New York. Me and Virgil would do all these warehouse parties in the deepest dungeons of SoHo. You met the coolest people. That’s where I met [A$AP] Yams, Bari, that whole scene was in New York.

We would run around Fashion Week and it was really organic and genuine. We were all depending on each other to push our personal brands forward, and Virgil was the ringleader of all that.

Music drove all those brands and sold PYREX to the streets.

Mamadou Bah: Kanye performing it in? Rocky and the Mob wearing it out for their shows? At that point, you mostly looked at the musicians.

Chase B: It was a music-driven thing. The hoody with the Roman art? That’s really what PYREX was for me.

Benjamin Gott: Caravaggio was kind of art’s bad boy at the time which is an understatement, I think he was accused of murder. If you look at his paintings, there’s emotion in them, romance, violence, all wrapped up in that.

I think Virgil had a deeper understanding of the fine arts, especially the Old Masters. He really enjoyed the juxtaposition of taking an old master and applying it to streetwear.

I believe all of those pieces of art are Creative Commons so you can use them without needing any copyright clearance. ClipArt is very Internet and Virgil is very Internet. At the time he was very into baroque.

Chase B: I didn’t really know what was going on, these pieces were just in the streets. There weren’t really releases, these things would just appear in boxes. I didn’t realize it was such a huge thing because it was just us wearing Virgil’s clothes.

A$AP Illz: It shows you how much it’s spreading, it’s like a starter kit now. People just know how to dress now. Even if it’s behind it’s still fire because it’s the blueprint that we set out there.

Benjamin Gott: People were starting to wear Air Forces again for the first time.

That’s exactly what it was: uncool. We were supposed to be wearing Rick Owens, we were supposed to be wearing black. The idea of wearing a baby blue or a red hoody? It’s so funny to think that now because now there’s no rules and I think that’s great.

It’s so iconic now that it’s almost hard to remember what it felt like when it was new.

A$AP Illz: PYREX VISION was one of the first brands besides Stüssy that really kicked it off for me. We made that brand go stupid.

Pusha T: Hip-hop? The whole culture of it from fashion to sneakers and everything, it’s really about coming outside and having the energy of, ‘Oh you ain’t got these! I could get this first!’ It makes it competitive.

It makes you aspire to have something or get the next best thing that’s hotter.

Vic Lloyd: From there, every artist made their merch more like a brand.

The Rebrand

In a matter of months, PYREX VISION had gone from DIY art project to the preferred brand of A-listers.

Appearing on stage at arena tours and on television shows watched by millions, the word on PYREX VISION quickly traveled beyond pop culture.

At the peak of its momentum, the man who was shattering fashion’s glass ceiling was suddenly catching heat from a glass company.

Pusha T: I remember him telling me, ‘Pyrex is giving us a hard time!’

Upscale Vandal: Why would Pyrex ever come for Virgil if they never made apparel? He’s making your brand iconic in a way you could never. Pyrex cookware would never make a fraction of the noise on the planet.

Ninety percent of the people who wore PYREX and support don’t even know the origin. Street motherfuckers know what Pyrex was because that’s what they cooked crack in.

A$AP Illz: A$AP Twelvvy gave Virgil an assist. He was going to get sued by Pyrex, the glass makers, so he changed it to OFF-WHITE because Twelvvy was like, ‘What’s the color of coke? It’s off-white.’

That’s how OFF-WHITE became OFF-WHITE, because of A$AP Twelvvy.

Pusha T: When the name changed and it was solidified that it was OFF-WHITE? He was like, ‘Man, I had to keep it in the same vein. This is what it is, this is built off of this.’

I was honored by the fact that he could translate something in the street culture that’s a bit frowned upon when talking about so blatantly, but he could translate it in a fashion world and so many people flung to it.

He artistically made it beautiful. Maybe people weren’t familiar with the drug culture in such a sense, but he made it digestible and made them understand.

Upscale Vandal: That’s what PYREX was. Y’all wanna play me? I’ll turn PYREX into OFF-WHITE and go ten times harder. Same design language, same narrative.

The killing of corporate fashion was in those two to three years. Virgil was our sherpa. The more shit he got away with and the more shit he tried and did? The more we felt like thanks for breaking that wall down and then we would break walls down.

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The Last Show

After announcing OFF-WHITE in Dec. 2013, life moved at the speed of light for Virgil Abloh and all in his orbit.

By Jan. 2016, he was presenting in Paris. By Mar. 2018, he was appointed Men’s Collections Artistic Director at Louis Vuitton.

In Nov. 2021, Virgil Abloh tragically passed away from a rare form of cancer. While working on his last show for Louis Vuitton, he reached out to his original PYREX VISION muse to score the soundtrack.

Pusha T: We were on our way back from Turks and Caicos. As we were landing, the e-mails and things started coming through about Virgil. At the very same time, like 15 minutes after that, the formal request from Virg to whoever was the music director at LV to our guys to be like, ‘Hey, can y’all help us get this clearance? Because this has to be in the show.’

So as I’m finding out about his death, we also got the clearance request from him that this has to happen.

It all came at the same time. It was so spooky. Chills, bro. This is all at the same time. Everybody on the plane cried. Crying to hear about Virg and then it was the request: “Mama I’m So Sorry” and “Mr. Me Too.” This is what this guy’s thinking? Because we didn’t necessarily know what state he was in or anything of that magnitude.

I always looked at it like he was making these requests up to his death. ‘I need this.’ You’re going through what you’re going through, and you found the way to articulate that you needed this?

I’m sure he wouldn’t change a thing about his path to get to where he got to. It’s ironic, but it’s a beautiful travel.

The Legacy

In Jul. 2021, LVMH bought into Virgil Abloh’s original art project by purchasing 60% of OFF-WHITE. In 2023, LVMH is worth over $500 billion.

At the time of Abloh’s passing, the streetwear market was estimated to be $185 billion. A year before PYREX VISION, the category was valued at a mere $60 billion.

Across continents and cultures, Abloh’s impact on fashion is far more than financial. The quiet kid on the laptop opened up a world of possibilities for all those who dare to dream in their creative pursuits.

Chase B: In the African-American space, he did a lot of things that a lot of people thought were impossible. After we saw these things were possible? We stopped taking no for an answer.

Pusha T: Virgil himself has single-handedly given hope to all those who aspire to be in the fashion world on some ‘you can do it too.’

I saw a post today that was a step-by-step from Virgil on how to get in the game and do it yourself from trademarking to Adobe. That speaks to his character and what he was looking to accomplish: inspiring the youth and letting them know that it was possible and not out of reach.

That’s the biggest thing to take from his legacy: he wanted everyone to dream big, you can reach it, and I’m gonna make it look easy for you.

Mamadou Bah: PYREX and other businesses were my educational courses on how to dissect and launch a big brand. That’s why I waited so long to launch C’est Bon, I was teaching myself exactly how to do that.

Upscale Vandal: How many kids were able to find their voice after that era of brands? That group literally killed high fashion retail. There’s no Barney’s, mall shopping is dead, and it’s all direct-to-consumer independent brands from young kids. It’s because of us.

We knew it was time for what we owned in this shit to take center stage. What we owned was all the social equity because we were the ones who made shit cool.

Chase B: Virgil would make you feel like you could do it just by being himself. He provided a lot of people with a lot of platforms. We’d DJ festivals together and I met a lot of people through that.

He put Bloody Osiris as a whole statue at a Louis Vuitton store. He always reached back and took everyone with him with his success.

Benjamin Gott: He was unbelievably positive almost to the point where it was intoxicating. He was a deeply curious person and I believe curiosity kills a lot of negativity.

A$AP Illz: Culture shock. I didn’t think we’d change the game forever, I thought we were just being us, honestly. I was just being me, I was just trying to be creative and dress differently.

Half the people were fucking with it. A lot of people were judging us saying we were gay and stuff like that. It was a lot of critical stuff that we had to take, but I didn’t really give a fuck what anybody said. At the end of the day? We influenced the whole world.

Benjamin Gott: Now, it’s really normal to be interested in a zillion different things. But ten to 12 years ago? People, myself included, were a little more condensed. That’s gone now.

Upscale Vandal: There is no other moment in fashion than those two years that meant more to me. Those two years in fashion is what dictated if I was going to go back to the street – and end up dead or in jail again – or be in this industry.

Benjamin Gott: PYREX VISION came out of absolutely nowhere with a design language nobody had ever seen before. It’s just incredibly beautiful.

The word Pyrex, there’s a lot implied depending on where you’re from. If you don’t know the reference it’s confusing, which is great. If you do know the reference, it’s kind of jarring over No. 23. That’s where it became really artistic to me.

Upscale Vandal: PYREX VISION is an inspiration of Pusha T. That’s why Kanye say, ‘Everything is Pusha T! Fear of God, that’s Pusha T! PYREX VISION, that’s Pusha T!’

All of that stems from Pusha being a rapper who exemplifies street shit in its highest quality. When Pusha talks about drugs and street shit? He’s saying it in a very Sotheby’s, Guggenheim-level curation.

All of those terms were the catalyst for saying that this is the music and inspiration that these kids are living by and what Virgil and Jerry were living by. The streets were inspiring all of these vibes but through a designer lens. It’s the trap through a luxury lens.

Vic Lloyd: In this era of people wanting stuff so fast? He had an idea and could just act on it. ‘I’ve got an idea? I can have it out in two weeks.’

