Nike's Volt

[scottysprings]

The reason I brought it up in the first place was its interesting to me in every other team sport there are rules or its tradition for the whole team to have the same color shoes (more or less) So in the NFL or NBA the whole team wears black or white based shoes. MLB same deal. Each company might have a different look around those shoes but the Oakland A's will always have a base color of white, the Cardinals red, the Chicago Bears Black, etc. Its not like that in soccer.

I'm not saying I'm against it or for it, just interesting to me that its the only sport that shoe color is not part of the uniform. There is no question they could do it. All companies could offer a white, black, red, and blue shoe and it'd match 100% of team colors (default could be white or black of course) but its just not tradition to do that. The player can do whatever they want and that was interesting to me.

Certainly a good point. I've played soccer since I was a youngin' and ever since I got my first Eurosport catalog in the mail and saw the footwear options available outside of The Sports Authority, I've been obsessed with having nice cleats. As a uniform/design perfectionist, I've always looked for cleats that somewhat matched my teams' colors, but I know a number of kids who bought the flashiest cleats regardless if they clashed with uniform colors. Now that you've mentioned it, historic trends in sports footwear would be a very cool topic to look at, especially the development of footwear as a personal statement (see Jordan in basketball, Beckham in soccer).

[JohnnySeoul]

Even if Nike is "itching" to do anything, the NFL has extremely strict uniform rules. Nothing drastic is going to happen in 2012 except for new materials that will supposedly improve the game (whatever that means). End of story.

I know they have strict rules, which is why I said I believe Nike will plead with the NFL to loosen up on the rules. I don't think we will see anything too crazy in 2012, but you'd better believe Nike will do something ridiculous in the NFL sooner or later.

Oh, there's no doubt they'll try. But there's also no way the NFL will allow it. The NFL even goes crazy over shoes (i.e. Ochocinco's "Bengals" reeboks that they forced him to remove prior to kickoff).

True, but that is one random clown wearing a crazy design. Nike is an entirely different thing being a business partner of the NFL. I don't think they will make the entire league pro combat or anything that bad, but at least one team will get full-on Nikefied. I believe they will have far more influence on the NFL than Reebok has, particularly with alternates. I think they will push the NFL to allow "themed" alternates where Reebok never has. I hope the NFL stands their ground.

Nah....NFL is too powerful. I mean, yeah, some teams may take a extremely different approach to how they look, but it won't be any different than the extremes the Broncos took in the 90's with their switch. Teams will still have to play within their color pallets.

[guest23]

The reason I brought it up in the first place was its interesting to me in every other team sport there are rules or its tradition for the whole team to have the same color shoes (more or less) So in the NFL or NBA the whole team wears black or white based shoes. MLB same deal. Each company might have a different look around those shoes but the Oakland A's will always have a base color of white, the Cardinals red, the Chicago Bears Black, etc. Its not like that in soccer.

I'm not saying I'm against it or for it, just interesting to me that its the only sport that shoe color is not part of the uniform. There is no question they could do it. All companies could offer a white, black, red, and blue shoe and it'd match 100% of team colors (default could be white or black of course) but its just not tradition to do that. The player can do whatever they want and that was interesting to me.

Certainly a good point. I've played soccer since I was a youngin' and ever since I got my first Eurosport catalog in the mail and saw the footwear options available outside of The Sports Authority, I've been obsessed with having nice cleats. As a uniform/design perfectionist, I've always looked for cleats that somewhat matched my teams' colors, but I know a number of kids who bought the flashiest cleats regardless if they clashed with uniform colors. Now that you've mentioned it, historic trends in sports footwear would be a very cool topic to look at, especially the development of footwear as a personal statement (see Jordan in basketball, Beckham in soccer).

historic cleat/spike trends can be generalized as the following

turn of the 20th century: dark brown/black leather then I'm guessing around the 40's everything was black leather

mid to late 60's: white leather introduced in football

late 60's early 70's: colored baseball spikes introduced (the steelers also experimented with yellow cleats in the 70's I believe)

80's: colored cleats in baseball and predominantly white cleats in football

early 90's: black cleat renaissance in football

over that period I think soccer stuck predominantly with black leather throughout the 20th century until roughly the late 90's when you started to see white and multi colored cleats starting to make some headway...from what I remember one of the big cleats to add color was the adidas predator and roughly the same time nike started to get into all kinds of colors in a big way.

