The Kicks You Wear, Vol. 306 — Queen Coco has arrived 👑
CROWN HER.
Gooooood morning, family. Welcome back to the Kicks You Wear. Thank you so much for rocking with me this morning. I appreciate you.
Hope you had a fantastic weekend. I played NBA 2k24 throughout mine. It turns out I stink. I’m shooting, like, 30% from 3-point range right now. Practice makes perfect, though. I’ll get better. Or I’ll just buy an XBox and play Starfield for the rest of my gaming life. Either way, I win.
Anyway, let’s jump in.
The Gauff era has begun
Coco Gauff just completely seized the moment on the tennis court. It’s up to New Balance to do the same off of it.
What happened: At just 19 years old, Gauff won her first Grand Slam title with a victory at the US Open.
She’s the youngest US Open winner since Serena Williams did it at 17 years old (!!!) in 1999.
In total, she’s just the fourth American teenager to ever win a major title in the Open Era of the sport. That’s all extremely impressive.
Her career is only just beginning, but she’s already one of the sport’s brightest and most recognizable stars. The fanfare surrounding her this weekend proved that.
Between the lines: Gauff did this while being the only woman in her sport with a signature sneaker. New Balance launched Gauff’s CG1 just a year ago in July of 2022. Since then, her star has only continued to grow.
Even before this US Open win she’d reached the French Open Finals, won the Cincinnati Open and beaten the No. 1 player in the world in Iga Swiatek.
It’s also worth noting that Aryna Sabalenka is the new world no. 1 following Swiatek’s defeat in the US Open and she just lost to Gauff in the finals, too.
What that means: This puts New Balance in a fascinating space. The brand has never really been here before — not in the realm of sports. It has what seems to be a truly generational star on its hands in Gauff and it landed her early on.
This is normally a Nike thing. The Swoosh gets access to the surefire prospects and markets the hell out of them. It’s a tried and true tradition. Just not in this case.
How’d this happen? It’s tennis. Tennis hasn’t been a priority at Nike for a long time. Think about it.
This is the brand that had Serena Williams in its midst but never once launched a signature silhouette for her.
That’s where New Balance differed here. It doesn’t have a massive basketball roster. It’s not a powerhouse in football. It’s working on the fringes and, by doing that, it has landed one of the brightest young stars in sports with Gauff.
What’s next: It’s time for the brand to tap in. This US Open win is a signal to take Gauff’s stardom seriously. What we saw — or rather didn’t see — from New Balance this weekend shows it isn’t quite doing that just yet.
We did get the “Call me
CocoChampion” t-shirts and a page on the NB site with Coco’s signature models, but that was it.I think this is a good start, but it just felt like there was a lack of creativity in pushing one of the brand’s best athletes.
Maybe we’ll get more down the line as New Balance gets better at this stuff. After all, we did just get an ALD spread featuring Gauff for the upcoming T500 collaboration. It’s also clear Joe FreshGoods wants to do something with her. So there are some opportunities there. They just need to be executed properly.
The big picture: People are enamored with Gauff. Her energy is amazing. Her story is incredible. We’ve been following her since she came on the scene as a plucky 14-year-old who was giving full-grown adults work on tennis’ biggest stages. She’s an absolute prodigy in every sense of the word.
She knows how good she is, but yet, she’s still so humble. She just makes you want to root for her, whether it’s because of that amazing emotional moment she shared with her family after the match or the part of her speech where she dunked on her haters. She’s just so endearing to so many people.
We need to get used to seeing her shine like this. New Balance does, too. Hopefully, with more time, we’ll see the brand handle that better.
SNKRS Day wasn’t what you thought it was
Nike’s SNKRS day popped off over the weekend on September 9. Well, popped off might be a bit of hyperbole here. It kind of just came and went.
The backdrop: Nike’s SNKRS day is something the company created to celebrate the launch of its SNKRS app years ago. It’s never been a thing in North America — it’s mostly been present in Europe.