Mamadou Bah: What I learned is don’t be afraid to put out your artwork. Because if you are afraid? No one’s going to see it and you won’t get a true visual of how you can make it better in the long run. From my standpoint, it’s put out as much work as you can and as efficiently as you can.

Even though people may perceive it as you don’t have a clear set plan? The plan is still there even though you’re moving in real-time. You have this vision that you’re going for, but you’re going to have to adjust the game plan as you go.

Seeing how he did that with PYREX was very prominent regarding how I want to run my business. Don’t be afraid to make those mistakes. Re-edit them and eventually, you will win that championship.

Upscale Vandal: The year before PYREX and the year it came out were the years we were all trying to figure out if we were going to make it. Streetwear saved us.

That era of fashion where leaders like Virgil and Don broke down the doors? That set a precedent, that’s the standard now. Kids are making designer clothes right out of the gate.

Virgil left how to get a license and how to print a t-shirt. We’ve done all of the educating so kids can have a whole business in 48 hours. You couldn’t do that shit in 2010 and be respected. I know kids that have had brands for two months and they’re the hottest shit in the world.

That lens gave us a platform to stand on that no LVMH or GPR can take from us because now we own it.

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The post The Oral History of Virgil Abloh’s PYREX VISION appeared first on Boardroom.

28 years ago, Black Friday was supposed to be another fourth-quarter victory for Michael Jordan.

Jordan Brand, less than a decade in as its own Swoosh subsidiary and still far from being an annual earner in the billions, was wrapping a massive 2005 full of big swings.

From introducing collaborations with UNDFTD to bringing back Tinker Hatfield for its 20th flagship shoe, the Air Jordan empire was defining life after MJ. Carmelo Anthony had become the brand’s first signature hooper, while hybrids like the Dub Zero were turning heads at American malls.

Regardless of where Jordan Brand saw its future customer shopping, the answers appeared in the past.

Retro releases were the catalyst for commercial success, with major moments at retail being the street-level equivalent of MJ flying on SportsCenter.

To make a moment, the marketing minds at Jordan Brand brainstormed an event unlike any other: the Air Jordan Defining Moments Package.

“The concept of putting two shoes together hadn’t been seen,” Gentry Humphrey, former Jordan Brand VP, told Boardroom.

Reviving retro rarities tied to three-peats in pristine packaging, Air Jordan 6 and Air Jordan 11 exclusives would be adorned in gold accents and sold in one big box for a scale-tipping $295.

“MJ loved the idea and was ready to push it,” said Humphrey. “He was a little nervous because we were going to command an extremely high price point, but he thought it was well worth it, and it was disruptive — the way we should be doing things.”

The dual drop was unlike anything sneakerheads had ever seen, appearing in acclaimed accounts just weeks before Santa started making his rounds.

Instead, a production problem pushed the Defining Moments Package into January 2006, sending the box set buzzer beater into overtime and overdrive. The result? Inordinate energy.

“There wasn’t hype like that at that time,” Sneaker Politics owner Derek Curry told Boardroom. “Now? That hype is a normal thing. But back then? It was new to us.”

Back for the first time as a patent leather proper, this holiday season’s Air Jordan 11 drop sees the DMP retro retold in retooled fashion. From acute hysteria to mass momentum, learn why 2023’s “Gratitude” take is giving nostalgia in the most mature of manners.

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Season on the Brink

When Michael Jordan jumps, so do the stock prices.

In 1994, Nike was a $3.7 billion brand but also one on the decline. Following MJ’s surprise retirement and baseball sabbatical, the Swoosh — despite having a slew of signature athletes and a global presence across sports — reported its first revenue decline in seven years.

Even off the equity of Jordan’s three NBA titles and the business model he built in Beaverton, Nike lacked the same lift with MJ away from the game. Nine months after reporting revenue decline, Jordan jumped back into basketball, announcing he was back to the chagrin of Swoosh shareholders.

Wearing No. 45 upon return, it only took a matter of weeks for MJ to go back to his old number and debut new sneakers. In the 1995 Eastern Conference Semifinals, the most missed man in all of pro sports unveiled the avant-garde Air Jordan 11.

Designed in the darkness by Tinker Hatfield when higher-ups at Nike told him Mike was never coming back, the patent leather look inspired by a lawn mower cut through TV screens across the country as millions of fans tuned in. It was an aesthetic Jordan had been begging for since the early ’90s but couldn’t get until he came back in ’95.

“MJ at the time wanted to put patent leather on the Air Jordan 9,” Humphrey told Boardroom in 2021. “But at that time? We weren’t ready for it. When we showed him the Concord? He went nuts.”

So did America.

“It was validated by everyone that had influence,” said Humphrey. “Once it hit? It was crazy. From day one, the product blew out.”

Seeing the shoes in action on MJ and on the feet of Ahmad Rashad, kids clamored around the idea of wearing the latest Air Jordan after two years of believing another Air Jordan would never happen again.

Historically, Mike would debut his new shoe at All-Star Weekend, adjoined by a retail release that same February. Due to his unplanned comeback and rogue wear of the Air Jordan 11 in the playoffs, Nike had to scramble while the masses had to wait.

Because of this, the Air Jordan 11 debuted in May 1995 and didn’t drop in stores until October 1995. The result was madness unlike any shoe release ever before.

While the Air Jordan 1 got its official airtime in February 1985 and was released at retail weeks after in April, there was no precedent for the signature shoe or even MJ. Listed for only $65, the new factor pushed sales into the millions and made Nike a model they could copy for years but never quite duplicate.

With the Air Jordan 11 in 1995, the drought of newness at Nike and months of missing Mike made demand otherworldly. Add in the factor that premium patent leather and a $125 price point made the model even more of a status symbol, and the yearning only ascended.

“It was a perfect storm,” said Humphrey. “You have MJ coming back from baseball and Allen Iverson at Georgetown rocking ’em. It was positioned in a way so that all eyes were on it. It was so different than everything else that you really didn’t need a ton of marketing efforts to tell the story. Even though the 100 ft tall ad was phenomenal.”

In only an 11-month window, the Air Jordan 11 had been released in three different patent leather looks, and the Bulls had completed a record-setting 72-10 season.

In his first full season back, MJ won MVP, Finals MVP, and NBA scoring champ. While he was putting up numbers in Chicago, his impact was felt most back in Beaverton.

By 1997, Nike’s revenue was up to nearly $9.2 billion — more than double what it was when MJ traded his hoop shoes for baseball cleats. The patent leather phenomenon and Air Jordan halo were as real as they got, with soaring stock prices to show for it.

Three years later, history would have to repeat itself, rearing yet another classic comeback.

Deja Vu All Over Again

When Michael Jordan kicked his feet up for his second retirement, each one of his prior partners saw their numbers go down.

The Chicago Bulls went from the best in basketball to the worst team in their conference. The NBA Finals fell in ratings by 40% in 1999 despite boasting a team from America’s biggest media market.

And worst of all, Nike’s revenue dipped by almost $1 billion.

Out of the mid-post and into the corner office, MJ was spearheading his subsidiary under Nike, Jordan Brand. Launched ahead of his Last Dance season, the succession plan from basketball was a natural shoo-in for the GOAT.

Already establishing himself as a marketeer and a poised professional, ushering in a new era of mature cool was intended to establish the Jumpman as a luxury umbrella meant to resonate from the ball court to the boardroom.

Unfortunately, business was not booming.

In 2000, Jordan Brand was coming off of its worst quarter to date. Down 42%, the dip was indicative of Mike’s break from basketball and slumping sales for Nike as a whole. For the first time in four years, Nike revenues dropped rather than rose.

As it turned, a new millennium meant old shoes.

Bracing for the fourth quarter, Jordan Brand brought back the Air Jordan 11 for the first time ever despite debuting only five years prior.

“That set the tone for Jordans still being prevalent to this day,” Colin Teagle, Kicking It general manager and Fresh Out the Box podcast host, told Boardroom. “The 11 was a gateway to a lot of us becoming full-time sneaker enthusiasts.”

Returning the classic “Concord” style and launching the cinematic “Space Jam” edition for the first time, the retro release caused commotion at malls nationwide. Typically, Air Jordan signatures received the retro treatment 10 years after their introduction as a means of anniversary sentiment.

Rewriting the formula, the Air Jordan 11 proved so hot that it cut the line and cut its time in the vault in half.

“It was a thing at that point,” NBA legend and Jordan Brand ambassador Quentin Richardson told Boardroom in 2021. “That was part of why me and Darius [Miles] became a popular duo. It was pandemonium when we went to the mall.”

“The Retro 11 was always on a pedestal,” said Teagle. “It was the release of the year.”

Existing as the release of the year meant holding a special responsibility for those inside the Air Jordan headquarters.

“I’ve always been overprotective of the 11, maybe to a fault,” Humphrey said. “Trying to be strategic in how we introduced it was part of the master plan because it was the holy grail of the sneaker industry. If you do the wrong thing, you run the risk of ruining the holy grail.”

Additionally, it turned the page from the new Jordans being the must-have to the old ones mattering more. None mattered more than the Air Jordan 11 Retro, soon an annual mainstay around the holidays.

As alluded to, this meant new Air Jordan 11 Retro colorways debuting on the court before erupting in mall madness across America.

False Start

In 2005, Michael Jordan was fully retired from basketball after two comebacks.

The Air Jordan 11 was not.

