John Migdal
Malaysia who have thousands . I have tons now . I ’ m not even sure the number . I still see ones that I ’ ve never seen before because if someone printed one hundred shirts for some fun run in Washington state , it ’ s an internal event that nobody has ever seen before . That ’ s part of the beauty , along with the ridiculous graphics . Some are perfectly hideous , and some are just gorgeous .
With a catalog , you can use it as a checklist and be like , “ Ok now I have all these , and there ’ s nothing else to collect .” It ’ s not until you get to the PEs and the SMUs that it can ’ t be entirely cataloged , so you never know . There ’ s so much non-catalog stuff and t-shirts that exist . Sure , if it pops up in a Japanese magazine , it becomes more coveted , but if “ X ” number of people who pay attention haven ’ t seen something before , then it ’ s inherently rare . What cost or value goes with that ? Who ’ s to say ? On eBay , it ’ s worth as much as two people are willing to pay for it .
Aside from being rare , why the focus on the early Nike basketball PEs ?
The PEs and SMUs also bleed over into sports memorabilia , to some degree . I have those green Kevin McHale ’ s . First of all , I hate the Celtics , and I have no love for McHale , but they weren ’ t just releasing green leather shoes back then , so it just looks different . Conceivably , you ’ re competing with someone who ’ s a big Boston Celtics fan who doesn ’ t even
care about sneakers at all . That ’ s part of the love for me -- that there ’ s a little bit of sports fandom involved , but it ’ s also art , design , and fashion . If you throw all those together , I guess that ’ s why I collect . The convergence of a gazillion things I care about .
People don ’ t entirely remember that Moses Malone helped Nike , but before Michael Jordan , it ’ s not like Nike had a stronghold in the NBA . If you look at what players wore in the early-to-mid 1980s , there were like seven or eight brands . Converse had Magic , Bird , and Dr . J . What ’ s interesting is you see some of those Nike PEs are for third tier players , which is also fascinating to me . Google some of the names on the old Nike PEs , and it could be some guy who was in the NBA for four years and ended up being a first round bust , and he ’ s got his name on the back of the shoe . You think , “ Oh that guy must be big time ,” but that ’ s hardly the case . Those are the ones that are most fascinating to me .
When did you start “ collecting ” sneakers ?
I went to college in fall of 1996 . I didn ’ t have the Internet at home before that . The Internet existed , but only one friend had it . I didn ’ t have email yet . I got to college and got an email address and T-1 Ethernet connection , and next thing you know , there are these dudes in Japan posting all these old photos of sneak-
64 | Classic Kicks | classickicks . com | Volume 2