Episode 4: Jordan Geller, ShoeZeum

From buying his very first pair of Air Jordan 11s in college to building the world's first sneaker museum, Jordan Geller shares one of the most incredible stories in sneaker history.

In this episode of The Rudy Be Good Show, Rudy sits down with Guinness World Record holder Jordan Geller to discuss how a passion for sneakers turned into an international business that changed the sneaker collecting world forever.

Jordan reveals how he built a business selling hundreds of pairs of sneakers every day on eBay, why Nike eventually banned him from buying from their stores, and how that setback inspired him to create the legendary ShoeZeum—the world's first sneaker museum.

The conversation dives into rare Air Jordans, DJ AM's famous sneaker collection, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant game-worn shoes, Pawn Stars, Nike history, sneaker investing, and the evolution of today's resale market. Rudy also shares the incredible story behind his rare Eminem Carhartt Air Jordan 4s and how Jordan helped him sell one of the most exclusive sneakers ever made.

They also revisit their University of Arizona days, discuss entrepreneurship, running marathons, collecting with purpose, and why timing can change everything in business and life.

Whether you're a sneakerhead, entrepreneur, collector, sports fan, or simply love hearing incredible success stories, this is an episode you won't want to miss.

👍 Don't forget to LIKE, COMMENT and SUBSCRIBE for more conversations with athletes, entrepreneurs, entertainers and industry leaders.

00:00 The Journey Begins: From College to Sneaker Enthusiast
02:47 Building a Business: The Rise of Sneaker Reselling
06:12 Reinventing Passion: The Birth of the Shoe-Zium
08:53 Collecting History: The Evolution of Nike Sneakers
12:12 The Guinness World Record: A Dream Realized
14:58 The Sneaker Reselling Market: Trends and Changes
18:08 The Impact of Celebrity Collections on Sneaker Culture
20:42 Navigating the Resale Market: Authenticity and Value
23:48 The Future of Sneaker Collecting: Apps and Trends
37:17 The Evolution of Sneaker Culture
39:46 The Journey of ShoeZium
42:46 The Highs and Lows of Selling Sneakers
45:46 The Market for Rare Sneakers
49:34 Running and Personal Growth
57:42 Life in Oregon and Meeting Michael Jordan
01:06:46 Naming and Family Connections
01:09:46 College Memories and Car Stories
01:11:06 Reflections on College Life and Changes
01:16:07 Favorite Tucson Eateries and Nostalgia
01:19:53 The 1997 Championship Team and Shoe Culture

Follow Rudy:
Instagram: @rudybegoodshow

#Sneakers #Nike #MichaelJordan #AirJordan #SneakerCollection #JordanGeller #ShoeZium #Sneakerhead #TheRudyBeGoodShow

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:15

Jordan Yeller, how are you?

SPEAKER_02 0:18

I'm so good. It's great to see you, Rudy.

SPEAKER_00 0:21

I haven't seen you in so long. You look great.

SPEAKER_02 0:24

Thanks, man. You too. Last time we saw each other in person was like 30 years ago.

SPEAKER_00 0:30

Can you not date us, please?

SPEAKER_02 0:32

Sorry, man. It's true.

SPEAKER_00 0:34

Jordan, you want to tell everybody who you are and why I wanted to interview you so badly.

SPEAKER_02 0:41

Yes. So my name is Jordan Geller. I am the owner of the shoe Zeum, which was the world's first sneaker museum.

SPEAKER_00 0:51

It's amazing. I to this day, like I've uh obviously I've known you for so long. And I don't know how you started. I don't know how you started. So I'm happy to tell you. Tell me how you started this.

SPEAKER_02 1:06

Yeah, actually, it goes all the way back to when we were in college together. Um, when I was in high school and elementary school, I always loved sneakers, but my parents wouldn't buy me the cool shoes because they were too expensive. So I had to wait until I was at college at University of Arizona with you. And my parents were giving me some money for living expenses, but now for the first time ever, I had enough money to buy cool shoes, which were not a part of my budget from my parents' perspective, but they weren't out there to stop me. So they were giving me a little bit of money each month, and I decided that I was going to take some of that money and buy my very first pair of Air Jordans. This was in 1996. They were the black and red Air Jordan 11s, and I absolutely loved them. Um, I wore them for four years in college very carefully. I used to like make sure I didn't walk in dirt or grass, and I even walked on the heels of the shoes so I wouldn't crease the toes. And I took really good care of these shoes, and I found out in 1999 that Nike was going to be retroing the Air Jordan 11 in the year 2000. And so I still had my pair that I've been wearing for four years, and I decided that I would clean them up and try to sell them on eBay so that I could use the money from selling those shoes to buy the new ones that were about to come out. So I took pictures of my shoes. Um, in these days, I didn't have a digital camera, so I actually like used one of those like uh those like disposable cameras. And I took pictures of the shoes, I had the pictures developed at a uh a pharmacy, um, got the pictures, scanned them onto the computer, and I sold my first pair of Jordans on eBay, and they sold for $167.50. And I was like, wow, this is cool. Because like I bought the shoes for $125, wore them, and then sold them for more money. And then the new ones that were coming out were only gonna cost $125. So I made enough money to buy the new shoes and take myself out for dinner. And I learned about the power of eBay. I graduated from the University of Arizona and moved to San Diego, where I went to law school. And one day I was at a swap meet in San Diego, and there was this guy, and he was selling shoes, and they were $20 a pair, and they were Nikes, they were brand new, and they were cool shoes. He had like Dunks, Air Force Ones, Harachis for 20 bucks. And I looked at these shoes and I remembered about my eBay experience with the Air Jordans, and I was like, okay, I can buy these shoes from this dude and sell them on eBay and make some good money. And so that's exactly what I did. I bought as many shoes as I could afford, took them home to my apartment, took pictures of them, posted them on eBay, sold them. They sold for like between $75 and $125 a pair. So I was making pretty good money on these shoes, and I kept going back to the SWAT meet week after week after week, just buying shoes and selling them for more money on eBay. Eventually, the dude at the SWAT meet disappeared, and so I wasn't able to get more inventory from him, but I knew that I could sell shoes for profit on eBay. I just needed to find the shoes to sell. So I started going to the mall and I would go to like Foot Locker, Finish Line, Foot Action, Chic, like all the sneaker stores, and I would look for cool shoes that were on sale or like on clearance, and I'd buy them and sell them on eBay. Eventually, I found the Nike outlets, and that was a gold mine because you could walk into any Nike outlet, they have thousands of shoes, they're all on sale. Um, and so I spent many years driving around to all the different Nike outlets in Southern California and reselling the shoes on eBay for profit. Um, my business became very successful. At my peak, I was selling between 150 and 200 pairs of shoes a day, seven days a week. I used to go to sleep at night and wake up in the morning to thousands of dollars in my PayPal account, and I'd wrap and ship the shoes and then go buy more. In 2009, Nike got wind of what I was doing, and they banned me from shopping at their stores. They sent me cease and assist letters saying you're no longer welcome to shop in the Nike stores, you can't return product to the Nike stores, sorry. Um I was devastated because I loved what I was doing. And it really wasn't about the money that I was making, I just loved the shoes and I loved running around and buying them and connecting with people all over the world and selling them to people in countries that I'll probably never visit. Um but anyway, when Nike banned me, I had to reinvent myself and figure out what I was gonna do. And at that time, I had a warehouse, it was 9,000 square feet, and it was full of shoes. I mean, I had 15,000 pairs of shoes when Nike banned me. And they were shoes that I hand-selected from running around to all the Nike outlets. And so I realized that Nike could ban me from shopping at their stores, but they couldn't stop me from selling my inventory. That was mine, and there was nothing they could do about it. So I started selling off my shoes, and I was bummed because I wasn't able to use the revenue to buy more shoes. Pretty quickly, my warehouse started emptying out. Like those 15,000 pairs became 14 and 13 and 12 and 10,000, and I'm looking at these racks that it used to look like a sea of orange boxes, and now there were big gaping holes in the shelves and racks that I wasn't able to fill. So I was like, what am I gonna do? Like, I I need to reinvent myself. And then I had this idea that I could use the warehouse and build a Nike museum. And I really wanted to show Nike who they banned. I wanted to show them that I love Nikes more than anyone, and that I'm one of their biggest fans, and that they banned me, and so I was gonna make a big celebration out of it and collect all the cool Nikes and put them on display. Um, I spent about a year and a half doing that, selling off my inventory and then strategically collecting all of the pivotal Nike models going all the way back to 1972, which was the first year of Nike. So my collection was running, basketball, skateboarding, cross-training, tennis, hiking, I mean, you name it, any category of Nike sneakers that they make, I dove deep into that category and bought all the important shoes. And I put them on display in chronological order. So you could like start off in the 70s, go to the 80s, 90s, 2000s, and just see the evolution of the brand. And in addition to the shoes, I also bought a bunch of toys and props and things that were the inspiration behind the shoes. So it wasn't just like shoes on shelves. It would be a shoe with maybe a book or a stuffed animal or like something that had to do with the shoes. And so it was much more than just a collection of sneakers. It was a collection of pop culture. Um, and it was amazing. Uh I'm in the Guinness Book of World Records for owning the world's largest sneaker collection. I also have three more Guinness World Records for selling the most expensive sneakers of all time. Um, I currently work with auction houses to help them sell amazing shoes. Right now I'm doing consulting work for an auction house called Jupiter. And we're currently selling this incredible pair of Kobe Bryant's game-worn Air Jordan 3s. Uh so it's been quite a journey for me from my first pair of Jordans back when we were in college together to the SWAT meet to the Nike outlets to the museum, and now working with big auction houses selling Grails.

