 We were looking like you know 14-15 year old kids. We're kind of small so he jacks the kicks from us But he has his baby in the other arm Everybody welcome to another episode of life of a sneakerhead It has been quite some time since we did one of these episodes and it wouldn't be right if we didn't come back with the comeback man himself Nelson Chan For the Macau black bears Man it's a good time to be back. It's been a minute. Okay All right, so now it's back in town for a little bit So you know we had to check on some of the sneakers that are dropping right now But Andrew there is a larger purpose recently me and David were featured on an episode of full-size run That is one of the top sneaker talk shows on the internet on the so collector YouTube channel It's under complex. It was a really big honor for us on the show We talked about a lot of things everything from Seattle to Kobe to the impact that sneakers have had on Asian Americans and Asians in Asia However, there was a few things we wanted to clarify solidify add on to plus nails back We got to talk about some of the sneakers in there So today we're gonna be talking about what we did not get to say on full-size run But we're also gonna be covering some of the general releases that are out right now All right We're here at nice kicks in downtown LA and this is life of a sneakerhead the things we didn't get to say on full-size run Let's go boy by the way guys. I know we haven't done a sneaker video in a while So please hit that like button click subscribe and check out our Instagrams All right, Andrew the very first question that we got asked on full-size run was about Kobe Bryant's Impact RIP on the Asian American community and to be honest, I wish I could have given a better answer for that I do stand by everything I said I said that Kobe was the biggest in the Asian American community or Asian community Kobe's always been big in like Asian American culture to write like he's always been like a central figure like what's he's the biggest Yeah, the biggest in Asia also obviously Asian American culture those two things being kind of interconnected and just so you know Nelson has been a big Kobe fan since day one is crazy man Just going back on how Kobe impacted like the game and the world is like he wasn't like the most athletic person But he relied on most of the skill and moves whether you're tall or you know short can try to do Kobe's moves Right Kobe was the first superstar that Asia and really the globe had seen from day one And to me the thing that strike most striking about Kobe aside from just his game is that he's just kind of a global guy Like he speaks multiple languages every time he would come to Asia or particularly China He would always try to speak some Chinese Nihao and I'll see you soon That's why everybody connected with him not only because of how we played and his mentality towards the game But just his mentality towards culture. It's so tragic But I hope that we can everybody can just take something away from it and have it impact away They want to live their life positive All right So that was just to address the first question that we're asked on full-size run shout out to Welty shout out to Brendan Dunn Shout out to Trinidad James, man They're all really cool dudes, but that was just something that we wanted to elaborate on now You're playing pro in Asia right now one of the questions they asked us We're sort of about the Asia exclusives or the Asia inspired sneakers like the Chinese New Year's shoes Like you're wearing one right now. Do you always think it's done in a tasteful way? Or do you feel like the brands are trying to kind of leech off of like a fan base sneakers in Asia? They rock with the Asia exclusives hella You're saying the Asia exclusive sell out more over there than obviously over here Like these fever shoes would sell better in China. I've seen these all over the streets What do you think about all the Chinese New Year edition shoes because they always come out with some whether it's year of the animal or Chinese New Year theme. I mean I appreciate what they're doing But sometimes it's more about like the backstory of the sneaker rather than just like the design of the shoe Are you saying sort of like we got to go all the way back the year of the rabbit Air Force one Oh the white rabbit candy. This is actually a Chinese New Year edition. This is a good execution It reminds me a lot of the clot 13 the clot 13 did a terracotta She on warrior pattern. I believe this is taking I want to say a money pattern Oh, the Chinese coin if you guys watch the episode of full-size right I was talking about it goes as deep as the Shanghai 97s that was almost like They're walking across the bridge and then there's blue funnel clouds and there's where do you guys rank it versus like Let's say for example a clot Air Force one That's probably the first time they just took the Chinese silk pattern and just threw it on the shoe But it actually did well. What do you think allowed this series of clot Chinese silk Air Force ones to blow up with the sneaker community