 These might actually be one of my favorite releases of 2023 when it comes to the GRs. And I know it's not some Jordan 1's or some Jordan 4's, it's actually the Playoff 8's. These shoes mean so much to me. Oh yeah, and if you didn't know by now, my name is DJ, and this is the DNA show. Now before we get to breaking down all the styles, cuts and materials and differences between these and the previous retros, you know we gotta talk about the history first. Back in 1993, Michael Jordan was in hot pursuit to win his third championship back to back to back. And he did it in style wearing the Air Jordan 8's. We remember those times, we saw the Bugs 8's, the Aqua 8's and the Playoff 8's. Over the years there has been a huge debate whether the Aqua 8's are better or the Playoff 8's. Now me personally, I say the Playoffs. But either way, this has been one of the iconic sneakers upon the Jordan models over the years. Again, may not get some of the most love, but to me, I have a lot of memories when it comes to the 2007 pair. We'll talk about that a little bit later. But from then, we saw the original release in 1993. And then 10 years later, we saw a low-top iteration in 2003. And one of my favorites that a lot of people don't talk about, the 2006 Dunk Low. Following that in 2007, we had the retro here and these ones in particular. Oh my gosh, I got so many memories. And then shortly after that in 2011, Jordan Brand disrespected the 8's with the 8.0's. Those things are terrible. And then a few years later, we saw the Playoff 8's retro again in 2013, which I was like on the fence about, you know, they cool, I had them for a little bit, but I had to get rid of those. And then earlier this year, we saw the slides actually released. And then in current time right now, we have the 2023 retro. But honestly, this might be the best version since 1993. So let's go ahead and take it to the studio and break down all the styles, cuts and materials because these things are fire. And here we have it, the Air Jordan 8's. Now, looking at the box right here, you got your more nostalgic, classic OG vibe right here with the liftoff lid, with your OG Jordan branding right here. Jordan with the air in between that and then the red jump man in the center of the lid. All black on the top end, gray on the bottom. And we can't forget the classic Nike branding right here on the lid as well. Now, looking at the size tag, it reads Air Jordan 8 retro, black, true red, white, size 13, just for me. And retail on these things was 210 bucks. I know, kind of steep for some Jordan 8's. Now, lifting off the lid of the box right here, you have your black paper classic to the OG vibe right there. And then you got the shoe. Oh, you got the shoe. Okay, first impressions of this sneaker. Honestly, these are nice. It's a different switch up when it comes to the materials I can already tell, but I like the way these look. And don't worry, in today's video, we will be comparing them against the 2007 retro as well. I got so many stories and memories behind this. We'll talk about that a little bit later in the video on how I got these. And how these kind of officially got me started collecting back in the day. But again, we'll talk about that later. So starting with the outsole right here, you can see you have your classic Air Jordan 8 playoff bottom. They didn't do anything when it comes to the colors on the switch up of the pattern. But you can see the colors are a lot more vibrant. When it comes to the blues, the yellows and the reds, they definitely pop a little bit more. And I'll show you side by side compared to the 2007 pair. You can definitely see the red is a lot more, I would say dull. And it might be a little bit from aging, but the 2023 pair definitely pops more. Now going to the midsole, you kind of got two different type of tones right here. You have more of a black and then like a graphite type of gray, grayish black kind of color. With that metallic flake kind of in the paint job as well on the front and the back in wrapping around the heel area, going to the side of the foot. And again, as you can see with them side by side compared to the 2007 pair, a big difference when it comes to the overall shades and colors of them. Definitely separating the colors on the midsole a little bit more when it comes to the 2007 pair compared to the 2023. But when it comes to the OG pair, I would say these are a lot more similar to those. And obviously they have been remastering and reimagining a lot of different retros that are in current time from the OG colorways. I would say overall just from the outsole in the midsole, Jordan Brand is doing a good job with this one. Now going up to the side panel, this is one of my favorite pieces right here. You have a white plastic piece with the art design right here with the black lines and the red filling on some of the areas. And like I said earlier, this is very similar to what the dunks you saw that pattern really emphasized on there. Obviously a little bit different, but I really like this element to the shoe. It's something about this color pattern. It's so unique. You can see it on clothing or anything else and you automatically think playoff eights. Now going up to the upper, you kind of have a mixture of two different materials when it comes to the suede. You can see really, really close right here on the toe and the panels on the side right there and around the ankle on the circular patch. That is more of a kind of like a tumbled type of suede look. And then the other one is a lot more smooth and thinner filling throughout the rest of the shoe. Everything is pretty much all black when it comes to the two materials, but definitely you can tell the difference of the shade of the two materials. And another dope branding element that I love on the Air Jordan 8s. It says Air Jordan right here on the Velcro strap. And then you have that on the outside and on the inside of the foot. And everybody knows when you wear your Air Jordan 8s for a long time, as you continue to put them on and take them off and everything, this starts to fray and then the letters actually kind of start to turn white over time. I'm not sure if that's going to happen with these new materials in the modern era, but it is kind of dope to see that as well. Let me know that you put your time in on the sneaker. It's just another character element to the shoe. Let me know what you think about that down below in the comment section. All my OG hands, y'all know what I'm talking about. Yo, sorry to interrupt, just real quick, wanted to let you guys know we got a bunch of new deals on the website. So hit the link down below, shopdncho.com. If you guys are interested in anything, also we have underneath this video, there's going to be a tab with some items. If you click on those items, that will take you directly to the website as well. I appreciate you guys for