SPEAKER_00 10:08

I mean, it's it's incredible. Like your journey is incredible. So your first pair was the Jordan 11s?

SPEAKER_02 10:15

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 10:16

You never had in like high school or anything?

SPEAKER_02 10:20

No, and the crazy thing is my name is Jordan Michael Geller. So I always like felt a connection to Michael Jordan, and I wanted his shoes, but my parents wouldn't buy them for me. They would buy me Michael Jordan t-shirts and be like, look, honey, like this shirt has your name on it, and it was cool, but it wasn't the shoes, and the shoes are what I really wanted.

SPEAKER_00 10:44

So the first pair was the Jordan 11s, but then when you started collecting, when you started selling off the those all those pairs, what was the first pair that you bought for the shoe XM?

SPEAKER_02 10:59

I mean, uh I I did have a collection of sneakers while I was reselling the shoes, but it was just like anybody's collection of sneakers. Maybe I had 40 or 50 pairs of shoes that were just shoes that I thought were cool. And sometimes I would buy shoes and never wear them. And the reason why is because I always wanted them when I was a kid, and now that I finally had the chance to own them, I didn't want to mess them up. So I just would keep them new in their boxes. A really interesting thing happened in the late 90s and early 2000s, and that was that Nike started retroing shoes. Because like when me and you were kids and Nike made like the Air Jordan 3, if you didn't get the shoes in 1988 when they came out, you were not getting the shoes ever because they weren't being retroed. You know, then the fours came out, and then the fives, and so on, and so forth. And so, like, really in the early 2000s, Nike went deep into retroing shoes, and so they're coming out with like the fours and the fives and the sixes, and these were shoes that I really wanted as a kid, and now I could buy them, but I didn't want to wear them. So I just like bought them and and admired them. Um, and so then when I had the idea to build the shoe zom, I was like, okay, I've got to get everything, like everything that is important. So there were about 500 pairs of Air Jordan retros at the time, and so I bought at least one of each pair. In the shoe XM, I had every single Air Jordan retro that ever came out in every color.

SPEAKER_00 12:48

Where were you where were you buying these from?

SPEAKER_02 12:50

Just in the mainly eBay, eBay and Flight Club and and Riff also. You know, in the early 2000s, there were not a whole lot of options to buy shoes on the secondary market. Like nowadays, there's StockX and GOAT and a million consignment stores. But back when I was collecting for the shoe XM, eBay was really the go-to place and Flight Club, and then like a few other shops, but mostly it was those two places. And so I quietly collected the shoes. I didn't tell anybody what I was doing. Um, I thought people would think I was crazy if I was like, oh, I'm gonna like buy every single Nike and make a museum out of it and put a bunch of stuffed animals next to the shoes. Like I could imagine what people would say, and so I just thought, you know, I'm just gonna do it. Just do it, right? Uh and so that's what I did. Um a year and a half, just quietly looking around on eBay and Flight Club and any other place I could find them. And I was buying all the important shoes. Like, I remember when I was 12 and 13 years old, Nike came out with the pumps, like the air pressure and the command force and the Air Force 180 highs that David Robinson wore, and they were so sick, and I wanted them so badly when I was a kid, but they were like 180 bucks, and my parents used to spend $60 on my shoes, so there was no way I was gonna convince them to get me the pumps, but it just was so fun to chase down and get to own everything that I ever wanted when I was a kid.

SPEAKER_00 14:40

It's amazing. How many pairs of shoes were in the shoe?

SPEAKER_02 14:44

There were 2,504 pairs in the shoe Xeom. Um, they were all brand new and in my size. I thought that it would be, I thought they needed to be brand new because nobody would want to come to see a museum of a bunch of like used stinky beater shoes. So I wanted them to be brand new in the box. And it was my personal collection, so I thought it would be appropriate if the shoes were in my size, even though I never intended on wearing them. I wear an 11 and a half, so in my shoe, everything was a size 11, 11 and a half, or 12. Like that was the the range of shoes that I collected. Nowadays, in my collection, I'm open to collecting other sizes as well.

SPEAKER_00 15:38

Right. So the when did you get the Guinness Book World Record?

SPEAKER_02 15:44

The people from Guinness came out from London and they counted up all my shoes, and we did like a photo shoot and a little video, and they put me in the Guinness Book of World Records, which was totally surreal. You know, I remember being a kid and like reading the Guinness Book of World Records about like the tallest person or the shortest person or the person with like the longest fingernails. And I mean, it was just cool to get to be featured in that book for something that I'm so passionate about. And before they put me in the book, there was no world record for the world's largest sneaker collection. Like it was it was my collection that made that even become a world record.

SPEAKER_00 16:32

So at the time when you started, when you were in San Diego and you started doing this and the and reselling on eBay, was this like a thing? Because like the last couple years it's been a thing. Like you have the people waiting online, you have them, you know, we were watching Entourage back in the day, and you know, you had Turtle, uh, it was the Fuji Fuchi Mucky. Fukajamas, and yeah, you know, you had that whole thing. So like the last couple years, and I think this year actually, reselling has kind of like went down a little bit, right?

SPEAKER_02 17:02

It is because Nike and the other brands are keen to what's going on. Like you know, in the early 2000s, it was a very underground thing, and there were certainly sneakerheads and collectors and people that were going on eBay and buying stuff, but it wasn't mainstream like it is now. And so Nike knows what shoes to make and how many to make, and they sell them direct to consumer on their app and website. And, you know, back in the early 2000s, there was room for a middleman like me to come in and buy stuff at the outlets and then flip it online because Nike really wasn't utilizing the internet to sell product. Um, funny thing that you brought up the Entourage episode. So at about the same time that I was banned from Nike, DJ AM passed away. And he was a huge sneaker collector. Um, at the time of his death, he had about 850 pairs of sneakers, which in 2009 was basically unheard of. There were not a lot of people that had sneaker collections as vast as DJ AM did. And when he died, his sister auctioned off his collection on eBay one by one. Um, every day, like 20 or 30 pairs of shoes would get listed until they went through and sold his whole collection. And Adam wore a size 12. Ooh, the lights went off in here. Hold on, let me let me turn them on. One second. Sorry about that. All good. Um so so Adam's amazing shoe collection was being auctioned off on eBay, and most of the shoes were size 12, which fit the criteria of what I was collecting. And of course, DJ AM was in that Entourage episode that you were talking about, where he was like trying to get to Undefeated to get those Fuki Jamas before Turtle and Vince uh went to get them. Um, and that pair of shoes was being auctioned off on eBay, like the exact pair that was on the Entourage episode. I bought them. Um, they were $3,050. It was the most expensive pair that sold from Adam's collection, uh, which, you know, they're worth like $10,000 or more now. But back then, like the market hadn't exploded like it has in recent times. But DJ AM was a big inspiration for me because at the time when I had the idea to build the shoe Xeam, now all of a sudden Adam's collection was being auctioned off, and I had the money to buy them because I had my inventory that I was selling off. And so I was like, okay, I'm just gonna like sell off all my shoes from the outlets and like buy all of DJ AM's cool shoes. So I ended up buying 55 pairs of shoes from his collection, and that was like kind of part of the snowball that turned into the shoe ZM.