And the sneaker game being so globally like bigger now and more diverse where like a lot of you would see like Bob's They would really like buy those sneakers to rock or just be sale one thing that I talked about on the show that I don't think made The final edit is I was talking about how much I like the tangent phones Oh, yeah Now one thing I found interesting about the tangent foams is that pretty much they're using the foam Posit as a blank canvas and then they're slapping on like a really cool like Chinese painting But usually covering a shoe and painting. I guess we'd never seen that before I'll tell you guys the story behind the tangent foams Tengen is a city near Beijing basically they said that that was the birthplace of basketball in China What are what are some of you guys's favorite Chinese theme ones? I know that for us I got the all the Air Force ones that are themed after cities. I have the Taipei's. I got the Hong Kong I got the Shanghai's going back for my love for Kobe I like the year the dragon sevens when those came out. Those are crazy They came in a crazy box, you know, I'm a year of the snake and there's not that many good snake shoes But the Air Max one year the snakes were cool because at its base a snakeskin design But then it meant that it was for a year of the snake So I liked how the meaning could go both ways another shoe line that they love in China that they don't maybe Necessarily love an American market is D Rose How do you explain the Chinese undying love for D Rose D Rose still has I believe a top five Selling sneaker signature line in China whereas in the US he might be like number 10 or I feel like people don't even talk about the D Rose is releasing I mean the love for D Rose I think it's just because how electrifying was at a young age and for him to be like a small guard and a player to dominate the league I think a lot of Asians can relate to that and maybe also because it kind of looks a little Asian He does look hey D Rose looks Cambodian I think it's more because when he flies in the air he looks like a kung fu master. Yeah That's what I'm saying. What do you think is the future of Asian theme shoes because obviously there's an argument like our I think just making it just make more money. Is it really paying homage? I said it was both I said obviously the shoe companies do see an opportunity to make money But I really think that they are paying homage to this sector of people that are often culturally ignored in the West that make Up just a gigantic portion of the demographics I mean I don't want to put on the same level as Black History Month But it is in the same way like is Nike making Black History Month sneakers. Is that a money grab? You know it there. It's a big part of culture and it makes other Asians care more about the culture I think it's only gonna get bigger because you know basketball is probably the number one sport in China And then Chinese people love basketball They like playing it watching it and they like wearing you know supporting their you know Chinese culture within the sneakers I agree with all you guys. I definitely think it's a great way to stay intact with the culture I know my Korean friends were rocking all those Soul 97 it's hard. You know the men packing out shoes with Nike I know Filipinos are rocking those hard. I guess for me one thing I'm looking forward to in the future And I believe it will happen I'm looking for the other Asian cultures to get some representation sneakers ideas one Asian shoe idea I don't think they have this yet the red envelopes. That's huge. You know in Chinese You say no nobody put that on a shoe yet even though I'm sure the colorways have you know There's a lot of red and gold colorway shoes But an actual like red envelope or you know like a red pocket for Hong Kong They need to release a VLT Air Max one You know what I'm either saw ice lemon You're not thinking about especially for Adidas because you know they do that have a relationship with Jeremy Scott What if they instead of the bare head it was a nyan. It was a lion from the lion dance You guys talked a lot about you know Sneakers being part of like the Asian-American Experience if there is or isn't like stereotypes or negative stereotypes like based around like that kind of like hype beast culture Right, right. Let's get specific because this is our channel We didn't get as specific on full-size right about the negative stereotypes about Asians in the sneaker game one They say we're all just resellers in it not for the culture, but just for the money some you know Some people say that yeah, no, have you guys ever resold sneakers? People think that you know, we don't help create any of the culture. We're just buying. We're consuming We have our parents pay for all of it or something like that Oh, yeah, and then everything we wear or do is like fake because obviously they do make fake and real shoes in China I would say that another thing is that like rich Chinese people make Hypey styles corning. Okay, we ruin Supreme. We ruin Jordan's We're not the brands and then also like the