supporting and rocking all the merch. I'd love to see you guys rocking the gear. So make sure you tag me on Instagram whenever you're rocking some of the stuff or pick up some new merch from the website. All right, let's get back to the video. Another thing that I noticed as well is the clip right here. This is more of a matte black finish on the plastic area. And on the 2007 pair, you can see it's a lot shinier on that element of the shoe as well. So a different switch up, but I think, again, probably a lot more similar to the OG when it comes to these in particular. Now going to the tongue and area, and honestly, I forgot because we got the straps to go across this area. We have the 23 that straps across on one side of the shoe and then there's no branding on the other strap that comes from the inside of the foot. But this is a cross mechanism that goes from one side to the other and then locks in with the Velcro straps at the top around the ankle. This 23 branding is another iconic element to the shoe. And I think there's probably three, maybe four elements to the Air Jordan 8s that really stand out that a lot of people can identify when it comes to the design elements. And I would say that's the plastic piece on the back end, the 23 on the straps, the chenille patch on the tongue with the different colors depending on the color way. And then obviously the sock liner, how they went crazy with the different colors and elements in that design and then also incorporated that on the bottom of the shoe. Now these come standard with a pair of all black laces and I know $210 you would assume there would be an additional pair of laces, a hang tag, a retro card, something. And if you don't remember what the retro card looks like, I still have my card from my 2007 pair right here. This thing is in like pristine condition right here. Let me show you guys what that looks like. Oh my gosh! I got so many memories of the retro cards, bruh. I don't know about you guys, but Jordan man, please bring the retro cards back, at least on the OGs. Like this is an OG color way. Can we please get a retro card? Now before we finish wrapping up the sneaker, we got to talk about the red pull tab as well. This is not connected to the heel area right here on the end of the shoe, but it's actually connected on to the sock liner area right here with the booty on the back end and you have the red pull tab right there. Now if you look at the 2007 pair, you can see there's a black pull tab, but also the way that they configured the sneaker and put it all together, if I push down right here, there's no way that it'll collapse because this whole back of the end of the sock liner is all connected and stitched in within the shoe. But if I do that same thing on this sneaker, you can see I can push down and the whole thing collapses in and it almost feels like you could rip the whole thing out, but it's actually stitched at the bottom of the heel area and this is more collapsible there. So I think this is how the OG was. Again, I don't have the OG playoff aids, but I'm assuming if they went off of design elements based off of that, that's something that they did and they said, hey, let's keep it like the OG and give them that nostalgic piece as well. And then obviously when they retro sneakers, they try to change things up and they decided to stitch it right there. So that's another design element that's a little bit different when it comes to these compared to the previous retro in the past and then obviously what the OG is. So that's a pretty decent look at this sneaker now again. Like I said, I had to have these in my collection because when I got the 2007 playoff aids, that was kind of like the beginning of my career. Coming out of middle school, going into high school, being able to afford my own stuff. Yeah, I was a sneakerhead. Yeah, I was already collecting and had sneakers, but you know, it was a different type of vibe. I was buying stuff with my own money then. And I have a full video telling you guys the story about how I got this pair in my collection. It's a good one. I'll link it for you guys down below in the description because trust me, it's a great watch. I actually just played it back. I made the video like a few years ago when I started the YouTube channel and it's some funny times. That's all I can say. So go ahead and watch that video after this one. I'll make sure I'll post it at the end of this video. But before you do that, we got to talk about the poll results because I'm interested to see what everybody else thinks about this shoe. Yeah, I was ecstatic and I'm so excited because it has such a huge sentimental value to me. But does anybody even care about these anymore? So I posted a poll of my story asking the people a simple question. Is this shoe fire or is this shoe trash? And if you haven't already, make sure you follow me on IG so you can participate in the polls and see the results here. This is what the people said. 82% of the people said fire and 18% of the people said trash. And it's crazy because that's higher than the reimagined Air Jordan 1 Royal Suede. And I get it. This is the classic. This is the OG. But kind of so is that, right? And they're, you know, two different retro versions. Obviously they switched it up with the materials, but interesting poll results right there. Let me know what you guys think down below in the comment section. To me, it makes complete sense. When the shoe came out, it low-key kind of sold out. As you see, I got these on the shock drop. I got them late. But I still got the shoe. I'm a heavy camper because, you know, size 13, it'd be selling out. You could say, oh, in some cities it's available and all. Yeah, I get that. But when you're a size 13, trust me, the struggle is different. I saw it sitting on shelves when I was out in LA actually a couple of days ago, about a week ago. And guess what? Didn't have my size. They had like a eight or eight and a half or something like that. That was all they had. So I know the struggle. It's real. Let me know what you guys think down below in the comment section. And again, make sure you guys watch the video at the end of this one so you guys can see how I got my Playoff 8's back in 2007. If you guys made it to the end of this video and you haven't heard already, I have the full sneakerhead program. Everything is linked down below in the description. My hobby to hustle, my sneakerhead academy. It's an eight week program. We have a live community. It teaches you guys everything. You have direct access to me. I give away free shoes every single month. There's challenges, points, leaderboards, you name it. There's so much stuff on the inside. If you guys haven't heard of it before, I would love to see you guys in there. And if you haven't heard of it before and still on the fence, trust me, you won't regret it. I'll see you guys in there. Love you. We out.