SPEAKER_00 20:24

So where did the other pairs go? Just other collectors?

SPEAKER_02 20:28

Yeah, other collectors. Um when the auction was all said and done, I reached out to Adam's sister. Her name was Lara. She actually passed away too, tragically. Um, but I reached out to her and I gave her props on the auction that she did, and I said to her that no doubt this must have been very difficult for her to do. I mean, nobody wants to have to sell off their deceased siblings' prized possessions. And she did a really good job at marketing the shoes and photographing them and all that, and so I just reached out to her to just say nice things and give her props. And she told me that a bunch of the shoes didn't end up getting paid for. And if I wanted, I could come by the office and take a look at the stuff that never got paid for. And if I wanted to buy that stuff, I could. So I went over to the office, and in addition to the shoes that didn't get paid for, they held back like the grails. They had the OG MM 4s, the blue ones. They had the green undefeated fours. I mean, these are like they only made 50 of the MMs and 72 of the undefeated fours. And like these things never come to market. And to get to own DJ AM's pairs, that was like something really special. So I ended up working out a deal to buy those shoes too. And I bought a bunch of the ones that didn't get paid for. And like when people would come to the shoe ZM, they were all about Adam's MM 4s and the undefeated fours. Those were probably two of the most popular shoes in my collection.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

Amazing. And you sold my MMs.

SPEAKER_02 22:19

I did. That was an amazing story when you reached out to me with those.

SPEAKER_00 22:23

You thought, you thought you're like, Rudy, these are not real. I'm like, no, no, they're real. You're like, no, no, no. These were only given to family and friends. And I'm like, yeah, I'm family and friends.

SPEAKER_02 22:36

I didn't know if you were gonna bring that up. Like if you felt comfortable talking about it. And I'm glad you did, because you had the black Carhartt MM fours. Uh and those were amazing, brand new in the box. You hit me up, and exactly like you said, I was like, bro, these are probably not real. And you're like, no, they're real. And sure enough, they were real, and it was a pleasure selling them for you.

SPEAKER_00 23:00

So the story is, and I could talk about this now because it's been so many years, and I probably will have Paul Rosenberg on my podcast. Um, so Paul was having a Christmas party, the sneakers were gifts for Christmas. Wow. And he comes over to me and he goes, These are gonna pay for college. And I'm like, okay, and I looked at them and they were my size. Because he asked previously, he goes, What's your what's your size? What's your size? And I'm like, okay. This is what and when I saw them, I was like, and I'm a sneaker guy too, or at least I was, and I was like, I'm gonna wear these, and then I put them in the box, and he and I remember him saying, These are gonna pay for college, so I never put them on.

SPEAKER_02 23:45

Were they a ten and a half or eleven? What were they?

SPEAKER_00 23:50

Yeah, they were a ten. My nephew got a pair also, a ten and a half.

SPEAKER_03 23:57

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 23:58

Because I I believe those were either given to my brother or to him. So Paul's a actually a neighbor of ours.

SPEAKER_02 24:04

I remember he said that.

SPEAKER_00 24:05

And he's the greatest guy. So when the Christmas party happened, and this was in his office in the city, and there was like all entertainment people, and we were there, and he gave them to me, and I was like, should I sell these? Should I not? And it was a couple years went by, maybe three or four or five years or something like that. And I was like, you know what? I'm gonna sell them because if I don't sell them now, you know, I don't know. So I didn't want to put them on eBay myself because I didn't really want it to come back to me because they are numbered. Yeah. But I thought it was a good idea to sell them at the time. I reached out to the person that I know best that you know that knows Jordans and Nike, and you did help me sell them, and they did not pay for college, but I did get a nice Rolex.

SPEAKER_02 24:53

Yeah, they were a five-figure pair, if I remember correctly.

SPEAKER_00 24:56

Uh yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh yeah, five. Five.

SPEAKER_02 24:59

Yeah, I think like like 12 grand or something like that.

SPEAKER_00 25:02

Yeah, we did good. We did good. I bought a nice Rolex. I feel like this was the Rolex that I bought actually doubled in price, which is crazy. Perfect.

SPEAKER_02 25:10

I feel like this was probably like eight years ago or so.

SPEAKER_00 25:14

Maybe longer. I don't know. I don't know. But it was a nice pair.

SPEAKER_02 25:19

Yeah, I could probably it was a very nice pair.

SPEAKER_00 25:22

It would they yeah, they were great, and Paul's a great guy. Um, and there were there were people selling them right. I mean, like, I know people that like I don't know those people, but I went on eBay and like people left that Christmas party and they put them on right away. I'm sure they got like 25 grand or something. Wow. What are those going for now?

SPEAKER_02 25:44

Probably 15, I would guess.

SPEAKER_00 25:46

So like we we did okay. Yeah, I think so. We did okay.

SPEAKER_02 25:49

It's a nice Christmas present.

SPEAKER_00 25:51

It's a great Christmas present. I mean, those I I think the closest pair to that that I've sold were Jordan won the satin. This there was there were uh I forgot what they're called, the satin OGs. I think I sold them for 3,500.

SPEAKER_02 26:11

Black and red?

SPEAKER_00 26:12

Black and red.

SPEAKER_02 26:13

Yeah, and they're number two under pairs.

SPEAKER_00 26:15

Yeah, they're only 200 pairs. A buddy of mine was down in I think Soho, and he's like, Hey, I'm I'm online, I could buy two pairs. Do you want them? I'm like, what are they? He's like, I have no idea. So I'm like, okay, how much are they? I think they were like 180 bucks.

SPEAKER_02 26:32

Nice.

SPEAKER_00 26:33

I was like, all right, get them. So he got them. I actually did wear them. Wow. I did wear them and I did sell them for that price. Cool. Yeah, I saw I wore them only once, and it was that's a win.

SPEAKER_02 26:45

That's that's one of those situations where you can have your cake and eat it too.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

Yeah, and for a for a while, like I I mean, I wasn't like, you know, Jordan Geller with the sneakers, but I was buying you know, hard-to-get Jordans and Nikes, and I would buy two pairs if I could, and I'd wear one and I'd sell one.

SPEAKER_02 27:05

Yeah, that's what it's all about. So many of us that got into sneaker reselling would do just that, like one to rock, a few to stock, and then sell the ones that you know you have on ice.

SPEAKER_00 27:17

Yeah, I did get a little so on back you're saying eBay, I think this was in 2002, 2003. I was buying some on eBay, and to my, you know, after I would get them, I'd be like, these are fake. You know, and then there's nothing really you can do. Now, StockX, eBay, Goat, all these companies, they actually inspect it. So, like whoever you're buying it from, it goes to them, they grade them, and then they sell, then they send them back to you. If they're fake, that's it.

SPEAKER_02 27:53

Yeah, back in the day, like you're talking about, it was like the wild, wild west. And you'd go on eBay and hope that what you're getting is legit, and all you could do is go off of the seller's feedback and be like, okay, well, this guy seems like he's legit. And uh, but yeah, a lot of fakes were being sold online, and they had to create these authentication centers, and now when you sell a pair of shoes on eBay, you're sending the shoes to an eBay authentication hub where they inspect the shoes and then send them to the buyer, which it's nice that they've policed the fakes, but the downside of it is it takes forever to buy a pair of shoes online now. Because it used to be like you could buy a pair of shoes from me on eBay and I would ship it that day, and you would get it priority mail in like two to three days. And now it's like the seller has to send it to the authentication center, the authentication hub has to check it, then they have to ship it again, and so sometimes it can take two weeks or even more to get a pair of shoes, which is tough because a lot of times people are like trying to buy a pair of shoes like for an event or for like the weekend or you know, something like that. And so I don't know, it's the downside of the authentication process.

SPEAKER_00 29:11

Yeah, there's pluses and minuses. One is the timing, but you know, you're also you know you're getting a real pair.

SPEAKER_03 29:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:19

That that's a that's a good thing, I think, but you know it is what it is. I but the but the whole reselling market has come down significantly now.

