The Best Nike SB Sneakers That Aren't Dunks

Image via Complex Original

The Blazer was one of Nike’s first basketball sneakers, releasing just a year after the brand’s inception in 1973. The most notable version of the shoe is its design from 1977, complete with a fat belly Swoosh and suede patches on the upper for a reinforced look. The sneaker was also a favorite amongst skaters, worn by the likes of Gino Iannucci in 1996’s 101: Trilogy skate video. It saw a streetwear interest in the early 2000s thanks to collaborations with Zoo York, Futura, and Stussy, but received its first SB version in 2005 with a black and brown pair. Supreme later collaborated on the shoe in 2006, with three versions (white, black, red) that took their inspiration from Gucci and high fashion handbags with quilted leather. Kanye West wore them, and the rest is history. Supreme would also work on a low-top version of the Blazer in 2016. Other notable SB Blazers include the Milk Crate, Todd Jordan, Lance Mountain, Mission, and Lebanon colorways.

If there was any other shoe to launch Nike SB off of instead of the Dunk, it would have been the Air Jordan 1. Skaters wore these in the 1980s, most infamously by Powell Peralta’s Bones Brigade, after the shoes went on sale. They would mismatch pairs and paint them different colors so they’d last longer. All of these worlds collided in 2014 with a collaboration with legendary skateboard artist Craig Stecyk. Lance Mountain, a Nike SB skater and an integral part of the Bones Brigade, received his own mismatched Air Jordan 1s that told the story of the sneaker’s history in skateboarding. The past year has seen the Air Jordan 1 SB get turned into a low, which received a collaboration with Eric Koston. 

The Nike Bruin is a true connoisseur’s pick when it comes to favorite Nike sneakers. It’s the brand’s first low-top basketball sneaker, first releasing in 1972. It’s the other sneaker from Back to the Future that’s not the Nike Mag. It’s also been turned into a skate shoe, thanks to Nike SB. The first to collaborate on the shoe, as it is with many sneakers in the SB range, was Supreme on a 2009 collection that included four different colorways with the brand’s “World Famous” logo on the heels. The sneaker would then move into the mainline and have several iterations. Among those are Hyperfeel, Zoom, and a recent collaboration with original SB rider Gino Iannucci’s Poets brand, that featured a green sunset Swoosh on a black upper.

Paul Rodriguez wasn’t part of the original batch of SB skaters that helped launch the brand in 2002—Danny Supa, Reese Forbes, Gino Iannucci, and Richard Mulder—but he was the first to receive his own signature from the line. The Nike Zoom Air Paul Rodriguez 1, typically referred to as the P-Rod 1, was a first for Nike SB. Not only did it launch Rodriguez’s line, but it was also the first non-Air Jordan sneaker to feature a Jumpman logo on it, with the “J-Rod” that released in 2005. One of the most coveted versions of the shoe is the collaboration with graffiti artist Futura. There was also a project with Stash and two pairs that represented Rodriguez’s Mexican heritage.

The SB Classic is an important shoe in the history of Nike SB—not the sneaker itself, but what it means to the line. The SB Classic is based off the Nike Tennis Classic, and it’s a shoe that inspired one of the original team skaters, Rich Mulder, as he obsessed over a white and light blue pair that he owned in the ‘90s and based his first Dunk off the shoe. The sneaker launched in 2005 and saw a short run. Notable pairs were the Jeremy Fish collaboration, which was taken off shelves because, allegedly, the artist wasn’t happy with the shoe, and the version for Dan Murphy version, a skater from New Hampshire who put his dog on the heel. Oscar the Grouch also got a pair. Supreme also did a collaboration on a modified version of the shoe and Val Kilmer owned the tennis ball pair.

The majority of the shoes on this list are skate-updated versions of archival Nike models. That’s the DNA of Nike. But a Nike skateboarding line wouldn’t be a Nike skateboarding line if it didn’t infuse the latest and greatest technology, and the Nike Zoom Tre did just that. It had Zoom Air in the heel like other SB sneakers, but it also had a mesh-like rubber upper, similar to that of the Nike Zoom Kobe 3. There were other tech-focused sneakers from Nike SB before (the E-Cue and URL come to mind) but both fell flat. This sneaker launched in 2006 and had a short run, but its most memorable contribution to Nike SB was bringing classic colorways to the line, such as the “Neon” Air Max 95, Safari, and the most coveted of them all, the Nike Mag color scheme. Skateboarding itself was falling out of love with teach-heavy shoes, so the sneaker was a hard sell at the time.