“If it were up to the number crunchers? They’d want to see an 11 every year,” Humphrey said. “I tried to be strategic to create other plans so that it would only add to the success when we’d bring back the 11 at the right time. Trying to keep some space in between when we launched that model was important.”

Since rolling out as a retro in 2000, the patent proper returned in “Playoff” and “Columbia” iterations as well as an instant-classic “Cool Grey” colorway.

For the better part of the early aughts, an Air Jordan 11 provided the spark for the brand’s bigger lifestyle business, being able to redress past favorites in Pantones of the original and new variety.

“The first batch of 11 Retros were great,” said Curry. “That started a line for our stores. We saw Finish Line having lines for retroes after that, whereas before? We’d open, put the Jordan on the shelf, and they’d sell throughout the week. But it wasn’t a day-of sellout.”

“The Retro 11 was kind of dangerous,” Teagle said. “If you go to the wrong mall? It could’ve ended badly.”

Rather than flood the market or be a one-trick pony, Jordan Brand possessed the pace not just to bring back the Air Jordan 11 ahead of schedule but also to put it back in the vault. After a retro run in 2000 and 2001, the Air Jordan 11 Mid made its way back to the archives.

For the shoe’s 10th anniversary, the footwear franchise had something big in mind. Real big.

Rather than run back the “Concord” Air Jordan 11s once again, Jordan Brand looked to make a major splash with the advent of the Defining Moments Package: a box set celebrating the shoes worn by Michael Jordan while starting each of his championship runs.

Internet leaks suggest the original brief included three pairs of shoes — the Air Jordan 6 to celebrate his first ring in 1991, the Air Jordan 11 to celebrate his comeback championship in 1996, and the Converse Pro Leather to coincide with his college championship in 1982.

“Originally, it was a three-shoe pack,” said Humphrey. “The company had just purchased Converse, and the original plan was to also celebrate his first championship with UNC. We were thinking somewhere around $550.”

Famously, Nike, Inc. had acquired Converse in 2003 for $305 million. Two decades later, they’ve seen incredible ROI, as Converse did over $2.3 billion in revenue in 2022. However, the crossover collaboration would not take place in 2005.

“The day I got the final approval on the logistics, we happened to have a quarterly business review meeting,” said Humphrey. “Mike came in, and we started talking about this project. We were ready to roll, and MJ flipped the script on me in front of all these people! We had to pull the Converse shoe.”

While the acquisition of Converse was a long-game win for Nike, fitting it into the first Jordan Brand box set was not meant to be. The golden grails were paired down to that of the 11 and 6, replacing original ‘Concord’ and ‘Infrared’ accents for that of the Midas touch.

“We have to make a concerted effort to deliver the future,” Humphrey said. “The way you connect is by grounding it in great, authentic stories. Because if you do authentic stories? People will at least respect what you’re bringing to the game.”

In its inception, the Air Jordan 11 “DMP” was designed not just to storytelling around MJ’s second three-peat but also to offer collectors an updated alternative to the classic “Concord” colorway. This tempted those who still had pairs of “Concords” from 1995 or 2000 while also protecting their love and loyalty.

Aging aside, when a retro release returns, it somewhat devalues that of the original. By offering slight twists, you appease both the old and new customers, telling an amended story while keeping the classic coveted.

Just the same, only basketball’s best, brightest, and youngest talent were afforded early access to the premium pairs.

“If you’re going to build a sustainable brand, you’ve got to see the future and paint a picture for the next generation,” said Humphrey.

Thus, an age-old story was retold in revived fashion.

Famously, championship gold graced and differentiated the DMP 11, offering a nod to MJ’s fourth NBA title. Additionally, J-O-R-D-A-N lettering down the eyelets was intended to pay tribute to a scrapped sample from Air Jordan’s past, adding even more equity to the story.

“My biggest fear was samples going out before we could tell the concept the way the concept was to be told,” said Humphrey. “We kept it as close to our chest as close as possible. We went to some select accounts to share the story and give them some visual imagery, but we would never leave anything behind.”

Unfortunately, the adhesive issues kept this detail from literally sticking, forcing the brand to push the major moment release from the peak holiday season of 2005 to January 2006, a general dead zone for sneaker shopping and retail as a whole.

What happened at American malls was something much different.

“It was insane,” said Curry. “Stores were scared to open.”

Double Up

After months and months of internet build-up, the Air Jordan Defining Moments Package was released at select stores nationwide on Jan. 28, 2006.

The result was absolute chaos.

From glass barricades shattering at malls in Texas to people going bonkers in Boston, the select stores across America both blessed and cursed with receiving the Air Jordan Defining Moments Package experienced hysteria they’d never seen.

“There was so much pandemonium,” Curry said. “It was borderline scary.”

The “Cool Grey” Air Jordan 11: An Oral History

The release of the Air Jordan 11 in various colorways is looked forward to by sneakerheads annually. Let’s look back on the “Cool Grey” drop in 2021.

Check it out!

In the days leading up to the drop, tea leaves started to surface that this Air Jordan release would not be anything like store employees or shoppers had ever seen before.

“The Defining Moments Package was the first of its kind,” said Teagle. “Social media didn’t exist, so it was literally driving to or calling every mall in town to see if they had them.”

“People you’d never seen before were begging and asking for them,” Curry added. “It was the first time our 24 pairs at Finish Line weren’t enough. My friends at Foot Locker were having the same battles. Like, ‘This is gonna be a huge deal, these shoes are outta hand.'”

Humphrey added: “At a premium price point, you couldn’t over-extend yourself because it’s way too much to have if it didn’t work. So I knew people would stay tight to the allocations because everybody was nervous at that time. We had a limited run on them mainly because we were commanding such a high price point.”

Due to the limited nature of the big box sets, demand inordinately exceeded supply. In San Diego — a city surpassing a million residents — only 60 Defining Moments Packages were shipped. This gross gap rewrote the rules of what MSRP meant in real time.

“There’s the laws of supply and demand, and the science there is not always exact because you’re playing in uncharted water when shoes are $125, and now you’re taking them up to $295,” Humphrey said. “The numbers were held tight because I didn’t want the 11 to be part of any markdown strategy. If it would’ve flopped I would’ve never heard the end of it. Everything blew out.”

In the early 2000s, an Air Jordan 11 Retro could be released at a shoe store for $125 and sell in the mall parking lot for $200 that same Saturday. The DMP drop was a whole new aftermarket.

“eBay prices were at like $1,000, which was unheard of,” said Curry. “It was the craziest come-up I had in shoes by far.”

While the allure of the golden box set caused chaos from coast to coast on the DMP’s launch date, the demand quickly shifted from the whole package to that of the pack’s Air Jordan 11.

“Everybody wanted the 11s,” Teagle said. “I had a buddy who sold me the 6s for like $150. They were unicorns. It was a status symbol, but you didn’t see them out in the wild.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anybody wearing the 11,” Humphrey said. “I’ve seen guys wearing the 6s, but I’ve never seen anybody wearing White/Black-Gold 11s! That just goes to show you that most people have them sitting in their archives, but hey, that’s kind of what you do with the holy grail.”

A status symbol that held its weight in gold for years and nearly decades. In 2023, original Air Jordan Defining Moments Packages can still fetch over $1,000 despite being unwearable due to aging.

In 2020, the Air Jordan 6 Retro returned in its “DMP” to stellar sales and proper fanfare. Still, fans salivated over the patent pair from 2006.

This holiday season, the wait is finally over.

Back for the First Time

In 2023, Nike reported revenue of over $51.2 billion, with Jordan Brand accounting for $6.6 billion of that.

It’s a far leap from the earnings reported the first time Michael Jordan retired from pro basketball and roughly 5x of what the Swoosh saw coming in when he hung up his No. 23 jersey for good.

From Beaverton to Berlin, Chicago to Shanghai, the Air Jordan 11 Retro is a cash cow each Christmas and the ultimate breadwinner for Brand Jordan each financial fourth quarter.

“It’s a tradition at this point,” Teagle said.

After the Air Jordan Defining Moments Package unrest in 2006, the brand became more measured in its approach to rolling out Retro 11 releases. By the early ’10s, the hype around said shoes had gone from a cultural phenomenon to a mass market needle mover.

It took half a decade to find the perfect point where supply and demand met with the right fervor, satisfying shoppers in recent years.

In 2016, the “Space Jam” Air Jordan 11 returned to rave reviews and easier access. The launch was said to be “the largest and most successful shoe launch in the history of Nike,” selling for $220 in adult sizing while scaled down to infant dimensions.

“It allows the consumer to get it, which I appreciate,” said Teagle. “It’s not as wild as it was circa 2010 or 2011.”

“It’s published everywhere that they’re making a million pairs,” said Curry. “And I’ve never seen it slow down — at all. We still on release date don’t have enough pairs and have customers asking a week after if we have pairs. In Louisiana and Texas? It’s still one of our biggest releases every year.”

On Dec. 9, 2023, the aptly re-named Air Jordan 11 “Gratitude” will be released at stores in full-family sizing for an MSRP of $230. Upgraded from Cordura mesh to luxe leather on the upper, the revamped retros will again differ from the originals in an attempt to tell a new story. Jordan Brand calls it a “Thank You” to their day ones.

Already, Jordan Brand has produced far more pairs than that of 2006 and released pairs ahead of the launch date on SNKRS Early Access. Additionally, retailers have leaned into the “Gratitude” theme through release plans tied to the holiday spirit.