SPEAKER_02 29:29

It has because so much of it is based on supply and demand. And Nike knows exactly what they're doing. You know, they know what the super sought-after shoes are, and they can produce enough of them for everyone, or they can make less than what the demand will be, and then those are the shoes that skyrocket on the secondary market, but then like other stuff that's just a general release, Air Jordan 3, like the Black Cement Air Jordan 3 is such a classic shoe. And Nike could make millions of them and just sell them all day long at their retail price, and so if they're making that many of a shoe and they're readily available at the malls or on websites, then there's no room to be able to sell them for profit, like on the secondary market. And so that has caused the the tanking of the resale prices. And the other thing is I remember like in the early 2000s, sneakerheads, we were just happy that Nike would retro a shoe. Like I think about the Grape 5s, the Grape Air Jordan 5s, they came out for the first time on September 30th, 2006. I remember that date specifically for a few reasons. Nike also released a pack of Air Maxes called the one-time only pack on that same day, but also that day was the end of a fiscal quarter, and so Nike was trying to like crank out desirable product to pad their earnings for that quarter. But anyway, September 30th, 2006, they came out with those grape fives, and sneakerheads were so excited to finally get to own those shoes because they only ever came out once, and that was in 1990. And there were like a lot of people like me whose parents like did not buy us the grape fives, and we always wanted them, and now boom, here we are, 2006, we can get them. And when they came out, they went way up on the secondary market. Like there was a time where they were like $500 a pair. Um, but then as Nike has continued to retro that shoe, they've retroed it probably five more times since then. And each time they retro the shoe, and it's more close to the original specs of what the shoe was like in 1990. And when they do that, nobody wants the older models. So, like that 2006 version, it's worthless, basically. I mean, for one thing, you can't wear it because it'll crumble and fall apart. It has a jump man on the heel instead of Nike Air, which like a lot of sneakerheads are kind of like snobby about, like, oh, I don't want the jump man on the back. I want it to say Nike Air the way that it did in 06. And now people are like all about the leather and is it like tumbled and is it supple and soft, or is it like plasticky and whatever? But like in the early 2000s, nobody cared about that. We were just like stoked to get a chance just to get the retro. But now Nike's much more sophisticated about the way that they're remaking the shoes, and a lot of that is driven by sneaker heads that are going on Instagram and like comparing, like, here's the 1990 version, here's the 06, here's the 2013, here's the this one, that one, the other one, and like comparing them across the board. And it's made Nike have to retro shoes a lot more close to like what they originally were like than they had to when they first started retroing stuff.

SPEAKER_00 33:09

Right. Do you think the the apps that like not only I'm saying the Nike actually app, the sneaker app that they released, do you think that has anything significant to do with the way people collect or for sure? Are they still going and waiting online for a drop?

SPEAKER_02 33:24

Well, Nike has kind of moved their more desirable products to the app. They don't really drop their uh sought-after sneakerhead-seeking models on Nike.com. They push that stuff on the app. And so uh most sneakerheads have that app on their phone, and when releases happen, they're like waiting for them to come out and like all over it. I remember when the cool gray Air Jordan 11s came out in 2010, and this was before the app. At the time, the shoes were releasing at midnight eastern time, so that was nine o'clock Pacific time. And I remember being on Nike.com at like 8 50, just waiting for it to like become nine, so I could buy the shoes. And they launched the shoes like 10 minutes early, and you could buy as many as you wanted. Like I just bought three pairs of them, just like boop, put them in my cart, bought them, no problem. Everything has changed so much. Nike has really mastered the supply and demand side of things, but also making it to where people can't get what they want. Like they do it on purpose, just to make it so that people just like want more and more and more.

SPEAKER_00 34:45

They s I don't know if this is true, but they would prioritize who would get those releases depending on your profile.

SPEAKER_02 34:52

I'm sure. I'm sure that it was not random.

SPEAKER_00 35:02

Maybe that you were on the sneaker app before and you bought this amount of shoes, you would get priority.

SPEAKER_02 35:10

I'm sure there's a lot going on behind the scenes that we don't know about, about how they go about picking who gets what, and and they keep changing things up and and I don't know, giving people um most recently I saw you could get almost like a golden ticket where you could pick out an upcoming shoe that's coming out and get it in your size. And so it's it's become kind of like a game.

SPEAKER_00 35:38

Gamify. I mean, it's it's kind of interesting that you say gamify, because remember when the whole NFT thing was out there? Yes, Nike was dabbling a little bit into that, and they were like, okay, we're selling the NFTs of the shoes, and it's you only own this pair of say 50, so that was another and then the NFTs obviously flopped, and somebody somewhere owns a one-of-one NFT Nike picture.

SPEAKER_02 36:06

Nike does a lot of that. Like they'll look at trends that are going on sometimes outside of sneakers and try to dabble in it, and more often than not, they're not successful at it. Like they're not a technology company, and they've tried to be, you know, for I remember I want to say it was probably like 2009 or 10 or something. They came out with that fuel band, which was like a bracelet that you could yeah, and like it didn't work or like it rarely worked properly. And then they had that other thing where like there was something that could connect to your iPod and it would go into your shoe underneath the insole and like keep track of your steps and stuff like that. But that was another thing that like didn't really work, and the NFTs is kind of the most recent example of them trying to do something that's not really their bread and butter, and then it just doesn't work out. Another thing that they did was I don't know if you've ever been to the Nike campus, which is in Beaverton. I actually live in Beaverton, okay. Um, it's very close to my house, but the campus is magnificent. It's like a uh adult person's Disneyland for sports. Um they have every type of field and turf and track and court that you can imagine. Um, but it's only for Nike employees. And Nike did something where they turned it into a game where people could play like on their computer or phone and act like they were on the Nike campus, like playing sports or something. Like they they they like video game it, so to speak. And that didn't work out.

SPEAKER_00 37:49

Didn't work out.

SPEAKER_02 37:50

Yeah. They need to just like stick to making shoes.

SPEAKER_00 37:56

Making shoes, yeah. But I you know, they have to they I I don't know, they need to look at different revenue models, and you know, their stock hasn't been doing so great lately.

SPEAKER_02 38:05

Yeah, that's an understatement.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

But yeah, they need to look at at other stuff now. Uh okay. Did you only collect Nikes?

SPEAKER_02 38:15

I in my shoe ZM I had ten pairs of shoes that were not Nikes. But they were related to Nike's, so that's why I had them in the collection. So like I had a bunch of Reebok pumps because the Reebok pumps inspired the Nike pumps. So I felt like that was an important part of the story. Um, I had some Converse shoes that were the models that Michael Jordan wore before he signed his deal with Nike, and so that was kind of like a part of the story leading up to the Air Jordan. So the shoes that I had that were not Nike's like fit within the narrative that I was trying to tell. I had a section in the shoe ZM that was shoes inspired by cartoon characters. Um, Nike is notorious for taking inspiration from things that are popular in pop culture, and they'll like make a pair of dunks that looks like Marge Simpson or Homer Simpson. And of course, they don't pay for the rights to do it, they just like do it. Um, but they there was a pair of vans that were inspired by Bart Simpson, where he like writes on the chalkboard. Remember in like the opening credits or opening music to The Simpsons, he writes like I will not skateboard in the hallways or something. There's a pair of vans that they made where it has Bart Simpson like writing on the upper of the shoes. And so I bought those and had them on display next to the Marge and Homer dunks. So that was another pair of non-Nikes that was in the collection.

SPEAKER_00 39:58

So what happened to Shoe Zim?

SPEAKER_02 40:02

I opened it in San Diego. I was selling tours on eBay for people to come by and check it out. I sold tours for $23.23, uh, inspired by Michael Jordan's number. And I gave people back $5 at the door if they wore Nikes, and everyone wore Nikes. So it was super fun. Like people would come in, I'd give them five bucks as soon as they walked in, give them a tour. It was one of the best times of my life, and the people that came to visit had such a good time, too. Um, eventually I packed up the shoe in San Diego and I moved it to Vegas. Uh, I thought Las Vegas would be the right destination for an attraction like that. At the time, there was a Titanic museum, there was a shark encounter at Mandalay Bay, there was the bodies exhibit, um, there was a mob museum in Vegas of like organized crime, and I was like, well, okay, maybe there's room for a sneaker museum. So I moved it to Vegas, and it was a real challenge launching an attraction in Vegas because I didn't have anybody backing me. It was just me and my shoes and the little bit of money that I had other than my shoe collection, and most of what I was worth was tied up in my sneakers. Um, and you know, here I am just like a young guy with I was young at the time, now I don't feel so young anymore. Um, but I was just like a young guy with a lot of shoes, and I managed to convince somebody to let me set up my collection. It was on Las Vegas Boulevard in Fremont, which is like old Las Vegas.

SPEAKER_03 41:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:48

Um, and I was selling tours for just $10 just to try to get people to come in the door. And my hope was that maybe one of the bigger casinos would get wind of what I was doing and that they would help me take it to the next level. Like I had this dream that I could have like a bar in Vegas called like Jordan's with all the Jordans, or like maybe a sports book would be like decked out with all the shoes. Um, but it never happened. The the rent was too high, the just the air conditioning alone in the summer, like my my location in Vegas was 7,500 square feet, and just to keep it cool in June, July, and August was so expensive, and then I had to have security there and and people like helping me sell tickets, and it was just too expensive to keep up. So eventually I had to shut it down uh and I sold most of my collection on eBay, Instagram, and through other larger auction houses like Sotheby's.

SPEAKER_00 42:57

Okay. So what year was that when you started selling things?

SPEAKER_02 43:01

It was like 2013-ish.

SPEAKER_00 43:07

And what uh what what do you think is the most expensive pair out of your collection that you've sold?

SPEAKER_02 43:13

Uh that's a good question. Um when when I was in Vegas, uh before I answer that question, there's one other thing that I wanted to mention. So when I was in Vegas and the shoe zom was open to the public and I was selling tickets, I thought that it would be a good idea to put the collection on eBay for a million dollars just to get attention. Like, oh my gosh, there's a million dollar sneaker collection in Vegas. And then on the listing, I would say, if you want to come see the shoes, come by the shoe zombie and I, you know, give the address. And Pawn Stars is located in Las Vegas, you know, the pawn shop with like Mike Harrison and Chumley. And so they found out about my eBay auction, and we did an episode where they came through and Spent the day with me and like there's a whole episode on YouTube where you could look up shoe ZM Pawn Stars. And I saw it. Yeah, so that was really cool. And and so even though I had to pack up and sell off my collection, I felt like Pawn Stars was great because it lives on in its own little way on the history channel. Um, and so when the episode aired, I waited for a little while before selling my shoes because I was thinking maybe someone will like see this on TV and want to buy it. Um, but that didn't happen. So then I ended up just selling the shoes one by one. I sold, getting back to your question, I sold a pair of Game Warn Air Jordan ones for $560,000, and I sold a pair of Nike Moon shoes for $437,500. So those two shoes sold for $997,500, and my eBay auction was for $2,500 shoes for a million dollars, and so I essentially got a million dollars out of two pairs.

SPEAKER_00 45:02

So the pawn stars, they messed up.

SPEAKER_02 45:06

Yeah, but you know what? That show is all for TV. I mean, there was nothing was ever gonna happen there. Um, it was totally scripted, it was fun. I enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_00 45:18

It was a good experience.

SPEAKER_02 45:19

Yeah, it was a good experience.

SPEAKER_00 45:20

And it gave you uh it gave you some press.

SPEAKER_02 45:23

It did. Um, my online following exploded when oh, the lights went out again. Hold on. They're back. Yeah, like I I remember the first the first night that Pawn Stars aired on TV, my Facebook and Instagram pages just like blew up, like tens of thousands of followers over and over again. And then interestingly, as the episode would air in like other parts of the world, all of a sudden there'd be like all these followers coming from like this country or that country. And so it was it was great for publicity.

SPEAKER_00 46:01

So I know you helped me sell my shoes. Did you have you helped other people sell shoes?

SPEAKER_02 46:08

All the time.

SPEAKER_00 46:10

So they come do you know them like you know me, or do you just random people hit you up and they're like, hey Jordan, I have this both. Jordan ones, game worn both.

SPEAKER_02 46:23

Sometimes it's friends like you, and other times it's just people online that just have heard of me or my collection, and they'll reach out and want to know what they have or what it's worth, or can I help them sell it? And I've helped a lot of people sell their shoes on consignment. I had uh a good friend who had a pair of rare Deft Tones dunks that I helped him sell, and that was a cool experience because I never even handled the shoes. Like he had the shoes, took pictures of them, sent me the pictures, I posted them on Instagram for $20,000. We got an offer for $17,000. My friend was cool taking $17,000, and so the buyer paid me, and then my friend shipped the shoes to the buyer.

SPEAKER_00 47:17

That's great. But okay, so back to like so most expensive. So we know about you selling the most expensive, but haven't I seen you selling stuff like that are like million-dollar shoes?

SPEAKER_02 47:30

Yes. A lot of times they're not my shoes, and I'm just like helping the auction house. Like right now, those those Game Warren Air Jordan 3s that Kobe wore, they're up for auction at Jupiter. They're currently at $130,000. That pair of shoes is gonna end on Thursday. I wouldn't be surprised if they sell for a half a million or even a million dollars. I mean, they're absolutely incredible. And I'm helping a friend sell them. So it's, you know, a situation just like what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_00 48:05

Right. So most of the most of the people that you know, do they how do they get these shoes? Do they also buy them like randomly from other people or they're on eBay, or they come into them, or they've had them?

SPEAKER_02 48:15

Uh it's a mix of everything. You know, it's it's harder to do a quick flip these days because people know a lot more now than they did before. You know, like people aren't giving away holy grails anymore. And so a lot of times people maybe bought something 15 or 20 years ago and they've had it for a while and now they're ready to sell it. Uh, my Air Jordan ones that I sold for $560,000, I bought those in 2012 for $5,000.

SPEAKER_00 48:51

So that's a good markup.

SPEAKER_02 48:54

Yeah, that was a great markup. The moon shoes that I sold for $437.5, I bought those on eBay for $23,000 three months before I sold them. That was like my best flip, just in terms of like the timing of all of it. I feel like timing, you know, people say timing is everything, and it's true. Um when I sold the moon shoes, it was 2019, and it was the 50th anniversary of man walking on the moon. And if you remember at that time, everyone was obsessed with all things related to the moon. Like even Oreo cookies were like inspired by the moon. And when I sold those Jordan ones for 560k, that was during the last dance, like the peak of the pandemic when we were all like staying home and away from each other, and there were no sports going on, and everyone was like totally captivated by the last dance and Michael Jordan and the Michael Jordan market just exploded. And so that was the right time to sell those shoes. Um, I actually intended on keeping those shoes forever. I wanted to give them to my kids, but I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get top dollar for them because the market was there. So I auctioned them off.

SPEAKER_00 50:15

What what about the waffles?

SPEAKER_02 50:17

Yeah, the waffles, the waffles are the moonshoe. The first Nike waffle ever was the Nike moonshoe. Um it was called the Moonshoe because in 1969, when the astronauts landed on the moon, you know, there's those famous iconic pictures that show the footprints on the moon. Right. Um, when the waffles came out, which was in 1972, so just like three years after the moon landing, uh, waffles left similar prints in the dirt. And so people were like, Oh, let's call them moon shoes. They're like the astronauts' moon boots, and so that's why they were called the moon shoes.

SPEAKER_00 50:58

Oh, interesting, interesting, interesting.

SPEAKER_02 51:00

Um I brought just because we're talking about old shoes, I want to show you like a really special pair of shoes that I bought or brought with me. Um, they mean a lot to me. Um this right here is a Nike pre-Montreal. It's brand new and it's 51 years old. This was Steve Pre-fontaine's signature track spike, and it's red, white, and blue because they were making them for Steve to wear in the Montreal Olympics, which were in 1976, but Pre tragically passed away in 1975, so he never got to wear these shoes in the Olympics that they were designed for. Uh yesterday I ran the Eugene Marathon, and uh I wore these, which are vapor flies that are inspired by the old prefontaine shoes. Um and I brought my my marathon medal too.

SPEAKER_00 52:15

Oh, congratulations.

SPEAKER_02 52:16

Thank you. It was an amazing day yesterday.

SPEAKER_00 52:19

Yeah, so you s you started running marathon. Well, you started running, and then you started running marathons. And I this has been like a couple years. Like how many years have you when did you start running? Because this has been like now. Recent yeah, like after COVID, right?

SPEAKER_02 52:33

Yeah, September of 2021 is when I started running, and I did it just to get in shape. Like I I was overweight. I think the pandemic contributed to that too, and I was just not healthy, and I needed to make a big lifestyle change, and so I started jogging and I started slow, like I was just running one mile a day at like an 11-minute or 12-minute pace. I felt like I was gonna die after I was running those early miles, but then I just built up and like started running one and a half miles and two miles and three miles, and then in 2023, I ran my first marathon. Um, and I did it in three hours and 33 minutes.

