There apparently was a Nike civil war within the Chicago Bulls dynasty in the ’90s. Dennis Rodman’s Nike Ndestrukt was not only a trendsetter but it was outselling Nike’s baby, the Air Jordan, for a while. And it seemingly made Michael Jordan salty. The sneaker titan still sells both but Rodman is very bitter about it. Enough to compare himself to Kanye West. He did it when he returned to Chicago for Get Sole, the annual sneaker show, as its presenter. He chanced upon one of the rarest and most expensive pairs of Yeezy kicks in a sea of limited-edition shoes and drew a dramatic parallel.
Those were the Nike Air Yeezy 2 Red October that the host of the show told Rodman is worth $20,000. Actually, some places list it as high as $36,000. He asked Rodman what he thought about one of the holy grails of the sneaker biz and the 5x NBA champion responded with high praise for Ye. “Kanye West has done a great job as far as marketing,” which is true.
Though Adidas and West divorced over the music mogul’s controversies, his marketability is still selling Yeezys. Nike’s German rival decided to sell ‘leftover’ Yeezys this year and is projecting a $542 million profit just from the sales. West accused them of copying his design and threatened to sue for a chunk of the profits.
Rodman believes he’s in the same shoes. Figuratively. “Nike did the same thing with me when I had the Desktrukt,” Rodman revealed on Get Sole. That’s the Nike Air Ndestrukt, Dennis Rodman’s second signature shoe under the brand after the Air Darwin. He’s more memorable for the second one, which was stiff competition to the Air Jordan in the late ’90s.
via Getty
However, Michael Jordan still profits from Air Jordan sales. Rodman broke off from Nike and signed with Converse during his final Bulls season. So while the giant is on a retro campaign, he doesn’t get a cut of his signature shoe sales. Since 2017, Nike has been bringing back the Ndestrukt in new colorways and Rodman’s logo. It got a classic black and white makeover for 2018, a little deviation from the original flamboyance of the signature athlete behind it.
Dennis Rodman accuses Jordan Brand of stealing his design
In 1996, Rodman won his third chip while wearing the Ndestrukt in the Finals. Two years before that, he came out with the Air Darwin and made everyone do a double-take at the backward Swoosh logo. Both his shoes screamed The Worm, the league’s most untameable personality.
The Ndestrukt was an outdoor basketball shoe with offset lacing and a tougher outsole to withstand concrete floors. Like its muse, it got eyeballs and sales. So much that Michael Jordan wanted the Ndestrukt design for the Air Jordan. It was one of the trash-talking points in their dynamic but it didn’t create animosity. Until now.
Rodman has called out the Travis Scott x Air Jordan 1 design at Got Sole twice in a row now for copying the reverse Nike logo in both the Air Darwin and the early Ndestrukt. Jordan’s not getting a say in Nike’s intellectual property even if Rodman is mad about it. So Nike won’t be calling him soon as it retro-releases the Ndestrukt. Unless he wants to go to Ye route.
Stay tuned for more such updates and join us for the exciting pilot episode of the “Dual Threat Show” as our host BG12 sits down with Georgia Bulldogs star and SEC All-Freshman Team Selection, Silas Demary Jr.