“With the ‘Gratitude’ 11s, we’re doing a toy drive to provide toys for kids who are less fortunate,” Teagle said. “We were able to reach out to Facebook groups of single mothers and tell them, ‘Pull up, we got you.’ We wanted to keep that tradition going.”

Full circle, the shoe that once had stores scared to open, is the impetus for store owners such as Curry to scale and sustain their business.

“It helped me open stores,” said Curry, who now owns six Sneaker Politics locations across the country off the origin story of reselling the original Defining Moments Package. “The hype is still there. I have customers call and ask for the ‘Christmas J’ — not even the 11, but the ‘Christmas J.'”

“The shoe is so good that there are people who will rock with it no matter what,” Humphrey said.

“Getting the 11s? That was leveling up on a social clout level,” said Teagle. “The feeling of getting that W on a Christmas Retro 11? There’s no better feeling.”

Across cultures, the Air Jordan 11 is a status symbol that’s endured energy in four different decades. It’s the singular sneaker that speaks to a mass audience with unmatched credibility, even if its tipping point moment was a double-box drop that once turned American malls upside down.

“I look forward to the 11 every year,” said Curry.

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The post The Hyperbola Hype of the ‘Gratitude’ Air Jordan 11 appeared first on Boardroom.

All the Smoke has become a behemoth in the content space in only four years.

Already in its fifth season, the show pulls top talent from all corners of culture, attracting the biggest names in sports, business, and entertainment to its gritty studio show.

From Flash opening up about his child’s transition to Hancock crashing on the couch after his Oscar action scene, the hazy hub is a place where superheroes show their superhuman side. It’s a place with no precedent and an empire that almost never happened.

“People didn’t understand what we were trying to create because there was nothing like it,” Brian Dailey, SVP of Sports Programming and Content at Showtime, told Boardroom. “It’s become a standard for the way new programming is looked at.”

The show is adored by People Magazine and TikTok, doing numbers on premium television and YouTube.

In the last year alone, All the Smoke has doubled its follower count and tripled its engagement.

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Over 200 episodes in, All the Smoke is not just rising among the competition and permeating across platforms; it’s becoming a production powerhouse with new properties and partnerships in the works.

With Showtime Sports closing its doors at the end of the year, another door opens.

In 2024, Showtime Basketball will transition into All the Smoke Productions and All the Smoke will enter into a strategic partnership with Meadowlark Media that will expand distribution, content development, and events for DraftKings. Furthermore, Dan Le Batard’s Meadowlark Media and All the Smoke Productions will bring together a collective universe of programming and personalities that will anchor the DraftKings Network.

Co-host and creator Matt Barnes will steer the ship, building a programming slate around the blunted brainchild that’s captured eyes and ears worldwide.

“I wanted a role where we could bring all these personalities under one umbrella,” Barnes told Boardroom. “To create a monster.”

Expanding beyond basketball and hip-hop to new sports and new deals, learn how Barnes and Jackson built a multi-platform force that’s sparking strategy shifts at billion-dollar networks.

A Joint Venture

The origin story of All the Smoke isn’t far from what you’d fathom.

While working as analysts for ESPN and FOX Sports, Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson saw the media landscape from a lifted perspective.

“We were the only two athletes doing both networks,” Jackson told Boardroom. “We were smoking one day, and Matt was like, ‘Damn, we’re really the reason both networks are hot. Why don’t we come up with our own show?’ I’m a loyal friend, so any idea Matt came up with, I’d be down.”

While Jackson took the idea literally in passing, Barnes took the idea off and running. Within weeks, Barnes was knocking down doors and researching how to build his own property.

“I really didn’t know what a podcast was,” Barnes said. “But I knew working for ESPN and FOX, it was a straight line you had to walk. A podcast was probably a little more flexible, where we could smoke and drink, if the guest wanted. A little more relaxed setting, more of us.”

All the while, a premium partner was waiting in the wings.

“Showtime had recently entered the podcast space on the combat side,” Dailey said. “We had the foundation of our basketball brand built through documentary storytelling, and I was looking to build on that. The timing was perfect.”

“Brian flew to LA, and I cold pitched him,” Barnes said. “I felt like the best conversations were a group of guys in the mancave watching a game. I wanted to put a camera on that, and he went for it.”

While Dailey was all in on the idea, Showtime was only all in on Barnes. The network didn’t understand the vision that included both of them.

“I told them that wasn’t the way I thought of the show,” Barnes said. “If Stak can’t do it, I’ll respectfully pass.”

“Stak was a non-negotiable part of the deal,” Dailey said. “The vision and the opportunity was Matt and Stak together, leaning into their friendship and history as teammates.”

Holding his ground with a premium partner at his fingertips, Barnes bet on loyalty and relied on his vision. Showtime accepted the terms, and the pilot took flight.

Smoke Alarms

When the first taping for All the Smoke took place, Dailey had just brought Showtime Sports into the audio space through boxing and MMA. Quickly, the fight for All the Smoke would take place in the C-suites.

“We had a marketing shoot on Day 1,” Dailey recalled. “There was content that included cannabis and smoking. Understandably, our legal team had questions, and we caught some heat.”

True indeed, everything about the title of the project proved prophetic.

“We wanted All the Smoke,” Barnes said. “It was the name my sister thought of, and we were cannabis advocates. We shot for five hours in LA, and everything had to do with smoking. He took it back to legal, and they’re like, ‘What the fuck is this?'”

“We didn’t know how they were going to take the smoking part of it,” Jackson said. “We’re posted up doing our album cover pictures, and Showtime was like, ‘Nope!’ They didn’t understand the dynamic of what me and Matt saw.”

What the execs saw were more red flags than the “Pop Bottles” music video. What Jackson and Barnes saw was an untapped media marriage between cannabis, culture, and sports.

“We knew how athletes tried to hide it for so long,” Jackson said. “Me and Matt smoked our whole career. We knew if we could start the show smoking? It’d be accepted by our culture.”

While the smoke alarm went off in Showtime’s corner office, an unlikely ally in the form of a lawyer came to their defense. Since everything was being shot in Los Angeles and cannabis was legal in California, all assets were in bounds, and the show could go on.

“People sit at home and smoke,” Jackson said. “Now we can smoke and watch two NBA Champions talk about sports and life with the biggest names in entertainment? Everything was God’s plan because a lot of things fell in line in time.”

Though the show was set to take off in October 2019 — right at the start of the NBA season — it would begin not with live-streaming the opener but with sitting down with a free agent.

“I knew with licensing we wouldn’t be able to watch the game, but I wanted to capture that barbershop talk with the guest format,” Barnes said. “Once Brian greenlit it? The first guest out the gate was JR Smith.”

“JR tells the story about the timeout in the NBA Finals,” Dailey said. “He had not spoken about it until that point. The way JR told the story, and the whole vibe of the interview, we hadn’t seen before. That put us on the map right away.”

More than just on the map, all over the map.

“It went viral,” Barnes said.

Upper Echelon

Anyone who watched the We Believe Warriors dismantle Dallas in 2007 knows one thing: Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson don’t half-ass anything.

“Our first year, we won Sports Podcast of the Year,” Barnes said. “We figured we had a little something.”

Upon catching the spark from JR, All the Smoke was able to book the likes of CC Sabathia and Dwyane Wade, offering an alternative space for conversation that led to athletes touching on topics never before presented publicly.

“The agenda was always to celebrate people, not extract clickbait,” Dailey said. “Early stuff like D Wade talking about his child and being a father? That crossed us over beyond sports. E!, Entertainment Tonight, People all picked it up. It’s always about elevating our guests versus trying to bait them.”

“Everything in our lives, from good to bad, we’ve owned it and wear it on our sleeves,” Jackson said. “We can talk about child support, losing family members, losing money. We can talk about anything and not judge anybody because we put ourselves in those shoes.”

Across the gotcha media landscape, people are often punked by pundits in the shiniest of studios. Despite the confrontational title, All the Smoke wasn’t looking to take on their guests — they were looking to take on the system by building their own.

“You weren’t walking into some corporate building,” Dailey said. “This was an amazing, gritty set-up in Santa Monica.”

A sunny setup surrounded by food trucks and access to legal weed.

“I always wanted to create the vibe,” Barnes said. “If you’re just in a green room? It’s stiff. We came out with music, food, alcohol, and cannabis. We wanted to create a relaxing, comfortable environment.”

Before cameras ever rolled, the hosts set the tone from the jump. The atmosphere they envisioned was actualized in the form of a main stage mural depicting Nipsey Hussle, 2Pac, Bob Marley, and The Notorious B.I.G. memorialized in kush clouds.

“Enkone, an LA street artist, spent a whole week sleeping in the studio and did that beautiful mural,” Dailey said. “When people saw the set and the vibe, it was an experience people wanted to be a part of.”

Within weeks, guests didn’t just want to pull up to All the Smoke; they wanted All the Smoke to pull up to them.

“Kobe was a huge breakthrough for us,” Dailey said. “That legitimized us a lot sooner than we anticipated. The network was ordering 12 episodes of our ‘Best of’ a lot sooner than we thought.”

Just as the Kobe episode caught traction on television, disaster struck twice.

Days after airing, Bryant tragically died in a January 2020 helicopter accident, making All the Smoke his last long-form interview.

Working while grieving, the show continued to climb. From filming in the studio with Steph Curry to hosting a live show with Kevin Garnett at All-Star Weekend in Chicago, the momentum mounted.

