On or off-court these are solid, but are they great??
What's up, everyone?? AirJayP is back again with another performance review and today we are going to talk about a pretty hyped pair of sneakers for hoopers and collectors alike. Let's go ahead and get straight into these and see how they worked for me on court!
Traction: 3
If I had to give these one word from a traction standpoint it would probably be disappointing. I had very high hopes for the traction setup on these, and it just wasn't there with my pair. The cw I tested which was the "Mirage V2" featured a translucent outsole with a herringbone pattern. I think most of my issues lie within the translucent outsole. I am not one that always has problems with translucent outsoles and sometimes I will even like them better than a solid rubber compound, but this one just didn't grip or keep me from sliding as I'd like. I do feel there would be a better experience with this sneaker featuring a solid rubber outsole as some of the other cw's do. It may be something I look into later down the road, but to sum up these, I had some issues picking up dust, sliding laterally and vertically, and just didn't get much grip whether the floor was dirty or clean. As much as I wanted to like these from a traction standpoint it just wasn't there for me.
Fit: 5
I had no issues with the sizing on this shoe and I went true to size. I had no negative space and since I had such a great fit, it didn't affect my experience in the shoe negatively. If you followed along with my reviews for a while, you will know I normally go down half in all my hoop shoes. With these, I felt great true to size and that's what I would recommend. If you are buying these strictly for casual wear, you may want to go up half a size as some may think they will fit a little snug.
Cushion: 4
I actually think probably the strongest point of the actual sneaker was the cushion setup. Nothing too crazy with the actual setup, but it just feels really well to me on foot. The sneaker features a top-loaded Zoom Air unit in the heel and a full-length foam midsole. On foot, the sneaker feels fairly plush and almost feels more like a casual shoe from a cushion standpoint. On the court, I did get a decent amount of court feel, and also some decent responsiveness out of the setup. Once again it was nothing overpowering or just to hit home about, but I do think this setup worked for this sneaker, and once again it was probably my favorite features of the sneaker. I could see myself wearing these as much casually or to work out in the gym as much as I could hoop in them.
Lockdown: 3
The lockdown setup was once again a little lackluster for me. It was not the worst thing I had ever played in, but it also just didn't give me my favorite locked-in feel either. The sneaker features a top-loaded mid-foot plastic shank as well as a plastic sidewall cage to help with stability. I did feel pretty stable within the shoe, but I didn't actually feel very locked in. I mentioned earlier that I had a great fit and that was very true, but I did feel like there was some movement within the shoe that was due to just the actual lockdown of the shoe. Remember all those times that I said when the fit, traction, and lockdown all work well a lot of times it is because they are all working well together? With these, that just was not happening for me. With the traction not working well, and yet having such a good fit.. I still felt the traction woes gave the lockdown aspect some letdowns as well. Once getting the sneaker on and laced up to my liking I felt like it would be fairly easy to still get the sneaker off had I wanted to. On one occasion I drove to the basket, got stepped on the wrong way and the sneaker actually did come off. For me guys, I don't know.. I want to give you some positivity here, but these just weren't it for me from a lockdown standpoint.
Materials: 4
I really had no issues with the materials, and thought they did a great job with making the sneaker have a more premium look and feel on foot. The upper is a soft nubuck. The materials on the sneaker feel soft to the touch and feel nice on foot as well. The materials were breathable, but I did notice if the gym was really hot there could be some sweat spots that bleed through in some areas. The tongue is nicely padded and also is a nice touch that feels great on foot. The ankle and collar area feels padded and very nice as well. The materials for me were a nice touch and one I really had no complaints about.
Overall: 3
I had absolutely nothing but high hopes and expectations for these. Maybe I set the bar a little too high because I just didn't get out of them what I hoped for. Is it a sneaker that I could hoop in and make work? Sure, but in this day and age, there are so many great ones out there It is number one hard to settle, and number two when you are playing in a lot of different sneakers all the time you can really tell the difference in all these models. Personally, I liked these more as an off-court shoe really from the start than I did as an on-court model. I do like the aspect they went with, on how they are geared to be both as is. That was a nice touch, but I do think there is a lot of room to grow here and I do think that will happen. I'm still intrigued at some point to try a pair with a solid rubber outsole and see how they perform compared to these! Either way though, there will be some who love these and some not like them as much. That is ok, as that is the beauty of not only basketball sneakers but sneakers in general!
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