big Chinese resellers Oh, they kind of control the market for certain sneakers because they buy so many of them I do say that Asians are really big sneaker heads throughout the games over the years whether you know It's Asian-Americans or like people from Asia dating back to like Jordan's I know like some like Asians who are like heavy Jordan sneaker heads You know they got every Jordan because we do have this range everything from the crazy rich Reseller that maybe is in it more for the money than the culture But that's not even all of them a lot of them are still you know actual true sneaker heads And then you have everything to the Asian sneaker designer who's really need I would say that easily from a performance standpoint Asians are the most into the performance kicks Like analyzing every little articulated zoom scroll mean Asians might get the nerdiest about on Nike talk I would say a majority of the original mods were either Chinese or Filipino Yeah, and we're not just talking about Chinese. I mean, there's Thai designers I think there's Filipino designers like Japanese Japanese designers like there's all types of Asian designers in the sneaker game And it is true that we don't have the Virgil's and the Jerry Lorenzo's and the Shawn weather spoons I mean those celebrities Yeah, we do have Hiroshi Fujiwara and like, you know Murakami and like just stable But they're more for like if you know you know crowd in between our full-size run takeaways I we just got to talk about some sneakers just as some regular sneaker heads No, did you guys expect this for them to start bringing back all the bronze? You would think that they would retro it after he retires, but LeBron. I mean he's getting up there in age And he does what he's in year 17. Yeah, that's a lot of sneakers man So like I think a lot of people has been asking for some of the older sneakers because you know such classic What are your some of your favorites that you that you wish they would bring back? I'm looking at LeBron eight nine and ten maybe getting brought back. All right This is an underrated one, but I really liked the LeBron twos. I like those Actually really like the LeBron threes right here I like this in the all-white and pearl colorway the white of pearl Those are my freshman year kicks dude, where do you see brawny jr? Do you ever see him becoming good enough to get his own signature line? He's gonna make it to the league but for him to fill his dad's shoes I don't think he can do it. Yo, you wouldn't be crazy if he got so good. He just continued the LeBron line Oh, he's literally he is LeBron He is only 15 years old and he has LeBron James's gene and training and tools at his disposal He's gonna be one standard deviation either better or worse than Tim Hardaway Jr But I don't know which one I think if he's on the cusp the X factor is that he's LeBron James's son So the team will just like try to build around yeah, of course He's gonna have to do his own thing and prove himself all right So you never know who you're gonna run into in the sneaker world where nice kicks in downtown L We just bumped into Troy. Who is the new balance rep for LA right? Yes, sir Yes, sir Can you tell us a little bit about the runner culture because if you guys know new balance runners and then new balance collapse with whether We're talking about Keith bodega So right here from just looking at these the first ones that my mind goes to this is a drop from 2017 2018 and this is a 990 But this is a shoe that they released for st. Patty's day What do you think cuz I felt like like kind of dad shoes and running shoes got back in style in the past few years I think that helped me balance a lot. Oh man, huge. There's a shoe. They just brought out two months ago They dropped originally in 96. It was such a dad shoe They put it in the vote by 98 because nobody was rocking with the shoe They just reintroduced it and it sold out the OG color way sold out within like two or three days You know what I always liked about the new balance shoes though. They got the an on them, you know for now David what's a story that we didn't really get to share on full-size run Maybe we forgot about it ran out of time the first Jordan's I got word the Jordan 10 white black and gray You got it for Christmas. I got it for Christmas and I remember when you unwrapped them. That's crazy. Did you remember? I don't remember because I think that was the first Jordan we ever had in the house Yeah, I remember I played Kent Park's in them and you know the Kent Park's courts indoor courts are super slippery There's dust everywhere you could I could not get traction with these so David moving on from the first Jordan to selling Jordan Wait, do you have a super jig going on? I want to know the house we used to flip kicks at the mall There were the white and black, you know Concord and let it be grades and somebody tried to rob us with his baby in his arm We were looking like you know 14 15 year old kids were kind of small So he jacks the kicks from us, but he has his baby in the other arm And then finally his friends were you know