Then the world shut down. Bred by adversity, Barnes and Jackson used the downtime to dig in.

“The pandemic is when we took off,” Jackson said.

“We were one of the first to get up and going during quarantine,” Dailey added. “Everyone was trying to figure out studio programming. We figured out right away how to set up the guys remotely and get to work.”

So good that the guest list, audience, and output grew tremendously.

“Matt started to hit up his network when nobody was doing anything,” Dailey said. “So we’d have Ken Griffey Jr. talk from his home office or Jamie Foxx from his steps.”

“We leveled up despite being in this terrible time,” Dailey said. “We were cranking out two or three episodes a week because we were getting such crazy volume, and the numbers were through the roof. We got Tatum, Ja, Vince, T Mac. We had legends, we had rookies, entertainers, it was wild and something for everyone.”

The path to Podcast of the Year — much like each of their NBA careers — was one of fight and resilience.

All leading up to another fight.

Season on the Brink

The inaugural season of All the Smoke spanned 43 episodes and blossomed amid a global pandemic.

It also coincided with a spring that saw ViacomCBS lay off 450 employees, including 88 at Showtime. Though ATS had made its way to premium television and soared through streams, Dailey still had to fight to keep the successful show afloat.

“The first year, he had to bootstrap to get us paid,” Barnes said. “He went to every single department and scraped the money together to pay us.”

Rather than sulk, Barnes leaned on the same ethos that made him successful as an NBA player. He hustled.

“I started learning the business and shopping it myself,” Barnes said. “I was talking to Spotify, Apple, Amazon, you name it, to figure out what the market was because it was such a new space.”

Due to the relatively new nature of podcasts and the cross-platform production that All the Smoke existed as, the market for what Barnes, Jackson, and Dailey had built was almost impossible to define because it didn’t live in one box.

Sensing such, Barnes sought suitors of all varieties.

“I started talking to iHeart and tried to figure out how we could intermix the two,” Barnes said. “I knew Showtime was great on the digital side, but iHeart was one of the biggest radio platforms in the world.”

Realizing All the Smoke had value in video and audio, Barnes brought both parties together.

“We had those two talk and sit down,” Barnes said. “We ended up being able to double-dip.”

From avoiding industry-wide layoffs to leveraging two backers, the undrafted Matt Barnes was now the media’s Rookie of the Year. Then, acting as his own agent, he was able to get audio backing by iHeart’s Black Effect Podcast Network and digital dollars by way of Showtime Basketball’s YouTube channel.

“We were able to double our money up,” Barnes said. “From there, we were off and running.”

Platform to Partners

The hustle of Barnes, Jackson, Dailey, and the All the Smoke family led to leverage inside Showtime and influence everywhere. But with power comes privilege.

In the early seasons of All the Smoke, Matt Barnes was cold-calling famous friends to talk over Zoom. By its third season, Hollywood’s elite was prioritizing pulling up on set.

“Kevin Hart pulled up,” Jackson recalled. “The first thing he said is, ‘I’m not here because y’all are my guys. You’re my friends, but I watch the show. I’m a fan.'”

The intimate hang with a worldwide audience made All the Smoke more personal and mass than TV competitors or podcast peers. Suddenly, stars in all stages of their careers were seeing Stak and Matt to talk, plug projects, and clear the air on issues personal and public.

“To have Will Smith request us to be his first show after everything went down? Will could’ve gone anywhere, but he chose us,” Jackson said. “That meant the world to us and let us know we’re doing something special.”

When it comes to booking talent on show, Jackson is quick to cite Melissa Chusid as a rockstar, with both hosts also happy to hop on the phone or in DMs. The rolodex of A-list guests from various industries makes the show a marketing magnet for ad reads and endorsements, even if the show’s sentiment towards cannabis and unfiltered conversation once scared sponsors.

“We’ve been lucky to work with partners that understand the brand and our audience,” Dailey said.

Dailey notes DraftKings as a Day 1 partner who has been on board the whole ride. Like smoking, sports gambling came into the media space with a stigma. Look around today, and you’d be hard-pressed to find a successful podcast, show, or series not backed by a betting platform.

For decades, traditional ad partners paved the way for media to make money and also appear credible. In a streaming and scrolling content space where the lines between broadcast and brand are blurred, All the Smoke is expanding into various streams of revenue to grow its reach and engage with the audience.

“From the jump, we’ve looked at it as a multi-platform content brand,” Dailey said. “We drew it up with that as our goal, and now we sit with an apparel partnership, upcoming mezcal launch, and a book.”

From fashion to spirits, books to live events, Barnes is not just fronting All the Smoke in new endeavors; he’s doing the ground-level R&D to make these moves happen.

“You see a lot of heavy exits in the alcohol space, so we jumped on and did our research,” Barnes said. “Initially, we wanted to do a tequila, but we saw the growth in mezcal.”

In conjunction with the show’s 200th episode, All the Smoke is entering the premium podcast merchandise space through a collaboration with Legends, an athletic apparel company in which Barnes is an investor.

While the show exists as a platform to push screen-printed tees and embroidered hats in bulk, they’re now hitting a higher price point and more intimate connection.

It’s a win for All the Smoke being taken more seriously as a lifestyle brand and an awareness lift for the company Barnes bought into in 2018, soon set to reach the $100 million mark.

“It’s added credibility to the brand,” Legends founder Scott Hochstadt told Boardroom. “They’ve made strategic intros for us, and it validates us. When I walk around with Matt in Vegas? More people want to meet him and take photos than current NBA guys.”

In 2023 and headed into 2024, All the Smoke will have books on tables and booze in stores. They’ll be able to sell premium apparel in limited launches online to the show’s millions of followers.

Better yet, they’ll be able to push that same product and meet those same fans via an expanded footprint in the live show space.

“Moving forward, live events will definitely be a huge part of what All the Smoke does,” Barnes said.

While live events were initially part of the plan in 2020 following the KG taping in Chicago, COVID-19 paused that momentum. In the time since, All the Smoke has hosted live events with Magic Johnson in LA and Jason Williams in Sacramento. Though the team has a flock of fans across California, they recently found out that even more exist abroad.

“Going to Croatia? We headlined a multi-day sports symposium,” Dailey said. “It was mind-blowing, we’re resonating with people in Croatia? We did a live show where a couple hundred people came out in jerseys and gear.”

Not only were fans from afar fans of Matt and Stak, but they were also in love with the content.

“We did a Q&A, and they’re asking detailed questions saying they’ve watched every single episode,” Dailey said. “It’s way beyond anything we could’ve ever imagined.”

Beyond Imagination has been a common theme for All the Smoke — so what’s next?

Battling the Big Dogs

Meet Matt Barnes in passing or pick up the phone with Stephen Jackson, and you’ll find the same candor and charisma they possess on the podcast.

Typecast them as absent in meetings or content with their content? Well, that’s where you’ve got them fucked up.

“We weren’t doing a show just to have a show,” Jackson said. “We were doing a show to compete with the big dogs.”

During their run at Showtime Basketball, Dailey, Barnes, and Jackson partnered with the likes of Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce, using the strength of All the Smoke to take all parties to new heights. Now aligned with Le Batard and John Skipper at Meadowlark Media, familiar faces will follow.

As a platform, All the Smoke has been able to revive Rachel Nichols’ legendary career and help DeMarcus Cousins lean into his next chapter after basketball. Additionally, they’ve teamed up with Allen Iverson as part of a multi-year partnership, continuing to build with AI and influence the next generation of hoopers.

Each entity will ascend alongside ATS with Meadowlark Media and DraftKings, making the most of this massive move.

“I’d put our roster up against any network,” Barnes said. “Brian made it easy. From the jump, I felt like he was one of us. Even though he was on the other side of the business, he always fought for us.”

“I tell you this wholeheartedly: it’s going to be hard for places like ESPN,” Jackson said. “When you have shows like ours and even Cam and Mase? You don’t have to wait for SportsCenter. I always want to see guys like Stephen A. Smith and Shannon Sharpe, the guys we look up to and love. But what we’re doing right now? I think it’s only going to get bigger.”

At All the Smoke, bigger means expanding to new audiences with new athletes and new shows.

“Basketball, baseball, soccer, hockey,” Jackson said. “Anything we feel belongs in our network? We’re trying to build a home for it.”

“We became an example of what a cross-platform content play could look like,” Dailey said. “It’s an award-winning podcast, long-form show on digital, and a program on premium cable. Our social audience has been our fastest-growing audience at Showtime, and it’s all been organic. We haven’t put a dollar against growing our social.”

The dollars instead are going to two NBA vets who won rings but never got a max contract.

“Jack and I were role players,” Barnes said. “Normally, stars are the ones that can go on and create incredible niches. It says a lot for myself and Stephen to do the same thing.”

“It’s great to be All-Stars in this space who weren’t All-Stars in basketball,” Jackson said. “Now they’re looking at us as the players in the space.”

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In the era of the entrepreneurial athlete, Ant-Man is standing on business by doubling down on his game. Will it all culminate in building an empire with Adidas?

Months before dethroning NBA Finals favorites and being compared to Michael Jordan, a smiling Anthony Edwards visualized his skyrocketing success.

“I see myself holding my own,” Edwards told Boardroom in September. “With the performance that I plan on putting on? It’s gonna go through the roof.”

