Exploring Jordan Brand’s Philosophy on the Air Jordan 41

Subscribe to The Kicks You Wear with Mike D. Sykes, a drill down on the red hot intersection between sports and fashion.

Good morning, friends! Welcome back to The Kicks You Wear. Thanks so much for reading today. I appreciate you giving me a bit of your time. Hope you have a great weekend ahead of you.

In today’s newsletter, I have a conversation with Jordan Brand vice president of visioneering and chief of design Jason Mayden about the upcoming Air Jordan 41. Forty-one versions of anything is a lot — I ask Mayden about what the imperatives were for this new model and how they managed to keep the line going through all these years.

Plus, Puma and Manchester City just used artificial intelligence in a way that I think could have implications for sports marketing moving forward.

Quick hits:

• Here’s BoF’s Diana Pearl on the #RushTok phenomenon and how it’s blown up over the last five years. Even Nike is in on it now.
• Here’s Daniela Morosini on Whoop’s growth and why the wearable fitness brand is looking to add more female consumers.
• Unrivaled, the women’s 3-on-3 basketball league, is now valued at $650 million after its latest round of funding. That’s impressive growth after just a couple of seasons.

Let’s get to it.

The Jordan 41 Is Coming: Can the Shoe Establish the Future of Jordan’s Signature Line?

Last year’s milestone for Jordan Brand was a big one. The newest piece in the line, the Air Jordan 40, came with a bit more heft. It wasn’t just a sneaker — it had to serve as a celebration of 40 years of Michael Jordan’s signature shoe line. The brand celebrated the milestone throughout the year with multiple colourways and designs that reimagined the model as facsimiles of sneakers from the line’s long past.

This year, things are a bit different. There’s no big milestone to celebrate, but the line still continues on with the Air Jordan 41. Instead of reflecting on its past, as the brand did with the AJ40, Jason Mayden, the brand’s vice president of visioneering and chief of design, said this newest sneaker in the line was focused on the future.

“We don’t see it as replacing the 40,” Mayden said. “We see it as trying to extend the brand into the next generation.”

Jordan’s success is essential to Nike’s business. The subsidiary accounts for around 15 percent of the brand’s annual sales. Jordan achieved just over $7 billion in sales for the company’s 2026 fiscal year, which was slightly down from $7.2 billion the previous fiscal year.

While this shoe won’t solve all of Nike’s woes as a company, the Air Jordan signature line is at the core of Jordan Brand’s performance basketball business. Whether people love it or hate it, it’s usually the brand’s most discussed sneaker of the year by the public. Nailing it is important.

Mayden was gracious enough to speak with me about the shoe, the stakes, and why the brand keeps the line going year after year. Below is our chat. Enjoy!

This conversation has been lightly edited for brevity.

Mike Sykes: What were some of the imperatives that were on the table when you all were ideating and thinking about this shoe? How did you decide to move on from the moment of the 40?

Jason Mayden: That’s a great question and it’s one that we ponder for every shoe. We can’t get points for yesterday’s game. A lot of the core considerations from the product team, the design team, sports marketing, [Michael Jordan] himself, is that we start to speak the universal language of youth. And if you look at the game today, it’s lower, it’s faster, it’s lighter, it’s more responsive.

It came down to asking ourselves, “How do we get back to continuing the legacy of dominance for performance, but also creating a simplified aesthetic that allows shape, proportion, light, and shadow to give people an emotional connection back to this physical artefact that we call the Air Jordan?” Really, this is step one in beginning a 40-year journey. We have the 42, the 43, the 44. As you start to think about the compounding effect of shifting the aesthetic, shifting the tech stack, introducing new methods of make, you can see how it’s going to build over years and years and years.

MS: The Jordan line is something that a lot of people obsess over because of the longevity of it. How do you keep a hero product like that going for so long? I don’t know if pressure is the right word, but I imagine coming up with something new every year is a tall task.