Depending on who you ask, this might be the most important Nike SB sneaker. First released in 2009, Stefan Janoski’s first signature model with Nike SB came after the line’s first wave of cultural impact, but it resonated nonetheless. It played off the interest in boat shoes at the time and looked unlike anything else the brand had put out at that point. And it’s still going. The sneaker never saw the hype collaborations as other SB models, although there was a pair with Michael Lau and a floral-print design that was popular, but the sneakers resonated with skaters and the Zumiez shopper.

Typically, soccer shoes aren’t the coolest thing to wear in the streets. Nike was able to flip that notion with the Zoom FC, a football-inspired skate shoe. It’s one of the earlier non-Dunk SBs in the line, as it launched in 2003, and remains a sleeper favorite to this day. Popular pairs of the shoe include an Aloha-print version for Nike’s Doernbecher collection, as well as a collaboration with Futura for Lance Armstrong’s LiveStrong foundation, as well as pairs made for FC Barcelona and the Brazilian National Team. Longstanding and influential skate brand Alien Workshop also had its own collaboration on the shoe.

One of the most controversial moments in Nike SB’s near-20-year history wasn’t the line existing, but signing Eric Koston—arguably the greatest skater of his generation—to a deal in 2009. Koston, who had previously skated for eS and Lakai, was viewed as leaving his friends and the core skate community by signing to Nike. But Koston has always been into Nike sneakers and basketball, so the move was a dream come true for him. His first model with the brand, aside from two Dunks, included a collaboration with Kobe Bryant, fusing the Koston 1 and the Kobe 6. There was a general release pair, but the limited edition set, which included the “islands” or snake-inspired print from the Kobe sneaker and was limited to 24 pairs. 

The Nike Air Trainer plays a special part in not only Nike SB’s history, but also Nike’s lineage. It was the first all-purpose sneaker, championed by John McEnroe in 1987 and designed by Tinker Hatfield. The sneaker was also a prototype used by Nike under its Savier brand, a precursor to Nike SB that functioned as a shadow company for the brand. Nike SB released the Air Trainer in 2003 in a “Paul Brown” colorway. It would then make waves in 2005 with a collaboration with streetwear brand and then-sneaker boutique Huf on a pair of San Francisco-inspired “Gold Digger” Air Trainers. There was also a popular “Bamboo” colorway. The sneaker then was shelved for quite some time and re-released in 2019 for a collaboration with Polar Skate Co.

The Nike Air Trainer 2 was a collector’s dream come true. The sneaker was launched in the SB line in 2008 in four different colorways via a collaboration with Supreme, but it was longtime footwear connoisseur and hunter Tommy Rebel (you might know him as the high-pitched guy living in his mom’s basement in the seminal footwear documentary Just For Kicks) who made the sneaker happen, due to his love for the original model. The Air Trainer 2 TW SB would see other colors release, such as a “Royal” Air Jordan -inspired pair, but none matched the fervor of the Supreme collaboration.

The Delta Force ¾ SB is the most under-the-radar of Supreme’s early Nike SB work, but it’s a fan favorite to a small crowd. The collaboration would release in 2004 in three tonal colorways, and there would be non-¾ versions to release in Nike SB’s mainline as well. The Delta Force has cred in the streets, being a favorite of the likes of Jadakiss and being worn by Salt-n-Pepa back in the day. Nike SB later turned it into a vulcanized sole skate, too.

The Air Force 2 isn’t the Air Force 1, but it’s still a good sneaker. The shoe first released in 1986 and saw popular reissues through collaborations in the early 2000s, such as artist Espo’s see-through pair in 2003 and a pair called “The Dirty” that came in old school Atlanta Hawks colorways and represented the South. The sneaker relaunched in 2017 through, once again, Supreme, and was debuted by Eric Koston. Even though he was already a Nike SB team rider, the cosign meant everything. The sneaker later found its way into Nike SB’s mainline.

The Nike Court Challenge was another sneaker made famous by John McEnroe in the 1980s and once again brought back by Nike SB, this time in 2012. The sneaker was launched thanks to original team rider Gino Iannucci and featured updated tech like a Lunarlon sole. It’s tough to beat the classic Nike design language a cosign from a legend.

The P Rod 2 was a solid follow up to the P Rod 1, but the best version of the shoe wasn’t even made for skating. It was something new all together. The Free Rod was a P Rod 2 with a Nike Free sole, but one that more so resembled the Zoom Moire. The Quickstrike pair came in a multicolor upper and is one of the brightest and oddest Nike SB releases ever. Nike also released a more straightforward version of the Free Rod in the “Takashi” colorway in collaboration with Active, but it didn’t generate the same feeling.