During a typical normal season, PJ Tucker spends his free days checking out the sneakers stores, regardless of the city he is in. When the NBA season was suspended, Tucker’s off-day shopping trips stopped.
But this hasn’t stopped his crazy purchases.
“During the coronavirus I bought more shoes than I have ever had,” said Tucker with a laugh. “Probably in my whole life.”
Tucker, known around the NBA as the league’s most prolific sneakerhead, spent countless hours during the period when the team’s facilities were closed checking eBay to add to his collection.
Last month, Tucker actually launched the script. Instead of buying the shoes at auction, he sold them, auctioning off the playoff sneakers worn on the Houston Rockets mobile app, as part of the team’s efforts to provide relief to local Houston organizations affected by the coronavirus.
In early April, he also launched a capsule collection of clothing with The Better Generation, an upcoming Houston boutique, to raise money for the local Houston Food Bank and help needy community members.
However, it’s the shopping that has filled most of Tucker’s time in the past four months.
“I was bored,” he said. “I just talked to people online [tracking down shoes]and he was crazy. That’s all I’ve done. “
Tucker plays in size 14 pairs, but casually wears both size 13 and size 14. The larger sizes allow for a long search when it comes to finding most of the limited edition models.
“I don’t know anyone who buys more shoes on eBay than me,” he joked. “I like eBay because I always manage to find rare gems in my size. I always have up to 40 sneakers in my cart at any given time.”
As he was preparing for the NBA restart in Orlando, Tucker wasn’t sure if he would be able to receive packets during the bubble, so he went “all-in” in case, bringing more than 80 pairs with him could end up be a three month stay if the rockets hit the NBA finals.
“I’m taking the big boy out to Orlando, I won’t lie,” he said as he was packing, with a laugh. “The big 24 [pair] common case. I’m bringing it. I must! Everything must come on the first day. “
Once settled in Orlando, the players realized that there was indeed a protocol for receiving packets. Surprisingly, Tucker’s first delivery was no longer sneakers, but an 85-inch TV for his room at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort.
Now that the reigning footwear champion of the league will not face a month’s break from sneaker shopping, he has returned to debunking eBay listings, sharing with ESPN this handful of elusive models that he can’t quite trace in his years of collecting.
Nike Air Total Foamposite Max – White / Black
Although the then fledgling San Antonio Spurs wore them only for the first two rounds of the 1998 playoffs, Total Foamposite Max has since become known as “The Tim Duncans”.
“That shoe is iconic where I come from,” said Tucker. “This is an east coast [staple]. We wore Foamposites and Nike boots. Foams, that’s what we wore. Winter clothing is essential. “
With an upper in indestructible Foamposite material, the shoe is known for its printed metallic silver color. Tucker had tried to find the black and white edition, which is closest to the couple Duncan actually played in and was last released in 2004.
“It’s the essential hoop shoe that you can kill it off the pitch and kill it on the pitch,” he said. “That shoe is one of the cleanest and spiciest shoes ever made, easily.”
After a year-long hunt, luckily, Tucker ran into a couple a few days after talking to ESPN over the phone. In the end it was the first shoe he wore in Orlando, coming to the bubble in style.
Nike Air Max CW – Black / White / Red
Another of Tucker’s long-lost favorites is Chris Webber’s short-lived lone model with the Swoosh.
“The whole era of Chris Webber with Nike was, for me, the golden age,” said Tucker. “Everyone had their own signed shoe. Chris Webber, Penny [Hardaway] is [Charles] Barkley, it was the best time and my favorite for Nike basketball. Everything was so innovative and nobody’s shoe looked the same. “
Although he has been able to find different colors of the “Air Max Sensation” redesigned by each of the times Nike has relaunched them over the years, Tucker has still been trying to get his hands on the Washington Bullets coloring since 1995, with Webber equally short term no. 2 highlighted along the heel tab. The heel of the only three original variants also includes the Webber “CW” basketball hoop logo.
Nike Vis Zoom Uptempo – Black / White / Royal
While the characteristic models of the 90s era could have been made for NBA hardwood, the team’s shoes wore the NCAA power plant programs are often more remembered by the school than by the player.
“The Duke’s Joints!” Tucker pops out when he names the third couple on his must-have list.
Although Sean Elliott walked tiptoe on the edge of San Antonio in Vis Zoom Uptempo for his “Memorial Day Miracle” shot, and Tim Duncan also wore them in black and white during the 1999 Spurs championship run, he was the black and color-blue faithful coloring of Blue Devils that Tucker remembers most of his time growing up in Raleigh, North Carolina.
“I had a couple in high school and I swept them away,” he laughed. “I’ve looked into these so much.”
Nike Zoom Flightposite 1 TB – Black / White / Red
Tucker’s longing for his favorite college teams at the beginning of the century also led him to an endless search to find the Zip-wrapped Flightposite, another Nike basketball classic, in rare colors.
“When Maryland had them!” He said. “A boy who went to my high school, Chris Wilcox, played in Maryland. The guards, Juan Dixon and Drew Nicholas, and [forward] Terence Morris had them all. That was a classic time. “
The shoe was known above all for its iridescent green and metallic purple colors, with colleges that wore simplified black and white pairs with color accents on the bottom.
“That was my second year high school shoe, and our colors were green and gold, so we had military green Flightposites,” said Tucker. “They were so sick with that uniform.”
Nike Air Max 1 ‘Parra’ Amsterdam F&F
Not everything on Tucker’s list is a basketball sneaker.
In almost all the interviews he has done in recent years, Tucker specifically mentioned a 2005 off-court shoe he wants.
“My # 1 is the friend and family” Parra “of the Netherlands Air Max 1,” he said. “This is my No. 1 shoe. I still can’t find it, I haven’t found it and I still want it.”
Released 15 years ago as a collaboration between Nike and the Dutch artist Parra, the retro running shoe features shades of burgundy, pink and turquoise, colors seen in Parra’s beloved character and works of art inspired by fonts.
Only about 200 couples were originally released – in Paris, Berlin, London and Amsterdam – and were recovering up to $ 5,000 per couple over a decade later. It was said that 11.5 was the largest size, which led Tucker to look for the even rarer edition of “Friends & Family”, a special batch of only 24 couples with Parra’s signature on the tip. This version can work for almost double on the resale market. Two pairs are said to have been made in larger sizes, although Tucker has yet to find one.
“I’ve never seen a 13 in those,” he sighed. “I’ve never heard anyone say he had them and sold them or anything. I’ve never heard of them in my size. Even the best guys I know, nobody has them. Boys who are 13 collectors – nobody has I have to take them.”
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