I also seem to recollect that nike really pushed forward into the multi colored cleats in football and baseball in the late 90's by adding quite a bit of white or gray to the team colored baseball spikes and adding large amounts of team color to their all black or all white designs.

most of the push to add so much color into cleats seems to be borrowed from the evolution of basketball sneaker design which nike took the lead back in the 80's...I don't think colored chuck taylor's really fit the bill here.

[scottysprings]

I vaguely remember the 2002 World Cup in Japan/Korea being the beginning of the colored soccer cleat trend. I may only remember it that way because the 2002 cup was the first exposure I had to international soccer, but I remember the Adidas' "champagne" colored Predators and Nike's first example of non-black Mercurial Vapors worn by Ronaldo. Soon after the Cup Nike released chrome, bright royal blue, and other bright color MV models which were extremely popular, as well as Adidas's new Predators in colors like "Lunar" and red. I know before the 2002 Cup, Adidas had the previous Predator model available in a royalish blue color but they weren't extremely popular as far as I remember.

[MJWalker45]

I know they have strict rules, which is why I said I believe Nike will plead with the NFL to loosen up on the rules. Unlike Reebok, Nike is big on crazy designs to be worn once which serve to only shill a supposedly revolutionary fabric or template. They will ask the NFL to change their rule which state that a team can only wear one given alternate over a three (I believe) year span. I don't think we will see anything too crazy in 2012, but you'd better believe Nike will do something ridiculous in the NFL sooner or later. They will leave their mark on at least one team, and others are going to get silly alternates.

Reebok/adidas are just as crazy with trying to push their designs as Nike is. the only difference in the States is that NFL teams are very serious about their identities and most colleges are not as stuck in their ways regarding uniform histories. That's why they let adidas and Nike give them new basketball designs every year. Even the long established programs. Duke and North Carolina are the only Nike schools that haven't had a radical (striping, not counting the back designs and materials) change in over 10 years. I'd expect some of the newer teams making little changes and maybe even teams like Cincinnatti or Baltimore, but I doubt Green Bay would be outrageously changed.

As for soccer, I have worn bright keeper shirts and dark keeper shirts. And based off my experience, people that know what they aren't doing won't automatically shoot at the highlighter shirts any more than they will at a dark shirt. I had the most saves in a game when I wore a gray keeper shirt with orange adidas piping.

[MJWalker45]

Ok I get what you are saying about Peyton Manning, but then again, the NFL also has regulations on what footwear models and colors are acceptable. If I recall, Peyton got fined for wearing all black or maybe white high tops (different than the team specified ones is the point) to honor Namath or someone like that. I guess my point is that you don't see NFL players wearing flashy colors because they have guidelines and will face penalties if they do so. Soccer players do not. Not saying I like the flashy colors (I don't), but just trying to establish an understanding.

It was for Johnny Unitas and he wore black shoes in honor of him the week after he passed away. The Ravens even put a pair of his shoes in a black case and put it on the sidelines. It was strange to see but he was big supporter of the Ravens when the moved in from Cleveland.

[MJWalker45]

I vaguely remember the 2002 World Cup in Japan/Korea being the beginning of the colored soccer cleat trend. I may only remember it that way because the 2002 cup was the first exposure I had to international soccer, but I remember the Adidas' "champagne" colored Predators and Nike's first example of non-black Mercurial Vapors worn by Ronaldo. Soon after the Cup Nike released chrome, bright royal blue, and other bright color MV models which were extremely popular, as well as Adidas's new Predators in colors like "Lunar" and red. I know before the 2002 Cup, Adidas had the previous Predator model available in a royalish blue color but they weren't extremely popular as far as I remember.

I think if you found pics of France 98 there may have been colored shoes. I know that prior to the 2002 World Cup when I was playing in San Antonio we had guys with white shoes on the team. We gave them crap because white was for goal scorers and they almost never did. And I had green adidas shoes before switching to Nike. I almost always try to wear black/yellow or black/gold because I'm Army and those are our colors though my team in San Antonio's colors are blue and white. So no matter what color my team wore I always had black and gold shoes. Other guys tried to match with the teams they supported in the Premier League or their college colors

[ConnMann5]

Teams are 0-2 in the Volt. Would it spare all of our eyes if it was retired perminatly?