Sitting under studio lighting in his high school weight room, Edwards has been zeroed in on as the Association’s alpha dog long before he purchased a pooch named Anthony Edwards Jr.

It all aligns with a summer abroad that saw Ant-Man make his case as the best baller on Earth, upping his game in the FIBA World Cup just weeks after the ink dried on a supermax Minnesota Timberwolves contract worth up to $260 million.

A summer when Ant saw himself leap league leaders before it happened. A summer when Adidas — an international company valued at over $35 billion — decided to make the 22-year-old All-Star the face of its basketball business.

A wise bet for the German juggernaut as basketball is the business Edwards is entirely consumed by.

“I used to train a lot of kids,” Ant’s partner and business manager, Justin Holland, told Boardroom’s Rich Kleiman on Out of Office. “Basketball, that’s the main thing. The last thing I have to worry about is if he’s getting in the gym.”

“Basketball, that’s all I want to focus on,” Edwards told Boardroom’s Rich Kleiman on Out of Office. “Nothing else.”

A man of few words yet endless soundbites, Edwards’ highlights have done the talking in the 2023-24 NBA season. The rare exception is a run of viral Adidas advertisements, positioning AE as the next MJ through pan-down shots similar to the infamous “Banned” campaign.

Like Mike, it’s a business Ant is invested in. Now, he’s debuting a daring signature shoe and an aggressive advertising angle to match.

“I’m in it, all in,” Edwards said. “I don’t want to make shoes that people might want to hoop in. Nah, I want to make shoes that I know people are gonna wear.”

Here’s how Ant and his Adidas partners envision his signature business ascent.

Advertising a Dawg

If you dive deep into Anthony Edwards’ Wikipedia page, it’ll tell you that he intended to major in marketing while at UGA.

If you ask Anthony, this is a typo.

“I ain’t study no marketing,” said Edwards. “I studied basketball at Georgia.”

That’s because Ant was so good during his sole season at Georgia that he led all NCAA freshmen in scoring. While those numbers rocketed him up the Draft board, it was something else that caught the attention of the Adidas execs once he landed in the league. Edwards entered a landscape where charisma mattered as much as stats.

“Marketing is a personality business,” legendary agent David Falk told Boardroom in July. “It’s not how many points you score.”

If anyone knows the intersection between athletes and shoe sales, it’s Falk. From launching Air Jordan at Nike to taking Allen Iverson‘s talents to Reebok, he’s seen brands build folklore around unearthly athleticism and uncanny cool. And when considering basketball’s bank-breaking signature stars before him, Ant may have enough MJ and AI in him to register at retail.

Sitting somewhere on the star spectrum between Bo Jackson and A$AP Rocky, Ant’s he-man heroics, cut with charisma, make him a real one-of-one. On the court, he’s defined by an alpha dog demeanor. Off the court, he’s affable in interviews. 

If you ask Ant’s agent, he might have more personality than all those icons combined.

“I refer to him as a walking Emmy,” Bill Duffy told Boardroom. “He’s so entertaining. He’s brilliant, he’s smart, he’s witty, he’s humorous, he’s the whole package.”

It’s an authentic zag that distances him from the load-managed, media-trained types he plays against each night. These are the same personalities he competes with in games and for shoe sales.

It’s a personality put front and center in his first Adidas ad — a viral venture that sees Ant quite literally in his bag. Tossing away debut drops from Ja Morant, Luka Dončić, and LeBron James, the clip is essential Edwards: confrontational and comedic, shit-talking with a smile.

It’s also Adidas Basketball‘s most engaging social post when it comes to creating conversation. Whether one speaks English or reads subtitles, Ant’s personality is backed by metrics with high hopes of his ability to translate abroad.

“There’s very few people that reach that level of popularity and global appeal where they can really move product,” said Duffy. “He’s definitely next up. I expect this to be one of the top shoes in the world.”

Bill Duffy

Historically, Adidas has made its mark in China and neighboring nations thanks to the popularity of Tracy McGrady and Derrick Rose. Ant appears next, a notion not lost on his agent where sales are concerned.

“50% of shoes are sold in Asia,” said Duffy. “They still play ball in Asia, so they’re buying shoes for performance. It’s like it was in the US 20 years ago.”

Right on time, the AE 1 is akin to the Y2K oddities of Adidas’ past, presenting a future for the basketball category as a whole.

The Model

Truth be told, big swings like this have been missed before on athletes of the unrelatable variety or products that cut corners. 

Betting it all on Ant, they’re hoping to hit it big with not just the AE 1 but everything the Three Stripes have in store in hoops.

“We tried to push him as the face of Adidas Basketball,” said Patrick Zempolich, Footwear Designer at Adidas Basketball and the pen behind the AE 1. “He pushed us to make something that didn’t look like anything on the market.”

Even on a roster that boasts James Harden and Jerry Lorenzo, Anthony Edwards has been deemed the chosen one for the future of the brand’s basketball category.

“He’s one of the best athletes in the world, but kids feel like they can touch him,” Eric Wise, Global GM of Basketball at Adidas, told Boardroom. “He eats the snacks they eat. He speaks their language.”

Eric Wise

The fact that Edwards tests off the charts in workouts but pounds hot fries makes him different from his pro peers but relatable to teens. An approachable personality and aspirational athleticism collide on his first shoe when it comes to price and positioning.

Retailing for $120, the Adidas AE 1 is affordable in the grand scheme of signature shoes. Ja’s debut sneaker starts at $110, while the 21st namesake Nike for LeBron tips the scales at $200. While the price places the AE 1 within mass grasp, its design deviates completely.

Futuristic and tech’d out, the model’s ‘Warped Velocity’ brief brings to life a perspective unlike anything else on the court. It’s oppositional to denim in approach and economy in aesthetic. Historically, forward-thinking products have pulled buyers to adapt.

“We’re trying to create aspirational products that perform at the highest level,” Adidas Basketball’s Vice President of Design Nathan VanHook told Boardroom.

Still, at $120 and on the feet of Ant, it has a chance to connect with the masses.

“That’s the secret sauce,” said Wise. “The product has to feel aspirational and hit on all the things those kids in the gym need. But it has to stand out.”

Eric Wise

When considering the bigger brand picture, it’s also decidedly Adidas.

“That shoe feels like us,” said Wise. “We know what the marketplace is, and we don’t want our products to look like a cereal box line in a grocery store.”

Lately, basketball brands have moved units by blasting their logo across the sidewall and using cartoon colorways as a means of storytelling. With Ant and Adidas’ new direction, the design direction and on-court performance are intended to do all the talking.

“They’re going to be the hardest basketball shoe out,” said Edwards. “To ever be released.”

Ants Go Marching

For over 30 years, the ‘Be Like Mike’ mantra has transcended time, culture, and continents.

The Air Jordan empire is worth billions, distilling MJ’s moxy, accomplishments, and personality into footwear that toes the line between aspirational and accessible. It all started with betting big on a country kid and daring to be different on his first shoe.

In 2023, Adidas has an opportunity to sell personality through footwear, rewriting what it means to be brash and self-assured. The notion of connecting to kids is not lost on the signature athlete or its designer.

“I want them to feel like they can play like me,” said Edwards. “And be like me.”

“We wanted to create a confident shoe,” said Zempolich. “Something that could boost a kid’s confidence.”

Silly as it may sound, millions of kids who connected with Air Jordans in the ’80s and ’90s bought into the same hope that they could fly simply by lacing up a pair of Nikes. Those who couldn’t jump still found confidence in said sneakers, still dipping their toes in the pond of nostalgia with each retro release.

While the MJ model is one many have tried but none have duplicated, Edwards may have enough personality and potential to build his own empire at Adidas.

An empire that, if done right, can outlast his career on court.

“I’m always planning for a life after basketball for him whether he realizes that or not,” Holland told Boardroom. “At 22, if we can start thinking business? At 25, 26, 27, he should have his own businesses that can run [years later] when he’s retired.”

At this point, Edwards still hasn’t won a title or sold a shoe. The hope is that as his star ascends and Adidas builds his business, he’ll be well set up to be the man for years to come.

“We think we have the product and the athlete to cut through,” said Wise. “The team’s already working on the second one.”

Until then, there’s the first one.

In the Adidas AE 1, the 22-year-old who saw himself owning the NBA months before it happened can already see kids imitating his aura through footwear. 

If you aren’t sold on who Ant could become, he’ll remind you why you should buy into who he is.

“I’m the coolest guy in the world,” closes Edwards. “Why would you not wanna get these and feel like me?”

The post Anthony Edwards: The New Blueprint appeared first on Boardroom.

Time flies when you’re Travis Scott.

From Air Jordan drops that sell out in seconds to working directly with Kim Jones on Dior designs, every minute matters for La Flame and his team. No matter the time zone, his calendar floods with international tour dates and alerts on his phone bury the listed hours and minutes.

Time is very much money. Enter the Cactus Jack x Audemars Piguet Royal Oak.

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Ticking away the moments that make up a lit day, the chocolate-brown watch is signature Scott, revising the 1972 timepiece in murky-yet-modern fashion.

Making the leap from StockX to Sotheby’s, the $201,000 chronometer collaboration sees Scott’s label, Cactus Jack, influence each element from the font to the face. While streetwear segues appear aesthetically, a keen eye and mature differentiation bleed through on the brown calfskin strap.

This testament is more than just a branding play. It’s a truly unique stance and possible pendulum swing when considering the brazen black leather or shiny stainless steel straps seen on past Royal Oak launches from legends like LeBron James and Jay-Z.

