Food for the sole

It’s titled "Sole Provider" and appropriately so. Because for the last 30 years, sports apparel and footwear giant Nike has produced basketball shoes that brought fame and fortune to stars like Michael Jordan, Vince Carter, Jason Kidd, and Ray Allen.

What exactly is "Sole Provider?" It’s not a movie. It’s not a song. And it’s definitely not Nike’s latest shoe model.

"Sole Provider" is a book, a lasting testament to Nike’s commitment to hoops. It’s also Nike’s way of celebrating 30 years in the business.

Tonight, Nike Philippines joins the world-wide launch of "Sole Provider" at the Tavern in Greenbelt 3, Makati. Nike’s top local honchos–general manager Lilette Quinio, marketing manager Colo Ventosa, footwear product manager Dennis Tan, and marketing services manager Auty Villarama–are hosting the affair that’s expected to assemble some of the game’s shiningest stars, past and present.

Nike’s local pioneer endorsers Ramon Fernandez and Chito Loyzaga will be around. So will Alvin Patrimonio and the other PBA luminaries who wear Nikes–the Seigle brothers, Jeffrey Cariaso, Jun Limpot, Olsen Racela, Asi Taulava, Eric Menk, Alex Compton, Willie Miller, John Arigo, Nic Belasco and Chris Calaguio.

The book is a collector’s dream come true. It’s a 255-page, 2.5-pound hard-cover edition with a 24-page shoe index of all the Nike models produced from 1972 to this year. The book is selling for P1,500 at all Nike Park and Nike Stadium outlets and also at Forum Greenhills, Zone, Sportscenter-SM Pampanga, Athletic Club-SM Iloilo, Sportshop-SM Davao, DFP-Bacolod, Fiesta Mall and Pro Star outlets.

The author is Robert (Scoop) Jackson, the outrageously outspoken Slam Magazine writer whose writing style is the closest thing to hip-hop in prose. Jackson, 38, is no ordinary cage junkie. He graduated at Xavier University and earned a Master’s degree at Howard University. His father was one of the first black news reporters in the US so Scoop’s genes are loaded.

Jackson likes to write in conversational style. "I don’t believe in interviews," he once said. "I believe in conversations."

In "Sole Provider," Jackson doesn’t let his words get in the way of capturing Nike’s basketball history in pictures. The book is heavily illustrated with photographs dating back to early endorsers Billy Ray Bates–that’s right, the Black Superman of Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) fame–George (The Iceman) Gervin, Moses Malone, Len (Truck) Robinson, Geoff Petrie, and Paul Westphal.

Jackson uses a sort of lingering stream of consciousness approach in tackling the book’s main sections–Force versus Flight, Air Jordan, Patriot Games, Shox Stunner, and many, many more. A chapter called "Sole on Ice" features reigning National Basketball Association (NBA) MVP Tim Duncan.

"One day, after realizing the impact he had on the game since his arrival, Tim ‘Iceman the Sequel’ Duncan, while lounging pool side in his native hometown of St. Croix, looked at his shoes that lay flat on the sand and dug a hole to see what was going on below," writes Jackson. "No doubt, he smiled, hell was still frozen over."

The photos in the book are spectacular. Most come from portraits shot for posters. Jordan’s pictures are surreal. He’s shown in various uniforms-playing for the Chicago Bulls and Washington Wizards. The images are worth the price of the entire book. Then, there are pictures of Scottie Pippen, Rasheed Wallace, Charles Barkley, and a host of others.

In Jackson’s final chapter called "The Future Is Clear," he describes the evolution of a "lighter shoe made out of an innovative synthetic stretch leather that acts as a lining molded into a clear plastic shell that slows the inside of the shoe to be on display."

Here’s how Jackson ends his scoop:

"If the shoe was an engine, it’d be funky cold like the Modena; if it were a point guard, it would be Gary Payton, Jason Kidd, and Baron Davis wrapped into one sample size 13. It’s the shoe that is both on time and ahead of its time at the same time."

Nike global footwear product marketing director Kris Aman had this to say about what the book means to him: "It means that Nike is bigger than shoes. It’s not leather and foam and rubber. It’s about the people and the ideas of reaching out for something that other people didn’t think was possible. It’s legitimized every time you hear somebody in a review or a consumer picking up a shoe say, ‘Only Nike can do that.’ It’s also a legacy. There’s a quote Michael Jordan said when he first got into the league–Barkley said it, too–about getting a lot of attention. He said, ‘We have to carry the torch.’ My best memories, my best games, my best identities were always shared with Nike products. It’s a privilege, it’s not a right. I take it very seriously about trying to carry the torch. It’s like playing with Dr. J, Oscar Robertson or Kareem or Wilt Chamberlain. It’s a legacy of something that’s a bigger idea that will probably never happen again."

"Sole Provider" brings you back in time when Nike’s first endorsers were Sidney Wicks and Petrie–"ebony and ivory," suggests Jackson. Then, it updates you into today’s ultra-modern, competitive world. When you finish reading the book and admiring its pictures, you’ll know why Nike has played a major part in the evolution of the game we all love.

"Sole Provider" says it all, in Jackson’s witty and unconventional style.