SPEAKER_00 53:22

Amazing.

SPEAKER_02 53:22

I think is pretty respectable. Um, thank you. And so then yesterday, when I ran it was my second marathon yesterday, my goal was to beat my previous time of 333, and I did it in 328. So I was like super stoked to accomplish that goal.

SPEAKER_00 53:43

So I have lots of friends who well, not lots of friends, maybe like a handful of friends that they ran one, they ran two, and now they're just running marathons. Like it's like like they're addicted to it. Yeah, I tried, like I started training, I think this was like in 2016 or 15. I started training, and I was up to running six miles. Nice, and then I pulled my hamstring.

SPEAKER_02 54:10

Yeah, that'll happen.

SPEAKER_00 54:12

Haven't done it. Have not did not go back to run. I do run. Like I I ran today. I have a I I'm recovering from a broken toe and I went to go run today. Like, it hurts. It hurts. Like last Saturday I was doing CrossFit and they're like, okay, we gotta run, and I'm like, I'm gonna jog. I don't care about time because like my it's the toe is really hard because like it you're always walking, and there's nothing that you can do to like make it better. But I'm hoping that it gets better where I could run, and eventually I would love to run the New York Marathon.

SPEAKER_02 54:48

It would be amazing. It's it's such an exhilarating feeling. You know, um the runner's high is a real thing when you're out there and you're feeling good. It takes a while to get in good enough shape that you can actually enjoy the running. But once you do, it's just such a very empowering feeling, and you start feeling good and healthy, and I lost a bunch of weight, which was great. Um, yesterday when I was running the race, at the beginning of the race, when there was just like a huge pack of runners, like thousands of runners, I was listening to the footsteps like on the ground, and it it just sounded so amazing, like, like not like horses trotting, because it's kind of a different sound, but it sounded like like music to my ears. I don't know quite how to describe it, but it was just like such an amazing thing to get to be a part of.

SPEAKER_00 55:52

So is this is this like a thing that you're gonna like okay, I'm like I said before, I have friends that are now running, running, are you now looking to see if you could do another marathon?

SPEAKER_02 56:02

Uh I mean, not today, because I'm recovering from yesterday, but I will do more. My dad ran 10 marathons when I was a kid, which is one of the things that made me fall in love with shoes to begin with. Like my dad used to take me to the Nike stores, and he would buy all the latest running shoes. And he wouldn't buy me the cool shoes that I wanted, but he would buy them for him. And I I would just go with him to the shoe stores, and he would be looking at the running shoes, and I'd go look at the Jordans and like the Bo Jackson's and the Andre Agassies and the Barclays and David Robinsons, and and I, you know, fell in love with all these shoes. But like my dad's running has been a big inspiration to me, and he did 10 marathons, and I would like to do 10 um in my lifetime just because he did. So I don't know, who knows if my body will be able to do that, but I plan on eight more keep on going. You could do it eight more. Yeah, you know, it's funny, like you know, these shoes right here, I'll never wear them again. Like, I I'll I retire my marathon shoes right after the race, and they just become so sentimental to me. Um, it's been a really cool progression for me to go from looking at shoes like this that no one would ever wear a 50-year-old track spike. But like as a sneaker head, I admired like the aesthetics of the shoes and the technology in them, but I never really used them and actually felt what it feels like to try the technology, and so it's been cool to evolve from somebody that just kind of admired the shoes from afar to somebody that actually uses them for what they're intended to be used for.

SPEAKER_00 57:57

What what do you think those are worth?

SPEAKER_02 57:59

Um, probably ten thousand dollars, I would say, for the track spikes. Okay. Look, they still have the wrench and the spikes, they've never even been like screwed into the shoes.

SPEAKER_00 58:10

Where'd you find those?

SPEAKER_02 58:12

Um, some guy that was a collector reached out to me on Facebook and was like, hey, I've had these in my family forever. Check this out. This is like the box top, and on the inside of the box top, it shows a list of all the Nike shoes that they made at the time. This is it. Like, that's how many Nike shoes they came out with. And then there's this little like chart that shows like what the shoes were made for. I mean, that's like how early this is, you know. Nike releases more shoes than this every week.

SPEAKER_00 58:48

I know, it's crazy. So why did you move to Oregon?

SPEAKER_02 58:55

Uh my wife is from here, and so we moved here to be closer to her family, and it was just like so cool to get to move into Nike's backyard, basically.

SPEAKER_00 59:08

I just left out, oh, I'm from Oregon. You're like, I love Nike.

SPEAKER_02 59:12

It's funny when I met my wife, I said, Where are you from? And she said, Beaverton, and I said, You had me at Beaverton.

SPEAKER_00 59:21

I mean, can you like isn't that crazy though? It is.

SPEAKER_02 59:26

Like I've been really fortunate, and I don't know, a lot of things that have happened to me, I feel like you you really can't even make it up. Like, I I went to law school and when I passed the California bar, my California bar number is 234523. And those are Michael Jordan's jersey numbers in the order that he wore them. And my name is Jordan Michael. And so, like, I have all kinds of like weird like coincidences or whatever that have happened along the way that are like, I don't know, uh like too random. What'd you say?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:10

What's your wife's name?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:11

Natalie.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:12

Okay, I was gonna say if her name is like m Michaeletta. Have you ever met Michael Jordan?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:19

I did. Um there was a party in Beverly Hills for the release of the Air Jordan 2011. Um there was there was a short period of time in 2010, 11, and 12 when Jordans were not numbered and they were just calling them like the Air Jordan 2010 or 2000. Anyway, I went to the release party for the Air Jordan 2011. And um, do you remember Jamie Tanowitz? She went to college with us.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:47

She got me into this party. Um, she was friends with a lady named Esty Portnoy, who's Michael Jordan's manager. And Estie got me an invite to the party, and she goes, if you get a chance to talk to Michael Jordan, be cool. And I was like, Okay. So, like when I met him, I wasn't like, Oh my god, my name is Jordan Michael. And by the way, I built the world's first sneaker museum, and I have all your shoes, and I love you. You know, like I was just like, hi, I'm Jordan. Nice to meet you, and we shook hands, and that was it.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:18

I would have been like, yeah, but I I actually met Michael Jordan three times. Once when we were in college in Las Vegas playing blackjack.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:31

Wow. Yeah. You must have been at the high rollers table.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:35

No. Ki I don't think so. I don't think I was at the high rollers table. It was really late at night. I didn't make like a thing about it. I really didn't care. I was drunk.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:49

Of course.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:50

I didn't make like a thing like, oh my god, that's Michael Jordan. I didn't I was more like an asshole, kind of like, oh, this guy's coming and you know, he's sitting at the table and like I don't give a shit, it's Michael Jordan. I, of course, was a New York Knic fan.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:05

So, you know, even though now I go back and I'm like, Michael Jordan is the man, he's the greatest of all time. I don't care what you say.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:14

But back then it was more like I'm a Knic fan, and this motherfucker You'd rather have it be Patrick Ewing sitting next to you.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:23

Exactly, because if it was Patrick Ewing, you know, then it'd be a different story. And then I met him in the city in Manhattan. Um, it was a little bit different. It was more like, hey, you know, you're amazing, you're great. Um, it was a you know short talk, he was sitting next to me, and then uh saw him in Florida. He was uh he lives in Jupiter, and I I'm down in Palm Beach a lot, so I've seen him there. That's cool. He's a nice guy.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:49

Do you remember a guy named Jeff Horowitz that we went to college with as well? Yes. One time I was in Vegas with Jeff, and we used to always joke around, like we'd see somebody wearing a Michael Jordan jersey, and we'd be like, Oh my god, it's Michael Jordan, or like a Larry Bird jersey. We'd be like, Oh my god, it's Larry Bird. And we were at a casino in Vegas, and Jeff says to me, Oh my god, it's Michael Jordan. And I'm thinking he's like saying this about some stupid kid wearing a Jordan jersey, and it actually was Michael Jordan. And we're like, we still laugh about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:20

Yeah, he was he was, I mean, now you know because of the stories, but he's a big gambler.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:26

