Nike Kyrie 6 Performance Review
Tight On The Foot, But A Sweet Shoe On The Court!
Lets Start Out With My Favorite Part Of Any Basketball Sneaker!
Rating System is 0 For Awful And 3 For Awesome!
Traction: 3
Lets be honest here, what Kyrie’s really have bad traction? Kyrie’s each year have one of the better traction setups of any of the signature models, of any brand overall. That comes straight from Kyrie, as he is a very shifty, athletic player. One of the key features that Kyrie really started with his shoes is the traction basically running all the way up to the midsole. The 6 is no different and offers a great traction setup. Whether playing on a super nice, clean floor, or a very dusty court the traction performed very well for me and I would rate this as the strongest overall aspect of the shoe. Not that I’m saying the other parts are weak, but this was definitely my favorite part. I literally had zero complaints about the traction. Laterally, vertically, whichever other way you wanna move, these guys have you covered!
Aesthetics: 3
When initial images started to surface of the Kyrie 6, I would say I wasn’t all that interested. I truthfully was not a huge fan of how they looked. I then started seeing more color ways and once they released I actually started warming up to the shoes and liked how they looked. I would truthfully say after actually owning three pairs of this model, it may actually be my favorite looking Kyrie yet. I was a huge fan of the Kyrie 3 and I know some people are not, but I just really liked how they performed overall and the look of the shoe. If you broke down each Kyrie from an aesthetics standpoint from 1-5; I personally don’t think overall any of the models are better looking than the 6. There have always been some pretty sweet collabs and don’t get me wrong there may be a better looking Kyrie than say a normal Kyrie 6, but we haven’t seen all the collabs with this one yet and I would say were still due for something awesome! I mean and truthfully speaking it does mimic the Nike Yeezy a lot which is a shoe loved by many!
Materials: 1
This is one of those areas where you like something, but you had an issue with it. I actually really liked the materials on the “Jet Black’ cw that I tested, and I explained the reason I wanted to test this pair in my initial review video on YouTube was due to having the leather material on the collar instead of a suede, nubuck, or synthetic material. I’ve always liked when you break in a leather upper, or ankle area basketball shoe, because it ends up wrapping, and almost forming to your foot so to speak. This turned out to be the actual worst part of the sneaker for me personally. The area around the nike swoosh actually ripped on me while I was playing. I believe there was a stitching defect possibly around the Nike swoosh to the leather. This happened on the left shoe and I am a left handed, left dominant player. I guess it could have also possibly been from a movement I made as well considering it was the left shoe. The right shoe has held up well and did not rip, but I am going to send them back to Nike which has a great return policy as well as a great warranty program. They normally send you a new pair right back out, so I’m not really to worried about that issue. I also do not want to give the wrong impression about the Kyrie 6 materials. Overall I absolutely love the pairs that have the leather collar area, and would recommend this shoe to anyone, but in this particular instance they ripped, meaning there just isn’t a way I can rate this category very high. Lastly I will say this abut the materials and how strongly I would still recommend the shoe is that if they hadn’t of ripped I definitely would have given them a 3!
The Strap: 1
Straps on basketball sneakers are something over my career that I actually like. I like them when they serve a purpose though, and on the 6 I feel like the strap for me was more to give the shoe a better aesthetic look, which it did in my opinion, but for an overall performance feature it didn’t serve to much of a purpose. Sure, you can pull it really tight and get some use out of the strap, but even trying to pull it super tight I didn’t get the normal feel a strap would give for a super tight performance shoe. Something such as the Kyrie 2 had more of a performance use for its strap. Overall the strap looks cool, and I like a lot of the details they have put on some of the cw’s overall, but as I said if your thinking its gonna tighten your shoe; I don’t think your gonna be to thrilled.
Sizing: 2
For me I always try to go true to size, especially with my basketball sneakers and that is what I did here as well. I will say this model definitely needs some break in time. They are super tight on your foot right out of the box. For me they loosened up rather quickly once playing in them, but it is not a shoe straight out of the box your going to get the maximum effect or feel of the shoe. Once broken in I loved how they felt and played overall, but as I said it did take a little time. Overall I would recommend going true to size.
Cushion: 2
The Kyrie 6 features Nike Air Zoom Turbo Cushioning technology. In my personal opinion Kyrie’s aren’t known to have the greatest cushioning setup or one that features a ton of cushion. Kyrie’s are known to always give a lot more court feel than say a LeBron sneaker. Personally, I do not mind it as I love a mixture of court feel and cushion, and most times I prefer court feel over cushion. I mean Jordan 1s basically have zero cushion or what we will call bare minimum and I actually love playing in them. The Kyrie 6 actually has a decent cushion setup! Its not super plush, but you can definitely feel it and from my experiences in Kyrie’s its probably one of the more comfortable models that I can remember. The cushion is definitely not the zoom strobel board in the KD 12 or anything, which I know is basically contradicting what I said about liking court feel over cushion, but man do I love the cushion in the KD12! Overall if your looking for what I’m going to call a good cushion setup with still a lot of court feel, this setup will be great for you.
Overall: 2
If I was to describe the Kyrie 6 in one word, and one word only it would be Fun! Every time out in these sneakers I had a ton of fun and actually really enjoyed playing in them. I try to always give you guys honest insights, and what I truthfully think personally of the sneakers. I cannot give these guys a perfect score of 3, due to the materials ripping on my left shoe. I know Nike will take care of me on that issue though and the overall fun time I had playing in these sneakers is definitely nothing less than a 2!
Thank You For Checking Out This Review On The Kyrie 6!
Have A Great Week & Happy Hooping!!
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