MANILA, Philippines -- After his trailblazing announcement of his impending retirement via The Players' Tribune, Kobe Bryant continues to change how the game is played on the ever-evolving media by unveiling his latest signature shoe from Nike, believed to be the last shoe design he will rock on the court before he retires at the end of this NBA season, via Periscope.
The innovative unveiling fittingly describes the shoe technology and perhaps Bryant's legacy, his dedication to innovation that summed up his pursuit of perfection of his craft on the hardcourt.
“Throughout my time with Nike, I’ve obsessed the details of my shoes. For the KOBE 11, we worked to perfect Flyknit for basketball,” said Bryant.
The five-time NBA champion and legendary Nike designer Eric Avar again nailed it by introducing another technical breakthroughs to basketball, including Flywire, Nike Free-inspired natural motion, advanced proprioception and Flyknit.
Their partnership which started in 2004 has once again underscored the philosophy that "less is more".
The KOBE 11 is a progressive low-top that bears Bryant’s signature legacy down to its core of high performance, lightweight, responsive and sophisticated design.
“The KOBE 11 design represents the whole being greater than the sum of the parts,” said Avar, who started designing for Kobe starting with the Huarache 2K4.
The first of many colorways to come out is the "Achilles Heel" which pays homage to the biggest injury that Bryant had to overcome in his NBA career.
According to the press release sent to Philstar.com on late Tuesday, the first colorway is a deep red and black shoe which features subtle nods to the Greek hero Achilles, and Bryant’s own career arch.
"Known to be invulnerable in all of his body except for his heel, Achilles’ ultimate demise resulted from an arrow to his weak point during the Trojan War. Consequently, the term “Achilles heel,” was born. The KOBE 11 Achilles Heel features a graphic representation of the hero on the right heel, while the left features four-stitch marks representing the four feet of thread used in Bryant’s 2013 Achilles surgery," the official Nike statement said.
The shoe will be available globally on January 9, 2016.
Watch Kobe's innovative unveiling via Periscope: