In March, Amazon Studios and Warner Bros. Pictures released Air, a film about the courtship between the Nike brand and then-collegiate star Michael Jordan. The story, set in 1984, profiles talent scout Sonny Vaccaro and his attempts to identify a new face for the company's failed basketball shoe division. Nike executives believed Jordan to be out of reach for a basketball division facing dissolution, but Vaccaro's sheer will and determination helped the sporting giant win that war over top competitor Adidas.
Some 33 years later, the Germany-based apparel and footwear corporation enjoyed a different fate in snaring the man who has become the crown jewel of the National Football League. Adidas inked Patrick Mahomes to a multi-million dollar contract the same year he was drafted in 2017. Since then, he's released his own signature shoe and is currently one of the premiers members of the brand family. Despite Mahomes' immense success through the first six years of his NFL career, something still seems amiss in his business relationship with Adidas.
Back in 2021, Mahomes became a member of an elite group of NFL players to have a signature shoe, when work began on the Mahomes 1 Impact FLX. Fewer than 20 players in the history of the league share this distinction, and he's one of just five NFL quarterbacks to have a signature model. The shoe debuted in late August and sold out in just 30 minutes. "Team Solar Green" was a bold choice for the original release of the shoe, but since then, nine other colorways have dropped: Black Panther, Black White Ice, Collegiate Red, Grey Two, Khaki Green, Royal Blue Team, Sky Blue Silver, Team Solar Orange, and White Gum.
How one of the leading athletic brands is fumbling an opportunity with the NFL's biggest star.
Over the past week, I've seen Pat donning at least three unreleased colorways (all-red, all-yellow and what appears to be an away jersey-inspired white/red). As Arrowhead Addict's resident sneakerhead, I'm left to wonder why these colorways haven't been prioritized. Mahomes is the quarterback of an NFL team that has won two of the past four Super Bowls. One might expect the athletic brand he represents to capitalize on his success.
Michael Jordan was the ubiquitous face of the Nike brand in the '80s and '90s. Why does Adidas' brand partnership with Mahomes pale in comparison? No, he's not Michael Jeffrey Jordan. He's arguably the best pitchman we've ever seen in American sports. That era was also a very different sports landscape with a much more narrow set of interests in professional athletes. Still, this is Patrick Lavon Mahomes II we're talking about. He's the face of the No. 1 sports league in the country and his unprecedented level of early success runs concurrently with the advent of social media. What are we doing?
Name the memorable Adidas spot that features Mahomes. Don't worry, I'll wait. I'll bet you can recall popular spots he's done for State Farm or Head & Shoulders. It took four years for the brand to develop a signature shoe model. The subtext here is that Adidas waited until after Mahomes won a regular season MVP award, Super Bowl LIV, and a Super Bowl MVP before making such an important decision. That's the stark difference between the relationship he has with Adidas and the one Nike built with Michael Jordan. Nike believed in Jordan's star power before he ever played a game. There was a fully-formed creative vision for what Michael Jordan would mean to Nike and ultimately to the Jordan brand.
Perhaps the visionaries are all extinct in the world of athletic apparel and footwear. Maybe there simply are no more figures like the Sonny Vaccaros, Howard Whites, and Peter Moores of yesteryear. It's a sobering thought, but we've seen what the Adidas brand was able to accomplish in its lifestyle partnership with Kanye West (well, before the train ultimately derailed). Those possibilities exist with Patrick Mahomes. He's less than a month shy of being prominently featured in the Netflix Original series Quarterback. More is possible, but I'm starting to believe the opportunity may be lost to truly leverage the relationship with Mahomes to be anything that remotely resembles what we saw with basketball's GOAT (argue with your therapist).
It's time for the Mahomes 2.0 Impact FLX. Hopefully, the next shoe is a better design with an accompanying apparel line. Imagine a series of creative television spots to market the shoe. I'd venture to guess Bel-Air creator Morgan Cooper (a K.C. native) could craft something unique having completely re-imagined The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air universe. Surely we can get Mahomes on an episode of Sneaker Shopping with Complex to promo the next release! The opportunities are there, but sans the creative direction to make your star athlete burn brighter than he ever has, Adidas' reach may simply be exceeding its grasp.