August is almost over and before I attempt to hustle my way over to Philly for the AND1 Remix Tour 2013 & line up a list of content to aggregate for website(s) I don’t have much control over, I wanted to let some thoughts I have about the Nike Air Flight 89 breathe a little.
If you take two sneakers that released in the same year, made by the same designer, with the same exact midsole & bottom; how does one stand out more than the other? Michael Jordan. The two sneakers are the Air Jordan IV(4) and the Nike Air Flight 89. Calling the Flight 89 a mostly leather Jordan IV wouldn’t make you wrong.
I would have such good looking comparison pictures if I had a pair of the ‘Toro Bravo/red suede’ Jordan IVs from a few weeks back to shoot next to that quiet red ’89 Flight release from this year that I featured in a Complex list because full size runs went on sale for $70. Another good comparison picture would be for the’FEAR’ Jordan IV to line up with this Air Flight 89 I picked up recently, that looks like another current Jordan IV; the one that was apart of the Air Jordan Retro ‘FEAR’ pack. Recently I went through a sneaker cleansing phase where I kept one colorway of every Air Jordan silhouette that I had and got rid of the rest, so this sole-by-sole picture of my newest Flight 89 with my battle-tested ‘Cool Grey’ IVs will have to suffice with getting my point across that the Flight 89 and Jordan IV look too much alike for one to be more popular than the other.
Definitely in 1993 but possibly the year before, a version of the lowtop Air Flight 89 featuring the famous cursive FLIGHT F appeared in the center of a strap that crossed the midfoot of the shoe. According to one of the Japanese sneaker ads below, this strapped version was sold alongside the original in the Asia market. I bet if Sir Charles knew about these he would have opted for those instead of the standard-issue strapless US releases we got.
With sneaker quality & gluespots being discussed at an all-time high on your favorite sneaker site’s comments section, the Flight 89 doesn’t get its just due. I will say that it is strange to see a Air Flight 89 made with little-to-no leather, but that is to be expected in basketball shoes these days. Despite using the same midsole, the midsoles of the Air Flight 89 lasts remarkably better than that of latter-day pairs of the Jordan IV. Curious, very curious.
On a few sneaker outlets I toyed with the idea of linking posts of the red Air Flight 89 from earlier in the year to that of the ‘Toro Bravo’ Air Jordan 4 Retro with a very similar red hue and it wouldn’t be that much of a reach. I really could have hit the internet with pictures of this latest pickup calling them the Air Flight 89 left out of the ‘FEAR’ pack with all type of buzzwords like “sample” & “PE”, and there would be those who saw, reposted, and believed that this a long, lost size 9 that got to me in a Memphis box as a rejected member of the now-released FEAR set of Air Jordan Retros. But that would be lying, and I’m not about that life.
Enjoy the shots for a few recognizable people in the Air Flight 89 (did I mention how crazy it is that a image search of this sneaker yields hundreds of Kanye West pictures) and do yourself the favor of picking up a pair if you like them.
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