There wasn’t necessarily a special release attached to SNKRS day in the US this time around. Just a Dunk shock drop and a bunch of SNKRS content. A lot of folks were upset about that.
Just search SNKRS day on Twitter. You’re bound to find a bunch of tweets about how we’ve been led astray by Nike.
People were looking for huge shock drops. Off-White Jordans. The Lost & Found 1s. High heat joints. Instead, all we got was just a pair of Dunks.
But look: Let’s be real, y’all. Placing our faith in online sneaker leakers and allowing them to raise our expectations has always been a mistake. They fail us every time. This time was no exception.
SNKRS day wasn’t about the shoes. It was about the app. There were sneakers, yes, but there was never any indication that a big drop of that nature was coming. Nike never promoted it as a “be by your phone” sort of day. Most of the heightened expectations came from online speculation.
That’s such a shame: Because, if you look at the day as a whole, SNKRS day actually had some pretty good shoes attached to it. We got:
The “Red Cement” Jordan 4s
A Big Bubble Air Max 1 in an OG colorway
That St. John’s Dunk Low shock drop
That’s a pretty solid drop list for just one day.
The big picture: Stop getting so upset about what the app is — or isn’t — giving you. Neither it nor these sneaker leakers deserve that attention from you. Focus on what you already have instead and you’ll be much happier about it.
Nike’s Memphis problem
This news will shock you, I’m sure, but there’s been another Nike robbery in Memphis. This time at its employee store.
What happened: Multiple suspects broke into a tractor-trailer at the Nike Employee store in Raleigh, Memphis in the early hours of the morning on Thursday, per WREG Memphis.
When authorities arrived on the scene they saw four sedans and a pickup truck rolling away with the stolen product.
In total, the suspects stole $200,000 worth of goods from the trailer.
Since the theft, local authorities have arrested a suspect allegedly involved in the robbery and charged him with theft and burglary, amongst other things from a previous incident.
The big picture: This is a huge problem for Nike. This is the second time its operation in Memphis has been hit in a month. It’s a troubling trend.
Earlier in August, $400,000 worth of merchandise was stolen from another box car.
Just about a year ago, 20 Nike trailers were ransacked for $800,000 in goods, too.
Let’s be real: Memphis is a huge hotspot for this stuff with Nike and it will continue to be. It’s the company’s biggest distribution center. Most things that have to do with Nike’s products run through Memphis. That includes the limited stuff, too.
As long as that’s the case, this is going to keep happening. Sneakers are an “asset class” now. This is how assets are treated.
Soooo…we DoorDashing kicks now?
Be careful ordering sneakers from some local spots around you. Your kicks might come back smelling like somebody’s McDonald’s fries. Or maybe you won’t get them at all.
That’s, apparently, what happened with one consumer’s sneakers ordered from Hibbet Sports. Steven Christopher said the company used DoorDash to deliver his sneakers and, well, he never got them.
The e-mail from Hibbett makes things worse. There was allegedly no tracking information coming with this shipment. He apparently just got an email saying he’ll receive the shoes in the next day or two.
I’ve reached out to Hibbett to confirm this but haven’t gotten a response yet.
This is wild, though. It’s not unheard of for a company to use a rideshare delivery service to deliver goods locally. But, uh, yeah. This ain’t it.
What’s droppin, bruh?
Air Jordan 1 “Praline” — Wednesday, September 13
Nike Mac Attack “Yin and Yang” — Thursday, September 14
UNDEFEATED x Converse Weapon — Thursday, September 14
Nike x NOCTA Glide — Friday, September 15
Air Force 1 x Terror Squad — Saturday, September 16
That’s all, folks! Thanks so much for rocking with me today. I appreciate you. Y’all are the best. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading KYW today.
Let’s chat again on Friday. Until then, folks. Peace and love. Be easy, be safe, be kind. And we out.
-Sykes💯