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- Dec 14, 2006
sthebest wrote:
jumpman cbt2 wrote:
sthebest wrote:
The quality pre 2005 was good, although it wasn't as perfect as many would lead you to believe. Messy paint jobs go back as far as the early 90s (my original Black/ True Red had a somewhat shoddy paint job). 2000 retro VIs had a paint paint crack proble, as well as the VIIIs from 2003. 2000 XIs came pre-yellowed and the Columbias and Concords lacked the blue tint from the OGs. And 1995 XIs had erratic patent leather cuts.
For me the last really good year was 2001. After that Jb started not to divide the look between retro+ And og style retros. The leather used were also ok, but the 2001 XI black/reds Were already less good in quality compared to the Previous XI retros (the smooth leather at the heel is Different and the jumpman jordan lettering is less Accurate than before). The aj 1 black/reds and black/royals were also the last jordan retros with the nike logo in the insoles. So from my point the jordan retros from 2002 to 2008 are the worst in terms of quality. Best retro years were 1994, 1999 and early 2000.
I hear where you're coming from. But the Black/Red and Black/Blue 1s had jumpman on the insoles, not Nike Air (I had both). The last retro to have Nike Air on the insole was Black/Cement III if Im not mistaken. From my experience, the quality started changing for the worse in 2002. The midsole on the IXs had a tendency to crack and chip, the Raptor VIIs looked DRAMATICALLY different from their OG counterpart (different mold altogether and a one tone upper instead of a two toned one), and there started being fewer original colorways coming out (I only remember Black/White IXs, Olive IXs, and Raptor VIIs as the original colorways that came out that year). And in 2003, we finally got White/Cement IIIs with good quality leather and better padding, but the midsole chipped quickly. Also, on the VIIIs, the leather was subpar at best and those too had BAD midsole chipping problems.
I started getting heavier into the brand around summer 2004 after the Olympic VIIs dropped but I've had most of the most desired retros and can say quality was good back then but could have been better.
This is a PM to me from someone has been around for awhile.
I'm using this for information purposes, I hope you don't mind man:
[font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]The decline was gradual. It started before I noticed it I guess.[/font]
I mean, the retros never quit looked like the originals; the 99 4's were lower cut for example. Looking back on it, the 2000 AJ5 retros
had different insoles than the originals, not a quality issue but a change nonetheless. In 2001, the 3's started to get cut shorter & the
AJ1's definately started to look differently. I think the 2001 AJ1's (with jumpman on insole) was a turning point that goes unnoticed.
But all those changes were so small, it wasn't a problem for me.
People complained about the tongues on the 99 4's, especially the wht/blk being way too tall like bunny ears.
I guess I started to agree with people that things were changing when the 2003 w/c 3's came out with no f*ckin nike air and
a pebbled tongue which was all new for AJ3s. Ya the 01 TB3 was an og colorway and got the 1st ogcw -> jumpman treatment but it wasn't known
that it would be a long term change until the 03 wc. Oh word? It was becoming harder for me to brush off criticisms as sour grapes.
But when the 04 AJ2 retro dropped, with the red piping which was absent on the ogs and 95s and the silloutte looking shrunken like
a toy replica - I started to not like what I was seeing. (Even though I did buy them.)
So end of 03/beginning of 04 is when the changes added up to me as a negative trend or decline. 04 is when they changed the open-cell
p.urethan midsoles to what we have now - the ones that won't crack but can't hold paint and can be noticabley uncomfortable.
I see some say a decline pt. of 2005 (and there were scattered decent ones then) - but I say a year or two before that. The 2003 wc 3
might be the last JB retro that was still holding on to some type of resemblence in quality to the ogs.
And ya know, 10 years+ ago when all these little changes started, we couldn't stare at online pics from 100 different sources all day long to even realize everything like one can now. I'll admit right now I didn't realize the TB3 was an og colorway until shortly after the retro in 2001.
Never saw or remembered it from 88 though I had the og w/c 3s! If you didn't have the og and the retro in front of you back then, it was harder to
trend the difference.