Forever young, the ceramic style is illuminated by glow coating and sapphire crystal casing.

Last but not least, smoked counters and a brown bezel tie in the Travis Scott style, subtly standing out among other AP collaborations.

Limited to 200 units, that total has already dipped to 199. At the unveiling event, Scott showcased a bust-down iteration on his own wrist, taken to new heights with rainbow jewels, word to the Denver Nuggets.

Said by Scott to be a project four years in the making, the watch reigns as the pinnacle piece of the collaboration but not the standalone. A range of merchandise including a robe, pajamas, shirts, and more allows an entry point to this aspirational project.

Additionally, it allows his fanbase to grow with him — or perhaps dream bigger — as his deals span from Fortnite and fast food to A24 and AP.

Look for the range to release on Dec. 1 at 10 a.m. PST at Travis Scott’s online shop. According to GQ, a portion of proceeds from each sale will go to a charity of Scott’s choice.

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Adidas Basketball has signed Darryn Peterson to an NIL deal, making him the first high school basketball player to ever sign with the Three Stripes.

Peterson, a 6’5 combo guard out of Canton, OH, is just 16 years old, but a consensus five-star recruit in the Class of 2025. The Huntington Prep prospect now embarks on his junior season with the backing of an international sportswear supplier and advances from over 30 Division I programs.

“The deal gives me the opportunity to take my brand to the next level,” Peterson told Boardroom. “And spread it around the world.”

Already a national name on the AAU circuit and in online mixtapes, Peterson is a newcomer to the NIL space due to his high school status.

Since the advent of NIL in 2021, tons of top athletes at colleges all over the country have benefitted from aligning with sponsors to earn off their name, image, and likeness rights. While college athletes have reaped the lion’s share of the benefits, high school hoopers have recently emerged as new names of interest.

In Oct. 2021, PUMA signed Mikey Williams to an endorsement deal when he was only 17-years-old. Last year, Nike inked contracts with JuJu Watkins, DJ Wagner, and Bronny James during their senior seasons of high school.

Not only are each of those Nike athletes playing college ball in 2023, they’re all attending a Swoosh-sponsored university. On top of that, each endorser has already been featured in online brand campaigns or retail activations.

With the early endorsement of Peterson — a player who averaged over 31 points and nine rebounds a night as a sophomore — the magnitude of him breaking the mold at Adidas isn’t lost on him.

“It means a lot,” Peterson said. “For Adidas to choose me out of all the high school basketball players in the world? For them to take a chance on me is a big deal. It’s an honor and a blessing.”

As the 16-year-old guard starts his junior season, Peterson will be ten toes down for the Three Stripes. Due to his deal, he’ll be able to publicly promote shoes tied to his new brand teammates like Anthony Edwards, Donovan Mitchell, and Trae Young.

He’ll also do it on a grander stage. Playing at the same prep school that produced the likes of Andrew Wiggins and Keldon Johnson, he’ll be competing with the Boozer brothers for the No. 1 ranking in his high school class. At the same time, he’ll blaze a trail for all the high school hopefuls looking to follow in his footsteps.

To any amateur athletes looking to become the next Adidas signee? The young man has some advice.

“Keep the main thing the main thing,” Peterson said. “Focus on whatever that dream is and the business part will come with it. Don’t let that drive you. Stay humble and be self-motivated.”

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In some sense, the Peterson pairing at Adidas is the next chapter of a full-circle story. For any fan familiar with high school hoops and Adidas’ storied history in the space, Peterson provides a through-line of what once was and what still could be.

Over the course of the ’90s and ’00s, the Adidas ABCD Camp was the place where numerous high school hopefuls started their ascent to NBA stardom. Led long ago in the grassroots game by Sonny Vaccaro, the Three Stripes provided platforms at the amateur level for everyone from Kobe Bryant to LeBron James.

It was with this influence on the amateur game that Sonny was able to sign Kobe, Tracy McGrady, and Jermaine O’Neal before the world knew their names. Such early insight put Adidas on a path to compete in the basketball market for years to come.

“That’s why I went there,” Vaccaro told Boardroom in May. “To find those guys. Adidas had players, but you just can’t get anybody. You’ve gotta get kids that move the needle.”

With the signing of Darryn Peterson in 2023, Adidas has the chance to capitalize on the energy it has long possessed. It’s already an immediate win for the 16-year-old star that’s just beginning to blossom — even if now it means less time to think about outfits and more incentive to go all in on hoops.

“The biggest thing it changes is probably my wardrobe,” Peterson said. “Every day I’m Three Stripes head to toe.”

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20 years ago, Jay-Z was leaving the game behind.

Releasing The Black Album, Shawn Carter’s transition from the booth to the boardroom was in full motion. After eight straight summers of releasing rhymes, those same gems applied to Preemo beats would be applied to partnerships.

Making the move from MC to CEO, his title would change. So would his clothes.

After a love affair with sports that started in his youth and became commercialized through his career, the throwback jersey popularized by Hov on the road of The Hard Knock Life Tour and in music videos off The Blueprint rose to the rafters at the end of his Fade to Black performance.

Selling out at Madison Square Garden, premium sportswear company Mitchell & Ness made Jay his own Roc-A-Fella Records jersey, sending it to the ceiling across the likes of Clyde Frazier and Earl Monroe.

Jay Hova sat at the right hand of Black Jesus, honoring the hand that don’t write in the most hip-hop of fashion. As a salute to fans, the iconic kit was released to the tune of 2,003 units, becoming a status symbol and fashion statement for the few fans able to purchase.

In the time since, Jay-Z made good on his own ascent. He traded in his throwbacks for button-ups, taking on presidential titles at Def Jam and starting Roc Nation. He played a pivotal role in moving the New Jersey Nets to his home of Brooklyn, staying connected to sports through drive and deals.

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All the while, he’d renege on his retirement from both rap and throwbacks, dropping albums and guest verses on occasion and popping up in a Michael Jordan jersey at his Made in America Festival. The lifelong love of Mitchell & Ness came full circle in 2022 when Jay-Z became an owner of the Philly threadmaker.

This weekend, the two-decades-old story sees its next chapter realized at retail: the Roc-A-Fella Records jersey from 2003 will launch at ComplexCon in Long Beach, followed by an online drop at Mitchell & Ness at a later date.

Like the OG, the S. Carter re-release will be limited and individually numbered to runs of 2003. The iconic Knicks color scheme returns with a new Nets-inspired rendition also following suit.

In addition to Hov’s historic tank, collaborations with Death Row Records, Ruff Ryders Entertainment, So So Def Recordings, and Top Dawg Entertainment will also be released, celebrating hip-hop’s 50th anniversary in sportswear style.

“These jerseys represent an era that revolutionized music, fashion, and popular culture,” Mitchell & Ness CEO Eli Kumekpor said in a statement. “We’re proud to honor that legacy.”

From the rafters to retail, homage to ownership, Jay-Z never left the game, he just reenvisioned how to give it.

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Kevin Durant and Drake are not using the latter months of 2023 to bask in what they’ve already accomplished.

Simultaneously leading the Suns in scoring and the world in streams, Easy Money Sniper and Champagne Papi started the season with For All the Dogs: Drake’s No. 1 album A&R’d by Durant.

The October release topped the charts in 10 countries, turning in a sprawling 23 tracks. Thursday, the run continues with the surprise release of Scary Hours 3.

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Announced on Instagram by The Boy, the third installment of the extended play series follows what was believed to be a break from music and touring after the release of FATD and the end of the It’s All a Blur Tour.

That proved to be a pump fake.

This week, Aubrey added another leg to the acclaimed road run, set to tour arenas in January with support from J Cole.

On Wednesday, the two rappers doubled down on the news by releasing the video for “First Person Shooter Mode” — the No. 1 single off the October album that tied Drake with Michael Jackson for most chart-toppers and gave Jermaine Cole his first single as Billboard’s best.

In less than 24 hours, the duet visual has already accrued over 2.7 million video views on YouTube. It all adds up to the buzz of both the tour and surprise EP.

With Scary Hours 3, Drake, Durant, and esteemed engineer Noel Cadastre are all billed as executive producers. OVO Noel has been working with Drake since Thank Me Later, with Durant formally joining the fold on For All the Dogs.

For those keeping track at home, the Scary Hours series started in 2018 with the two-track release of “God’s Plan” and “Diplomatic Immunity.” The EP’s opener went on to go Diamond on RIAA and viral on YouTube, amassing over 1.5 billion views and counting.

Scary Hours 2 came in 2021, offering an appetizer for Certified Lover Boy later that year. The three-track project produced another No. 1 hit for Drake in the form of “What’s Next,” reuniting with Lil Baby and Rick Ross on “Wants & Needs” and “Lemon Pepper Freestyle,” respectively.

Upon arrival, each Scary Hours 2 track took the top three spots on that week’s Billboard Hot 100.

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Though details around Scary Hours 3 remain scarce, an ominous midnight release and continued work with KD are confirmed.

Not only does this project follow Durant’s A&R work on For All the Dogs, but it comes amid rumors of an upcoming project with Blueprint producer Bink alongside rappers Ransom and 38 Spesh.

“KD been wearing his executive hat,” 38 Spesh told Rap Radar Podcast in September. “KD got an ear. He knows good music, he’s got a good ear. A real good ear. It surprised me how in tune he is.”

