FanHouse Nike

Will Brinson kicked it at The OC for the Nike Global Training Summit.

Disclaimer: FanHouse in no way endorses any particular shoe or believes any brand to be superior to another when discussing athletic apparel. This is just one blogger's (albeit a brilliant one) opinion of the culturally significant release of the product that Nike calls the "Trainer 1."

There are two important aspects of shoes (much like everything else): form, and function. The Nike Trainer 1, which was unveiled to sneakerheads and media folks at Newport Beach this past week, receives high marks for both in an impressive fashion.

About 10 years ago, Nike had a hot basketball sneaker campaign called Nike freestyle. In what looks like an UNDRCRWN promotion, the Washington Wizards' young guns (and Mike James) have decided to create their own version of the freestyle ads. Here's a look at the vid:



(HT: First Cuts)

Appearing at the Nike "Coach of the Year" clinic in Pennsylvania, Florida Gators football coach Urban Meyer delivered what was described as a "colorful" address," complete with lots of four-letter language.

The Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel report from the event included no less than three (bleep)s in its online edition. Maybe that's just the kind of coverage needed to perk up the newspaper industry.

Earlier this month Will Brinson posted a clip of Kobe Bryant offering ankle insurance to Mike Epps in a spot for his new Zoom Kobe IVs. I was wondering where they were going with the ankle insurance line, but now I know the answer. Take a look at the hilarious clip below. And no, there's no fee required to watch.



(HT: First Cuts)

Elie Seckbach, the Embedded Correspondent, brings his exclusive video reporting to FanHouse. Check back regularly for more videos.

NBA star Carmelo Anthony is one of the brightest young stars in the NBA, which may be why he was chosen by Nike to be the face of their "Jordan" brand shoe line. In this video we catch up with 'Melo and his wife La La Vazquez at a party in Hollywood where his new "Jordan Melo-5" shoe was unleashed. 'Melo tells us which NBA player has the most street cred, and what he thinks about the Nuggets' new point guard Chauncey Billups. We also hear from Chloe Kardashian, professional wrestler Michael 'The Miz' Mizanin, and actor Pooch Hill.

With everyone convinced that LeBron James will leave Cleveland for the New York Knicks during the summer of 2010, there have been all sorts of rumors that have come about to explain his desire to leave. One of them is the belief that he will receive more money from Nike if he plays in New York. The thinking behind this is that it would be much more advantageous for Nike to have LeBron playing in the country's largest market and the world's basketball mecca.

Today CNBC's Darren Rovell stepped up to the plate and killed all notions of that rumor. Here's the scoop:

The $100 million number is LeBron's total contract that includes a $10 million signing bonus. There are other bonuses, royalties and incentives, but there is no New York, Chicago or L.A. market incentive.

Even if LeBron did have the New York clause in his contract it would be done by the time his contract expired. James' original deal is a seven year deal, meaning it ends at the end of the 2009-10 season, before he would have a chance to go to New York.

Rovell eventually goes into something about how LeBron hasn't been really moving product for Nike and how he likely won't be able to make more than what he's making from Nike now even if he goes to New York.

After taking last season off, the LeBron's characters have made their return. In this ad for the Nike Air Zoom LeBron VI, the LeBron's character Biz LeBron romances Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger. Here's the spot:



Honestly, I love this ad because it does two things that most shoe ads don't do these days. First, it's funny and memorable. It was a brilliant move to use Scherzinger in the spot. Tons more people will watch the spot just because she's in it. Next, it actually highlights the shoe effectively. I can't tell you how many shoe commercials I see that don't highlight the shoe enough.

HT: Skeeter and BDL

Fashion is all the rage in college football these days. Well, actually the changing of uniform designs for sales and marketing purposes isn't anything new at all. From the incredibly ugly Orange arm Florida and Va. Tech uniforms to the 230 million combination Oregon uniforms, schools are producing new uniforms on an almost yearly basis. Most likely for the purpose of selling more jerseys. But in some cases, like Cal, for a visual improvement.

The new Nike designs feature bear claw - eque slashes around the neckline along with the Cal Bear Claw logo on the neck. The claw slash look also appears on the side of the pants.

This could have gone so wrong if they would have made the claw slashes more like what a real slash looked like. For some reason I'm thinking Cincinnati Bengals bad here. But the design looks sharp for the most part. I'm not in love with the helmet design, but this is an improvement over the current uniforms.

This should be of particular interest to West Virginia fans, and ostensibly Michigan fans, as the Mountaineer uniforms have followed the Cal design since as far back as I can remember. Maybe it's just the similarities in the school colors that is sticking with me, but West Virginia didn't get gold jerseys until Cal did. Or maybe it's one too many times of walking in front of the TV thinking the Mountaineers were on, only to find out it was Cal. One thing is for sure, these two team should never play each other again! The chance for interceptions would quadruple for any quarterback that isn't color blind.

Tiger Woods finished the first day of the Masters at even-par, and doesn't seem to be happy with the course changes:

Well, the way the golf course plays now, you don't really shoot low rounds here anymore. You've just got to plod along. It's playing more of a U.S. Open than it is a Masters. I mean, there's really only one roar I heard all day, and that was (Ian) Poultie's eagle. But other than that, it was really quiet.

Well, and his eagle made a bit of noise too. Above is a video of the highs and lows of Woods' round. Of note:

7th Hole 0:15 - Unfathomable shot to save par. For me, the best part of the pro game is seeing the remarkable shots that players accomplish to get themselves out of trouble.

13th Hole 0:56 - A shot that looks like it is going to be good ends up being awful. Woods whips his club around in anger so hard after the shot that it made me think that if I did that, my arm would come out of socket.

15th Hole 1:35 - Eagle chip in to save the round. I wonder if he gets paid extra to pace ball into the cup just perfectly so that the Nike swoosh is identifiable before it drops in the hole? He might, as there are people whose job it is to watch tournaments just to catalog how long the logos are seen on TV.

Interesting piece from ESPN's "Outside the Lines" series profiling the unusual hiring of Oregon Athletic Director Pat Kilkenny. Kilkenny was a well-heeled Oregon booster with ties to former Nike founder Phil Knight.

OTL: "The next time you consider hiring or firing a coach will you call Phil Knight first? To see what he thinks?

PK: Yeah, I'd probably would talk to him about it, I would talk to some other donors too.

This kind of stuff makes the NCAA incredibly squeamish, but Kilkenny comes across as honest about the murkier aspects of his ascent and relationship with Knight.

Previously at FanHouse
Oregon's Filthy Rich AD Draws Preschool Teacher's Salary