JM: It starts with humility, right? If you start to assume that you have all the answers because you’ve had the chance to work on 40 other versions of a product, subconsciously you’re going to start to redraw the same lines. Having a muse, such as Michael Jordan, who never rests, becomes imbued into the process. Because he lives his life that way, he’s established with his own legacy and canon, the project goes through that same transformation.

When you start on an Air Jordan, every project starts with a question you’re trying to answer. We’re saying, what is missing in the market? What is missing in a kid’s closet? What unique way can we evolve the game for today’s athlete? Keeping the pace of innovation is simple when you align yourself with the pace of human endeavour and the pace of human potential. That becomes a really fun task, and it isn’t necessarily a pressure.

MS: What was the question you all wanted to answer with the 41?

JM: Yeah, honestly, we came down to one fundamental question: How do we make the most responsive two-way product on the market? Because MJ’s game was offensive and defensive, and in a lot of ways, he was a better defensive player, which is scary to say because he was mentally getting inside of the minds of his competition, him wearing all black, him walking into their locker room and telling somebody, “I’m giving you 50 tonight,” and then doing it. And so he played both sides of the ball masterfully. We wanted to create a product that helps the athlete become the most dominant version of themselves on both sides of the ball.

MS: From a big picture standpoint, Jordan Brand has so many athletes who are strong enough brands to hold lines of their own. In some cases, they do. With that being the case, I’ve always wondered if we’d ever get to the point where the main line takes a pause and comes back for big anniversaries. That’s never really happened. Why? Is it because of that point about the line keeping pace with humanity?

JM: You can look at the Air Jordan as a conversation with history. Each shoe takes you back to a specific context. You think of [Spike Lee’s] “Do the Right Thing” when you see the Air Jordan 4. You think of “Space Jam” when you see the 11. We know our artifacts are attached to human narrative just as much as they’re attached to sport performance. And so because we’re creating future ancient artifacts, we have to think about what people will remember and revere 50 to 100 years from now because we’re all participating in helping the narrative of Michael Jordan exist across timelines, and that’s a beautiful responsibility to be a steward of someone’s lived experience.

The Air Jordan helps to do three things specifically for the brand. It pushes us in our method to make, so we always get a chance to question: How do we manufacture our footwear? Is there new technology out there that we want to bring to the market for our pinnacle expression? It helps us to push style. A big part of the conversation is always disrupting ourselves. It’s a mental game for us to push ourselves. What else can we do? How can we simplify? How can we exemplify a standard of the world’s greatest athlete? And then the third piece, we get a chance to interact with the youth on their terms. With this shoe, it’s unopinionated in the sense that even though it’s Michael Jordan’s name on the product, anyone can wear it.

MS: Are there any specific athletes or colourways that we should look forward to seeing with these?

JM: You’ll see the athletes supporting the product. They have a great opportunity, like they’ve always had, to tell stories through their colourways and their details. I’m excited for that to come to market. I think you guys will be pleased with how that all rolls out.

AI Is Building Team Uniforms Now

Manchester City and Puma unveiled the new third kit for the team’s 2026-27 English Premier League season on Thursday. Usually, that isn’t considered big news. But, in this case, the creation of this kit is grabbing headlines.

What happened: The club’s new kit was a fan design that was created with the help of AI. No other sports team has launched an initiative quite like this one yet that involves fans. Man City and Puma revealed the club’s new initiative on Thursday along with the reveal of the kit itself.

• Puma created an AI app that turns written prompts into designs.
• Fans from over 200 countries had access to the creator, according to the Club, and submitted designs using the AI’s editing tools.
• There were more than 180,000 unique kits submitted and rated by fans. After 1.7 million ratings, the submissions were shortlisted down to 10 and ultimately voted on by fans in January 2025 before the winning kit moved into production.

The winning kit came from a fan named Elliott, who said he created the design while on his lunch break at work “never imagining it could actually become a City kit,” he said in a statement.

