It’s that time of year again. The Air Jordan 40 hits stores today, marking four decades of the signature line that birthed sneaker culture as we understand it today. The impact of Air Jordan simply can’t be overstated—the Nike sublabel’s shoes have revolutionized everything from performance technology to the resale economy to athlete marketing deals to global fashion trends. Forty years in, we’re all still chasing Mike.
The Jordan line has long been a hub of Nike’s technological innovation, and the 40 is no different. For the first time ever, the design team combined a full-length Nike ZoomX foam unit and a full-length Zoom Strobel board in the soles. What does that mean, exactly? A whole lot of bounce—but with enough stability to counter it. The traction pad features treads set at 40-degree angles (get it?) for additional grip and control.
For the upper, the brand has gone with a high-grade leather and subtle accents like a suede strip along the toe box. Incorporated within the design are direct nods to classic Js past, including the 3, 5, 9, and 13. The last decade-plus of Jordans have featured tech-forward silhouettes, but this year’s installment is substantially lower-key and puts a greater emphasis on aesthetic for aesthetic’s sake.
How that aesthetic has gone over with sneakerheads is another story. Like many recent Air Jordans, the 40 has proven divisive, with some collectors loving the step in a new direction and others feeling it’s indicative of the storied line losing steam. With the Air Jordan 40 officially hitting stores tomorrow, GQ called up an all-star squad of esteemed sneaker enthusiasts to get their takes on the 40 and the state of Air Jordan.
Hanif Abdurraqib
Author, There's Always This Year
“I don't have many thoughts on the silhouette itself. It's fine, largely nondescript with a handful of easter eggs from past versions of the shoe, and I think in a way that gets to the larger question of designing for the future when weighed against the past. Jordan retros pairs at a high rate, many of those pairs coming within the range of silhouettes that were actually on MJ's feet when he was playing, and that means those models have a history, a lore, a legacy, and a cultural familiarity. And the real challenge of designing new signature Jordan releases in real time, I think, is that the name and the brand is still incredibly powerful, of course. But without the physical person and the legacy and lore of the player who made the shoe actually doing things in the shoe, it's almost like you're designing towards a series of memories and homages, and that can be a challenge.”
Jacques Slade
Sneaker content creator
“I think this is one of the generational shoes in the lineup. The brand has been focused a lot on nostalgia when it comes to the game shoe and this shoe breaks from that mold. I think the design language we see is indicative of the design language of today’s basketball shoes. A lot of people are associating it with the Fear of Gods but I think it’s just because they are the most popular in this space when it comes to that sort of design language. As far as performance goes, I think they nailed it with the full-length ZoomX and Strobel board. It’s a combination no other brand has really been able to do and I think it plays well ever since we got the Zoom Strobel in the KD signature line. I think they hit that fine line between performance and style, which is not something they’ve done lately. I think this is a shoe people are going to see later down the line and wish they’d picked up. I think it’s going to start a new chapter design-wise and thematically shows that Jordan is looking at the game shoe in a totally different way.”
Russ Bengston
Author, A History of Basketball in Fifteen Sneakers
“Jordan has dug themselves a pretty deep hole when it comes to the flagship Air Jordan line, between an overreliance on retro [releases] and retro cues and the fact that their premier athletes have their own signature models. They can say the newest Air Jordan is for Michael Jordan, but what does that really mean for a young audience who never saw him play and wasn’t indoctrinated by the brilliant marketing campaigns that accompanied the golden-era releases? To me, the AJ40 is actually exactly what a new Air Jordan should be, but given how Jordan Brand has spent the last 25 years pushing the past at the expense of the future, will anyone care?”
Travonne Edwards
Senior cultural partnership strategist, JD Finish Line
“I think the 40 has the DNA of the Air Jordan 22, which wasn’t a personal favorite of mine but had the appeal of an on-and-off court basketball shoe, having both performance elements and style ones. My favorite part of the shoe is the cement heel, paying homage to the classic models of the past. I do think the challenges of creating any shoe in the Air Jordan line is having to compete with multiple classic silhouettes that are tough to top. It makes it tough to get consumers to enjoy potential new classics. I personally can’t wait to get a pair.”
Luis Torres
Partnerships and social media manager, Reshoevn8r
“Even before the unveiling of the Air Jordan 40, I was a big proponent of Jordan Brand ending the flagship model at 45 for the sake of story [Ed. note: 45 being the number Michael Jordan wore in the immediate aftermath of his 1995 return]. This reveal solidified it. While I appreciate the subtle design nods to previous Jordan models, the 40 doesn’t stand out or move me emotionally as a flagship model should, especially in its 40th year. The tech and premium quality is there, but it feels too minimal when the Air Jordan legacy is anything but. It looks like Jordan Brand’s response to the Adidas Crazy IIInfinity or the Fear of God Athletics basketball trainers. If the brand is still dedicated to making quality products inspired by the greatest basketball player ever, it has some course correction to do.”