calm yeah, but he just got in one of those moments with Jordan's They would get people emotional back then. Let me tell you this story about shocks This is not the R4 shocks with the BB for us. So we have a high school in a Seattle called Rainier Beach And it's a huge basketball high school Nate Robinson's from there Doug Christie's from there Jamal Crawford is from there And so what happens is during the time when the BB for us were popular They had their own royal blue and white team color So then I'm at Foot Locker at South Center Mall, and then I'm trying on some shoes and I look over and I just see these white Royal BB for us. I'm just shocked. I'm like, oh my god. Who am I standing next to it was one of the bench players But I still thought it was tight. Well, that's why his BB for us was crispy. Yeah I'd say being a Kobe fan my first basketball sneaker was a pair of Kobe's It was the adidas KV ones, you know the ones that like a brick I saw that one pair the all-black pair and it was on sale have that red sale ticket on it I was like, I'm gonna kind of hide these and I wore them to like there was holes all the way up until the insults And if you know that shoe, it's got a really thick. It is like this thick, right? So it's like man, aren't you guys here at the nice kicks in downtown LA upstairs as Adidas was going Do you think it took him too long to start doing playful stuff with the boost? Yeah I do think so obviously I like this collab It's with the International Space Station. I'm just a fan of color boost man, because you know, I like to be flashy I was always a fan of the color boost. So you would rock this shoe I'm rock this shoe what you guys opinion on 4d man. I will say there's something oddly satisfying about squeezing this midsole The moment I've been holding the shoe. I've been squeezing it the whole time I think as they're able to push the price of this technology down I think it's got a shot because at the end of the day people like to look I think they're gonna flop moving forward because I think I never understood the hype of the you know The 40s, you know if they can figure out a way to do different strands So this is like the uppers white and this is a red and blue mixture the DNAs like a All right you guys we are looking at some all-star weekend exclusive kicks Andrew you're looking at the Don C. Katie 12 I remember just seeing these online. We're just talking about them personally. I love the laces I think that's my favorite feature and I love this tongue best christening setup of the year I Got my own personal Macau black bears edition and I dunked with the torn hamstring in them for my commercial So they got to be good somehow. I got the Lebron all-star monster edition Lebron 17 One thing that really stood out to me immediately about this was how many different shades of purple there are not only that I think this air max bubble in the back being coated in iridescent paint I don't know what's your opinion I like how they can weave so many different colors and patterns into these little panels here I don't know about the execution a lot of the paneling on the Lebron 17s. I haven't been a big fan of there No, that's probably one of the most hyped Jordan ones in the world. I got the UNC to Chicago ones These are women's shoe actually, but they have it in a you know bigger size so you know men's kick off I think it looks cool man It has tribute from when Jordan was in college at UNC all the way up until you know when he played for Chicago Would you get it in the extended sizes? I would man I think for sneakerheads get one for your sneaker bae Aren't you guys? Thank you so much for watching that episode of life of a sneaker head Huge shout out to Nelson chair from the Macau black bears whooping life shout out to nice kicks in downtown LA Andrew it was so dope to go down memory lane and just expand on a few thoughts that our guest spot on full-size run was able to spark Definitely, I mean I think for us, you know sneakers at this point in time across the globe It's a universal language so is food and that's kind of why we cover a lot of food on our channel because on our episode of full-size run We did acknowledge that we are not fully a sneaker channel although we do love sneakers Sneakers are a necessity to us man. We got to wear them sneakers can bridge the you know coaches together Ethnicities whatever that is RIP Kobe. It just reminded me of what ice cube said when Kobe passed away He said, you know Kobe was the glue to like a fragmented LA you guys. Thank you so much huge shout out to nice kicks Nelson Chan Macau black bears follow him on social media If you guys have not watched our episode of full-size run definitely check it out down below check out Nelson's channel Aren't you guys thank you so much for watching? Link to our social down below and until next time we out big socks or no socks. You got it. You have to first It reminds me of raps. Remember those like all clear Air Force ones back in the day. Oh the invisible woman You see a steam up cuz like but you see pigs of people wearing them with those socks