The kit legitimately looks like it could’ve been designed by a professional. It takes Man City’s classic two-toned blue colours and places them in a fading stripe that goes down the middle of the jersey. The Etihad Airways sponsor tag sits in the chest. Puma’s logo is also featured on the jersey as well.

The fan reaction has been mixed so far. “Was excited for this one with the leaks, but hate the AI aspect,” one commenter on the Manchester City fan subreddit said.

The big picture: While this story feels quaint and charming on the surface, it’s also one that will spark debate throughout the sports world.

• On one hand, this initiative from Puma and Man City gave lifelong fans access and input on the team’s operations through AI on a level that they would never have been granted otherwise.
• On the other hand, questions about labour have to be raised here. The club ultimately saved costs on design by not only outsourcing the job to eager fans, but also having AI lead the charge in guiding them. Questions about the ethics of this and what roles professional human designers should play in a process like this will surely come up.

Regardless, this is happening. And if Man City is doing this as one of the most popular and powerful clubs in the biggest professional football league in the world, then it’s surely something others will consider down the line.

Nike Fills Its CCO Position

In a bit of surprise news this week, Nike finally filled its chief commercial officer role. Chief executive Elliott Hill announced that former Walmart exec Jane Ewing will be stepping into the role.

Her background: Ewing previously spent 14 years at Walmart on the company’s global leadership team.

• Most recently, she served as an executive board member for Walmart China.
• She also previously served as the interim CEO for Sam’s Club China, where she managed the brand’s business across 30 cities.

In her new role as Nike’s executive vice president and chief commercial officer, she’ll report directly to Elliott Hill. She’ll be focused on Nike’s marketplace strategy across its wholesale and direct-to-consumer business. Ewing’s tenure begins on September 7.

Remember: Nike’s previous chief commercial officer was Craig Williams, who was formerly the president of Jordan Brand. He left Nike in December 2025 as the company continued to shift its senior leadership structure.

• Back then, the role focused on managing Nike’s global geographies and integrating its wholesale and direct-to-consumer businesses.
• In the company’s new format, Nike’s geographic leaders report directly to Elliott Hill. Ewing’s role will be focused specifically on the brand’s wholesale and direct-to-consumer businesses.

The big picture: Nike is currently facing an uphill battle when it comes to balancing out its wholesale and direct businesses.

• Nike has fixed its relationship with wholesalers like Foot Locker and JD Sports and it’s showing growth in the area because of it. The brand achieved $27.5 billion in wholesale revenue for its full fiscal year in 2026, which was up six percent year over year.
• On the flip side, its direct-to-consumer business has fallen back quite considerably. It reported $17.7 billion for the full year, which was a six per cent year-over-year dip.

Some of that direct-to-consumer dip is a result of the brand prioritising rebuilding its wholesale relationships, but another major part of it is the brand’s struggle to clean up its inventory last year and recapture consumer attention with fresh products.

Finding that balance will be the job Ewing is tasked with at the business. She’s got a long road ahead.

#TheKicksWeWear

This is the community section of the newsletter where you (Yes, you!!!!) send me your best fits and kicks from the week. Feel free to send submissions to michael.sykes@businessoffashion.com or shoot me a message via social channels @MikeDSykes

First, the homie Jimmy got us started with the Sachs GPS sneakers. The utility in these is crazy. You can dress them up or down.

The homie Rohan is keeping the World Cup vibes going with these Adi F50s. You absolutely love to see it.

The homie Jerlisa came through with these Marathon joints in a pony hair leopard print

Then the homie Marissa came through with her baby and a pair of adorable AJ1s. I’m sorry, y’all. My heart just melts when I see children in sneakers. I don’t think I got my first pair of legit Jordans until I was 14? This baby has it good!

Thanks for reading, gang!

If you have any questions, comments or concerns, reach out to me via email at michael.sykes@businessoffashion.com or shoot me a message @MikeDSykes via socials.

Peace and love. Be safe, be easy, be kind. We out.

-Sykes 💯