And back then, you know, it was it he was there a lot, and you know, it wasn't like it wasn't Vegas how it is now. Back then, Vegas, there was only like a few casinos, and it wasn't like they were, you know, people were just sitting around. Now it's like, you know, tons of high rollers, big casinos, big money. You go for a I mean, I haven't been there in a in years, but you go for a drink, it's like fifty dollars a drink. There, you're sitting at the casino, you're playing ten dollars a hand, and you want a drink, they bring you a couple drinks for free. You want to go see the lions and the tigers, you know. You thought it was very different. It was different. Now it's like it's completely different. And if Jordan's going to to Vegas, you're not seeing him.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:10

He's going to tell you a funny story about Vegas. It doesn't have to do with shoes, but it's I love this story. When I was 16, I went to Vegas with my best friend from high school and his family, of course. Like we weren't just two 16-year-olds going to Vegas. And I said to my buddy, I'm like, dude, we should bring suits with us to Vegas. And if we're wearing suits, we'll be able to play slots, and from the back, the security will look at us and we'll just look like we're like short adults or whatever. And so we dress up in these suits and we're playing the slot machines, and we're at the dollar machines, and we're playing jacks or better, and we put five dollars into the machine, and it deals us an ace and a jack. And so we kept the ace and jack and like got three new cards, and we're hoping to get another ace or jack so we could break even. And it gave us a Queen King 10 all diamonds. So we hit a royal flush at 16 years old, and the machine's like flipping out and going crazy, lights are on, jackpot, this and that. And it wasn't like paying out the money right there. The security had to come over to pay us. And I look at my friend, I'm like, they're not gonna pay us, we're kids. So I look over and there's like some older lady at a slot machine two seats over, and I'm like, yo, we just hit the jackpot. Come sit here and collect it, and we'll split the money with you. And she's like, Okay. And she comes and sits down where we were, and me and my boy go off like to the wall, like 10 feet away, and we're just looking at this, like, are they gonna pay her? And they came, gave her some forms, she filled out like like her tax information. They just started counting hundreds into her hand, and we gave her two grand, and she gave us two grand, and me and my boy each took a thousand bucks, and it was like the best gambling experience of my life.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:50

Oh, that's great. You're lucky she didn't run away.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:53

Yeah, that or that the security didn't like look at cameras. That shit would never go down.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:57

No, now they like you know, they roll it. That's it.

unknown 1:06:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:01

You know, now it's now it's a wrap.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:03

But yeah, Vegas was very different back then.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:06

The good times, the good times.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:08

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:08

So what are you doing work-wise now?

SPEAKER_02 1:06:10

Are you still doing stuff with sneakers or I'm uh the sneaker and sports memorabilia expert for Jupiter auctions? Jupiter's owned by Pharrell, and um we're always getting in like cool stuff to sell. So I do that for them. I also still sell shoes independently, like on eBay or Instagram. Um, I recently took a serving position at a really nice restaurant in Portland just to get out and mingle with people, so that's another thing that I'm doing. Um I'm busy with my kids. I've got two kids that are nine and six years old, and I coach them in sports. And so I'm I'm a pretty busy guy, but I love what I do, so I'm lucky.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:56

That's great. So do you have boys or girls?

SPEAKER_02 1:06:59

Uh my daughter's nine, and my son is six.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:02

Michael and Jordan.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:04

Violet and Oliver.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:06

I was close.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:08

I actually named them after Nike. Violet's middle name is Moon after the moon shoe, and Oliver's middle name is Knight after Phil Knight. So we were close.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:18

Hey, I was trying. I was trying.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:21

How old are your kids? They're a little older than mine, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:07:23

Yeah, so I have four girls 18, 17, 14, and 8.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:29

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:30

Yeah, and my older oldest one did have a sneaker addiction. She kept, you know, she was, you know, I had a bunch of I had a nice collection at one time, and she was like, Well, I want Jordans, and I went, and so she was maybe two or three. We went and we bought her these pink Jordan 4s. Cool. Um, I think we still have them somewhere, and then she's just been like, you know, every couple months, she's like, I want this Jordan, I want that Jordan. I'm like, you gotta relax. You don't need these Jordans, you're never gonna wear them again. But she's she's she's got a nice little collection.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:09

Next thing you know, she's gonna want an M3, just like her dad used to have.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:13

Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, you know, she I did get her car and she's complaining that she wants an a BMW.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:20

There you go. You had like the coolest car in college.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:24

Yeah, it was. I mean, at that time, it was it was definitely a cool car. I I had two of the coolest cars in college at the time. What was the second one? I had a Range Rover 4.6.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:36

That's right. You did. I forgot about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:38

Yeah, and the funny story is I so I sold, I sold my BMW, and I also had a Harley, and I sold the Harley, and I was working in college, you know, I was working really hard, and I saved up enough money to buy a Range Rover, but I couldn't buy a brand new one, so I bought a used one, and I was, you know, I'm from New York, so I had my I back then you it was you're looking in the New York Times for an auto trader, like these paper things for for cars.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:11

Yeah, I remember.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:12

Yeah, so I found a Range Rover up in Connecticut. So I had my mom drive me up to Connecticut, and it was a Maroon 4.0. So I'm like, okay, I can buy it. My brother's like, just lease it. You're gonna drive this car for three years, and that's it. And I didn't know the difference between leasing and buying. The first one my dad bought me, and then you know, that was my second car actually, the BMW. And I was like, all right, we'll lease it. I leased it, my brother leased it for me in his name because I didn't have credit. I was I was I think I was 19 at the time, maybe 18. No, 19, 19. I went away to Europe and I had the car delivered to my brother. He had a Harley shop in Soho at the time. It was called American Dream Machine, and he lived on 87th and Park Avenue.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:02

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:02

So he takes the car and instead of paying $25 for parking, he parks it in front of the building. Next day he calls me and he says, I got bad news the car was stolen. And I'm like, You're such a liar. It wasn't stolen. The car was stolen.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:19

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:20

So I didn't have a car for like between you know, because insurance, by the time insurance pays, then you gotta find another Range Rover, all this stuff. So it was like for six months I didn't have a car, and I lived up in the foothills, so that's a good 15-20 minutes away from campus. So my brother felt really bad, and I made him feel really bad. So he went and he found this Range Rover, a black one, 4.6, from a Miami Dolphins football player, Ricky Jordan. And I mean, the car was in condition. The only problem was the back seat, the the armrest was down because Ricky Jordan was like leaning on it.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:58

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:59

So, yeah, so I got that car, and it was like everyone was like, How do you have a Range Rover 4.6? Like, you know, it was like a thing because I probably had the third nicest car on campus. Next to some kid that had a uh Porsche, another guy had a Ferrari. Actually, I knew two guys had Ferrari, but those guys were from Dubai.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:21

Um it was exciting to watch our team this year.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:24

Oh, so so I took my daughter, my seven, well, she was 16 at the time. I took her to homecoming because she wanted to see University of Arizona. My oldest one didn't want to go to Arizona, so she wanted to go see. So I took her to homecoming. So we went, she's a volleyball player, so we went on thir was it, yeah, Thursday. We went to volleyball. Amazing. The girls' volleyball team is so good, and then we went to the opener for basketball. Nice for men's basketball, and it was amazing. And then we went to homecoming football, which was great. So it was like yeah, so for her, it was it was like that was the weekend, and it was great. It was the first time I was back since 2018, I think. So it was uh it was amazing. I had I had a great time. I didn't s really see anybody like that we know, although my partner from Coolmix drove down from uh Scottsdale to come visit me with his son, so that was fun, but I didn't really see anybody, and it's completely different than when we went there. Everybody lives on campus, nobody lives off campus, nobody lives at up at Star Pass or the foothills. A lot of kids don't have cars, um, a lot of kids don't go to restaurants off campus. When I'm talking about restaurants off campus, I'm talking about like three blocks, like they won't go. They won't go. Fourth Avenue is completely different, downtown is completely different. Um, it's and there's like these big apartment buildings, and there's pools on top, and that's where everybody lives, and it's a lot of kids don't go to bars.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:58

Um we had a great college experience. We were very fortunate.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:02

It was great. I think we had a uh, you know, it was I think it was a combination, like we had the bars, the clubs. If you wanted a frat party, it was a frat party. If you wanted a house party, there was a house party. If you wanted to go off campus and live off campus, you went and lived off campus. If you wanted 25 minutes away, you could live 25, 15, 15. And it and it was it was great. I was I was driving around, I was like, uh, this was so good. And like I really wish back then, like I took more innovative, but you know, how could we have known though?

