Trail Blazers: Carmelo Anthony was Jordan brand’s first signature athlete

Trail Blazers forward Carmelo Anthony was Jordan Brand’s first ever signature athlete. Interestingly, Michael Jordan paid for half of the endorsement deal.

Jordan Brand has obviously been heavily in the news with the prominence of ‘ The Last Dance ‘ documentary. This week, Trail Blazers forward Carmelo Anthony talked about how he was the brand’s first ever signature athlete.

Michael Jordan signing with Nike and then the creation of the Air Jordan brand was a focus of the documentary this week. Jordan himself and Nike executives who worked for the company at the time, talked about how the brand came about.

Though the Jordan brand was massive in the 80s and 90s, Jordan himself was the only signature athlete on the books until 2003. At that time when Melo came into the league, Nike and Jordan Brand were struggling in the basketball shoe landscape.

Most of the biggest names were with Adidas. Tracy McGrady, Tim Duncan, Kevin Garnett and Kobe Bryant were all wearing the three stripes.

So Nike, knowing that three of the brightest young stars were being drafted into the league in Melo, LeBron James and Dwyane Wade, they swooped. Chris Bosh was part of this conversation too.

LeBron signed with Nike as their big fish, and Wade and Bosh with Converse, who were also under the Nike umbrella.  Jordan had worn a new version of Air Jordans every year he played in the league till his final retirement in 2003, but no one was actually wearing a signature shoe for Jordan brand outside of that.

Melo discussed the signing process in detail while on Uninterrupted’s WRTS:After Party show.

Nike did sign Melo, but then Michael Jordan himself stepped up and said he would split the endorsement contract with Nike and that he would bring Melo over to Jordan Brand. Maverick Carter was working at Nike at the time and he talked about how Jordan himself took a bit to come around to the idea before eventually betting on Melo and bringing him in.

Melo chatted about how he started off playing in Jordan’s, but that a pair of them had broken in his rookie year.

The shoe market wasn’t like it was now with everyone having their own signature shoes, but after the broken shoes, he went on to have his own signature shoe made every year, forming a longterm partnership with the brand that eventually saw other athletes added too.

The sneaker market has obviously changed significantly since 2003, but it’s amazing to think about how Adidas was the market leader back then when you compare that to Nike’s dominance now.

Kyrie Irving, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Paul George all have signature shoes with Nike and are some of the market leading sneakers for kids these days. Melo and LeBron were leading the way, even back then.