Dialed in, Durant and Drake are both doing numbers where rap records are concerned.

The A&R arrival in October saw KD and OVO claim seven out of the top 10 spots on Billboard’s singles charts. Getting back at it during in-season tournament play, Thursday’s executive producer pivot proves the latest move for the restless rapper and active All-Star.

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Operating a turntable while speaking to 70,000 screaming fans, it only takes Chase B two-and-a-half words to turn a sold-out Sofi Stadium into Studio 54.

“Let’s party.”

As “MODERN JAM” melts a Samsung sound system blasting 1.3 million watts of Daft Punk drums and Teezo Touchdown cabaret, Chase operates as offensive coordinator for the Travis Scott show, selling out NFL arenas and moving millions in merch.

Over the last decade, the fly guy behind the booth has seen his star soar as a DJ, producer, and personality, booked by billionaires to throw parties and brands to find their footing.

From Jordan Brand campaign gigs to Chrome Hearts events, the boy born Chase Benjamin has lived up to his name, hunting hundos at a race pace since embarking on his entertainment journey.

Now 33 years old and already a veteran in the game, the Houston hyphenate is bringing it back home by building his empire.

“What I’m on now is trying to condense all of it,” Chase told Boardroom.

Crystalizing his debut album and launching Aux Money, his studio show at Boardroom, learn how the Cactus Jack general became the go-to-guy for Mike Rubin and Mike Jordan alike, set to embark on a new era of excellence.

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Houston to Howard

Chase B was born in Houston, coming of age at Hightower High School before coming into his own at Howard University.

The son of two Boston College graduates, academics and sports surrounded Chase as a child, excelling in hoops and football before focusing on the family trade of track and field.

“My brother was super talented at track and went to the University of Pennsylvania,” said Chase. “I really wanted to go to Columbia.”

With the grades to attend an Ivy League school and the footspeed to run mid-distance at Clemson, Chase battled between going all in on academics or keeping his running career alive.

“I wasn’t going to the Olympics,” Chase said. “I kept hearing things about Howard. I loved it as soon as I got there.”

Enamored by the possibility of attending an HBCU, the 800-meter star soon found his footing in music and entertainment.

From hosting functions on campus to getting club gigs as an underclassman, the Texas track star was the toast of DC’s party scene before he was old enough to drink legally.

“I was 19 years old hosting clubs,” said Chase. “They’d take my ID, and I’d host. Being in that realm put me onto so many things in entertainment culture.”

Like Puff Daddy decades before him, Chase excelled in Howard’s social scene, making a name for himself so fast around campus that it quickly became clear that being a DJ was his calling.

A calling that didn’t require a degree but did require a change of scenery.

How to Make it in America

Rather than wait for his graduation cap in DC, Chase B headed north to New York.

The three-hour train ride was a career equivalent to the long jump, looking to land all the experience he picked up DJing at Howard into a real residency in the Big Apple.

“Moving to New York really stamped everything for me,” said Chase. “I was damn near homeless trying to figure everything out even though I was doing really cool gigs.”

Standing at the center of culture, the big bet on going from DC to NYC was a worthwhile risk for Chase. Although the cost of living versus price for parties paled compared to getting by on a college campus, the proximity to talent, energy, and branding opportunities was next level.

“The looks would be so great, but I’m DJing parties for $50 to $100,” Chase said. “How do I take this from a hobby to a real career?”

Miles away from the homecoming concerts he threw at Howard and beneath the poverty line where New York rent was concerned, Chase’s passion proved bigger than his paychecks upon arrival.

That same spirit for music and people eventually introduced him to two mentors who would change his life, the first being DJ Clark Kent.

“When I got to New York, he had a management company, and I wanted to be down so bad,” Chase said. “We had meetings, and he’d put me on game. He said, ‘Honestly, you can survive on your own. Let’s keep this strictly a friendship.’ He’s been my big brother through this.”

As alluded to, another big brother became an early advocate for Chase B. His name? None other than Virgil Abloh.

“I was broke as hell in New York,” recalled Chase. “Me and Virgil would do all these warehouse parties in the deepest dungeons of SoHo. You met the coolest people. That’s where I met [A$AP] Yams, Bari, that whole scene was in New York.”

In Abloh, Chase had a mentor 10 years his senior but equally energized. Their excitement for new sounds saw Chase tagging along for Fashion Week parties and eventually playing festivals alongside the late Off-White founder.

It also opened doors in the city, making Chase the go-to DJ for hip-hop showcases during the latter years of The Blog Era.

“Those shows at Santos Party House and SOBs gave me the notoriety to get to headlining gigs,” said Chase. “My tenure at The Darby and Up&Down transcended my career. It’s where I met all the artists I know now.”

From Swae Lee to Young Thug, Ty Dolla $ign to Quavo, Chase B became buddies with hip-hop‘s next wave of talent at a moment when they were all going up. Despite being from Houston and attending school in DC, he was the guy in NYC when it came to throwing parties at all of the city’s hottest spots.

“It was a prime time in New York nightlife history,” said Chase. “I was at the pulse of all that with 1 OAK. From 2015 to 2019, all those interactions are really what impacted my career the most.”

A career that blossomed in the Big Apple and soon took him everywhere.

Coast to Coast

In the mid-2010s, Chase B was becoming the biggest young DJ in New York City.

All the while, his childhood friend from Houston was still sending him songs on Soundcloud. Jacques Webster, better known as Travis Scott, had grown up with Chase in Missouri City and pursued music on a parallel path.

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In that era, Chase was spinning at showcases for bubbling XXL Freshman and at 1 OAK for socialites looking to get lit. At the same time, Travis was becoming both. From producing tracks on Yeezus to rapping alongside Justin Bieber, Scott’s meteoric rise ran concurrently with Chase’s.

For much of the 2010s, Chase B was so booked as a DJ that he had residencies in multiple time zones simultaneously.

“At one point, I had every Thursday at Up&Down in SoHo,” said Chase. “They owned 1 OAK as well, so I’d do 1 OAK in New York every Friday or Saturday and then 1 OAK in LA every week for three or four years. That was my biggest contribution to the DJ culture, those moments.”

From playing TAO in Las Vegas to hosting a party at LIV in Miami, Chase was booked to the brim and tapped in at every market. The coast-to-coast club circuit boosted his name nationwide, setting the stage for taking his talents around the world.

In 2016, Chase traveled with Travis on Rihanna‘s ANTI World Tour. Spinning in NBA arenas in front of thousands of fans, the stage was soon set for Travis and Chase to do the same as the Cactus Jack label ascended.

“We were on tour for like five years straight,” said Chase. Back on the road supporting Utopia, the grind hasn’t stopped since he started spinning.

Looking ahead, Chase is set to embark on a new pace in new lanes.

Mic Check

When Chase B began throwing parties at Howard, he dreamed of someday being Houston’s equivalent to Funkmaster Flex or Big Boy.

Hosting a radio show was the end goal, with the posts pivoting as the demands to DJ and tour the world increased. At 33, he looks back at the last 15 years fondly but ahead at the next 15 smartly.

“When I was 24? It was exciting,” said Chase. “6 a.m. flights every day and drinking until 4 in the morning? In 2017, I was probably on six flights a week. I loved it, and the money was great. But right now? It’s the whole life-after-basketball situation.”

The next few months for Chase B will see the end of the Circus Maximus Tour and the birth of Aux Money, Chase’s new show at Boardroom.

“I always knew I’d get back into radio and hosting,” Chase said. “More personality-driven stuff using my platform to put other people on.”

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Shooting episodes in his Houston studio, the likes of CJ Stroud, Bun B, and more have already pulled up to chop it up with Chase, sharing stories on their lives and careers while also grabbing the aux to get deep into the music. It’s a creative pursuit that returns to his roots of hosting.

“This show is my biggest focus right now,” said Chase. “It’s a transitional period because I’ve never had to veer away from DJing. I wanted to push myself to offer services in totally different ways.”

Additionally, it coincides with his ongoing production pivot.

In recent years, Chase has been busy behind the boards, making beats for the likes of Pusha-T, Babyface Ray, Sheck Wes, Don Toliver, Gunna, and more. Working with Mike Caren, an industry vet well-versed in business, DJing, and producing himself, Chase is releasing singles from his upcoming album, Be Very Afraid, while putting the finishing touches on the project.

Working with the same friends he met when spinning at SOB’s in New York and adding features from those he’s met on the way, it’s a testament to the journey that’s shaped his career and his sound.

“I’m really proud of this album because I didn’t follow any trends,” said Chase. “It’s me personified through music, and a lot of my favorite artists in the world are on this album.”

It’s also a showcase of his ability not just to break songs but to make them.

“I want the production to shine through because it’s really different,” Chase said. “It’s a rap album. The beats are strong. The verses are strong. The samples are dope. I want people to take away that I can not just make beats but really curate a project.”

Both Be Very Afraid and Aux Money see Chase stepping out of the lane of what’s expected of him but returning home to where he always saw his career going. In many ways, it’s no different than the bets he took on himself when he left Texas for school and left school for New York.

“Leaving Houston, I met people from the Bay Area, Atlanta, Trinidad, and Jamaica,” said Chase. “It taught me so many different things. If it wasn’t for Howard, I wouldn’t be here right now.”

A place that’s introduced him to a world of sounds and an array of artists.

A place that’s taking all of that stadium status experience and bringing it right back home to the set of Aux Money.