Everyone’s favorite day of the week is here, Wednesday.
Only one thing matters today and that is #WYKW and well that it is Air Max Day Eve of course. Excited to see what the folks at Nike decide to do for the joyous day aside from the Nike Air Max Zero and recent Air Max Day Cars with FIAT.
Anyway lets get into today. Last week we shared with you guys the Wear Your Kicks Pt. 23 which featured a submission from the newest writer to the Def Pen team, Mike or as he goes by on twitter @_MikeSinatra.
His submission was easily a special one simply because it featured his OG ’97 Air Jordan 12 ‘Black/Red’ which happened to be his grails.
This week though, we have another familiar face to Kickin’ It With Def Pen and that’s Ant Sheppard or formally known as @ant_sheppard via: twitter.
Today Ant decides to share with us a sneaker that is special to him and holds a symbolic meaning to his sneaker collection, the Nike LeBron 9 ‘Cannon’.
I happen to have a pair which took me, I think like 6 months to find for retail but this isn’t about me, lets get into Mr. Sheppard’s story….
This is not about a Grail shoe. This isn’t even about my favorite pair. This is about the shoe that got me jumpstarted with a sneaker obsession again a few years ago. His is about the Lebron 9 “Cannon”.
Although I now don’t really wear more colorful sneakers (just a personal style thing), I love the ones I have for getting my interest back up on current athletic shoe designs. I have and always will have the most love for 80s/90s sneaker designs, thanks to the God, Tinker Hatfield.
But anyway, after a few years of pretty much living off of a few pair of Dunks, Jordans, and anything that would now be Nike Sportswear (throw in some random Adidas, Puma & Fila pairs), I got a desk job and started looking at sneaker blogs in my downtime. I was marginally interested in a couple Hyperdunks, updated Huaraches, and HyperMax bball shoes (McFly and Tennis Ball that I still want), but nothing really wowed me. Always kept an eye on Lebrons, of which I’ve had 4s, 6s & maybe one other that was lost along the way. Still hadn’t been wowed that much. Then came the 8s and the South Beach craze. This was cool and all, but the 8 wasn’t a need for me.
Oh boy oh boy, the next year I saw the cover of what I believe was a Chinese sneaker mag showing the rumored Lebron 9 in a colorway I wouldn’t say I had ever seen before. I think the blogs were calling them Miami Hurricanes Lebrons. I was hooked. Looked at that shoe constantly. I went out and bought the OG Blk/Red 9s when they dropped because I had to have this shoe (sold recently). I kept an eye out for release details on the shoe that got me going, later called “Cannons” and ended up being impatient and bought them for about $100 over retail from China, before US release. I even designed a sweatshirt to go with them before a purchase was even possible.
I think a lot of people will say the 8 is the best Lebron because of the South Beach version, but man that was the beginning to me. Jason Petrie took what worked with the 8 and made the 9 an even better sneaker. I’m sure I’m not the only one who would say that. I feel like there are elements of the 9 still present in the Lebron line. That says a lot. But hey, I’ve said too much and if you’re reading this, you’re probably bored by now. Peace and Love and wear those damn sneakers that you bought 7 yrs ago!
