How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Spizike

I used to hate the Jordan Spizike, but here's why I learned to love it.

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I am a traditionalist. This is something that extends beyond sneakers—my iPod is filled with albums, not individual songs, and one of the first things I did when I bought my ‘89 Civic was find the right center caps for the steel wheels—but it is most commonly expressed in my sneaker choices. It’s not that I’m afraid to venture outside of original colorways, but those are what I generally prefer. Unlike my colleague Matt Welty, I identify with many sneakers based on memories of the athletes (and my more spendthrift high school classmates) who wore them.

So when the Air Jordan Spizike was originally released in 2006, I cringed. Probably literally. In fact, I’m pretty sure I thought the whole thing was some kind of sick joke. Combining elements of the Air Jordan III, IV, V, VI and the all-new XX? Seriously? Breaking some of Tinker Hatfield’s most well-known—and coherent—works into their component parts then Frankensteining a single shoe from them seemed less like homage and more like sacrilege. By all means, pay tribute to Spike Lee, who belongs in the trinity along with Tinker and Jordan himself, but not like this. Not like this.

Still, it seemed to be something of a limited project, one that would flare up briefly and then fade away. No one would really buy into this, right? Wrong. The initial Spizike releases met with a degree of ridicule, but they also sold. The initial colorways were followed by more. There were classics (True Blue, Black/Cement) and new ones (Kings County, Do The Right Thing), ones with perforated uppers and ones with patent leather. When it came to the Spizike, too much was clearly never enough. Spike Lee himself introduced blue and orange Knicks-themed pairs, and presented President Obama with a “Bordeaux” pair at a fundraiser held at his New York home. The Spizike was here to stay.



 And at least it had a legitimate backstory unlike, say, the Dub Zero.


And somewhere along the line, outrage turned to acceptance. Yes, each original sneaker that contributed componentry to the Spizike was vastly better than the end result—the Spizike is less than the sum of its parts. But what was wrong with it, really? Was it any different than, say, Dr. Dre sampling from multiple Parliament Funkadelic tracks to make a new one of his own? After all, the Spizike wasn’t replacing earlier Air Jordans, just standing alongside them. And at least it had a legitimate backstory unlike, say, the Dub Zero.

This weekend—today, in fact—the original Spizike returns. The white, red and green colorway, which was jarring when it originally dropped, is almost subtle now. And the overall design, with those IV wings wrapping around the V’s silhouette like someone trying to hug Big Baby is no longer as much of a monstrosity. (It’s certainly better than its overbuilt Son of Mars offspring.) Familiarity breeds… affection? While it’s highly unlikely the Spizike will ever enjoy the same status as the Hatfield classics, it’s proven to be a worthy addition to the Jordan canon. And trust, from me that’s saying a lot.

Russ Bengtson is a senior staff writer at Complex and still doesn't own a pair of Spizikes. You can follow him on Twitter here.