SPEAKER_02 1:13:37

You know, we were just kids.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:38

We were just kids, we didn't know, we didn't know. And even now, like some like Gerbs was there, he went a couple weeks ago with his son, and I'm like, Yeah, go to this place. He's like, I've never heard of that place. I'm like, Yeah, it's it's like off Ina. Like, little have you been to Little Abner's? No, so Little Abner's, it's I can't believe it's still around. So it's so like if you go like out to the desert, you just go out to the desert. They used to have a dirt road and like no lights, but when you go out there, you get to this little restaurant, and it's the best barbecue, and there's like little guy on a banjo playing, and you're eating outside on paper plates, and now it's not paper plates, now it's like you gotta make a reservation. There's an actual road.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:23

Hang on, let me get the lights back on.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:25

Keep talking, though. I'm listening. And it's and it it's it was it was it was so good, and now it's a little bit different. But I'm I'm really happy that it's still around. There's still a lot of places that are still around that um I would like to go back there sometime.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:39

It's been too many years since I've been there.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:42

Yeah, go take your kids, you know, go during homecoming.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:47

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:48

I mean that because it's just there's so much going on during homecoming, and it's still not like a shit show. It's like it's not like so many people, but there's a lot of people, and there's always like activities and there's fun stuff to do, and you know, the it's good stuff. And so the book there's a bookstore, right? So the one thing I noticed from going around to different colleges with my daughters and visiting is Arizona has the most bookstores, meaning the most apparel stores. And I hope it continues. Because like if you want something, you'll go to like the McHale Center, there's stuff there. By the football stadium, they have stuff there, but there's this one bookstore on campus, and it's it's by the student union.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:33

Yeah, I remember.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:35

No, no, no, it's not the same one we had. This thing is huge, and there's one section there, and it wasn't there the last time I went, but this time it was there. They call it used stuff, I'd like to call it vintage stuff. Okay, and they had all this like racks, like maybe four racks of vintage Arizona stuff. And it was amazing. I got this starter jacket and it yeah, it was it was great. I I would have got more stuff. I spent so much money in there. My daughter's like, you're not allowed to come in here, and we and I go back the next day and she's like, You can't come back in here, and I'd be like, uh hold on, I'm gonna get something else. And I'd go in the back, I'd find like a blanket.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:18

That's cool.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:19

I had to buy another bag. But yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:22

I used to get my mom to put money on my cat card, and I'd buy stuff at the student store and then return it at like Target so I could get money. Like that was my hustle. I'd buy like T I 82. Yeah, I'd get my mom to buy me a TI-82 calculator and then return it at Target.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:42

I think I have my somewhere here, my s my uh my card. There's somewhere in my desk over here, but I don't know where it is. But yeah, it's amazing. Amazing. So, okay. Real quick, I'm probably gonna edit some of that stuff out, but I did I did interview a guy, the a football player from Arizona, and I'm gonna ask you, and maybe it could like ring it in somehow like to the Arizona feel. What were your top places to like eat and hang out in Tucson? On the Arizona campus.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:15

Uh, if I could go to Tucson right now, the first place I would go to dinner would be a place called Rosa's, which was on Fort Lowell and Campbell. It was a little family-owned Mexican restaurant. They had the best tacos that I've ever had. So I'd go there for sure. Um, beyond bread, I would go there for lunch and get those tuna sandwiches. They were so good.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:37

So good.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:38

Um I remember uh what was it, the East Coast sub place that was like by the um uh not sausage deli.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:47

No uh the uh uh Jersey, no.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:52

I feel like it was called East Coast Subs or something. Maybe I'm wrong.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:56

No, it was um it was a guy's name.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:00

I don't remember, but but I I can vividly visually I know where it is. I think it was on 6th, like by the Circle K, like right next door to there. Um man, there was another little Mexican restaurant called Minadito that was really good. They had great Mexican restaurants.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:19

Mexican restaurants were amazing.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:21

Um, I had my 21st birthday at a Tepon place, I think it might have been called Socura. Kingfisher was a good spot to go for like Kingfisher, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:36

The ribs were amazing at Kingfisher, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:39

And then there was a place called Cottonwood Cafe that's not around anymore. That was also good. I remember we used to get sandwiches from baggins. I wouldn't say it was like my favorite, but it's something nostalgic. I remember going to Eegy's and getting those little like icy things. Yeah. Remember those?

SPEAKER_00 1:18:56

Yeah. Um so Beyond Bread moved. So really, yeah, so like it was kind of like on that same side as Baggins.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:07

And they moved to a larger location across, like kind of like diagonal from where they were. And I took my daughter there, and I'm like, this is the best place. And I was expecting to walk in there and see like a lot of kids. Jordan, when I tell you this, you're not gonna believe me.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:22

Tell me.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:22

I was the youngest person in there.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:24

Wow, that's so hard to believe. I remember they used to have like samples of bread and like butter, and you could like do it up yourself while you walked in and waited. Probably not anymore.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:35

Not anymore. They did I did order the tuna sandwich.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:38

Was it as good as it used to be?

SPEAKER_00 1:19:41

Not as good. Not as good.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:43

That's a bummer.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:45

Not as good. The cookies were good. Um, what uh I did get something else, I forgot what it was, but it yeah, it's a little bit bigger. Not, you know. Kingfisher was very good. Um, I don't think Sakora's there anymore. Maybe it is, I don't know. But yeah, what good times we had.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:05

We did. They didn't have an in and out there when we were there.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:09

No, and I didn't go to in and out when we were there. Uh my daughter is not a really big meat eater, so uh she didn't want to go, so I was like, ah, screw up.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:17

If they had an in and out back then, I'd have been living there.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:21

Last question before we go. Yeah. So the 97 cats. Yes, we won the championship 97.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:30

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:31

That was one I think that might have been so back then the teams never got really they they didn't really get their own shoes. But this was like one of the first teams that were actually getting those like the penny hardaways, the foam posits, the foam posits. Yeah, there was another shoe, I forgot what it was, but the the this team was one of the first teams that were able to wear those shoes, the different shoes that people wanted, and it and it got a lot of uh you know awareness out there. And I think after that season was when they started to get shoe deals.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:14

Yeah, schools got shoe deals. Well, U of A has been a Nike school for a long time. Like even when Steve Kerr was a player at U of A, he was wearing dunks, and that this was like in the 80s, you know. But 97, that team that won the championship, they were wearing amazing shoes. Like lots of the players were wearing those royal blue foam posits before Penny even wore the shoes, and they were made for Penny, but Mike Bibby was the first one to debut them on court, and uh Miles Simon wore Air Up Tempo 97s in the championship game. I mean, we had a squad, and those players wore really amazing shoes, and like Eugene Edgerson was like a real throwback with his fro, and he went on to become a Harlem Globetrotter, but he used to wear like old school like Air Force Ones and like Vandals, things like that. I remember I was in theater appreciation class with a bunch of the basketball players, and I used to sit behind them and just like listen into like their conversations because they were celebrities at at our school and they really stood out, you know. I mean, for one thing, they were like super tall, and like everyone knew who they were. And I remember like they would be talking to each other about when games were being televised, they'd be like, yo, like what shoes are you wearing tonight? Are you gonna wear like the no-show socks or like higher socks? And like, yo, we better go get our haircuts before the game. And like, you know, we were all kids, like they were kids too. And I used to just like sit and listen to them in awe and then watch the games and see them like wearing whatever shoes and socks that they were talking about that they were gonna wear.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:05

It was a cool memory that I had it was it was it was a great time, a great time. Great time.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:10

I've connected with Miles Simon too, like ever since I built the shoe Xeam, he reached out to me and like gave me props on my collection, and that meant so much to me because like some of my fondest memories from college were watching that team go all the way through the tournament and win. And you know, like I was never friends with any of those guys back then, and so it was like cool to get to connect with him later on.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:40

Yeah, I mean it was a great time, it was a great time. We I mean we won the championship back then.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:45

It was like I felt like this year, of course I wanted U of A to win, like I'll always root for U of A. But I also feel like for us it's kind of a win-win situation because if they don't win, at least we were there when they did win. And it's like kind of cool that we were there the one and only time that U of A won the tournament.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:07

I hear you. I hear you. Well, I I want to thank you very much, Jordan, for doing this interview with me. I appreciate it. It's great for seeing you after all these years.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:17

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:18

You too. We'll we'll see you soon.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:21

Yeah, if uh Paul Rosenberg gives you another amazing Christmas present, hit me up and I'll be happy to turn it into money for you.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:29

Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:29

All right, dude.