When it comes to apparel collaborations with sporting good companies, back in the day, such collaborations would be with your more traditional athletes in the field of football, soccer, basketball, golf, and so on. However, these days the term athlete has gotten a lot broader where it now, to a certain extent, covers those who play eSports professionally.
In fact, it seems that Adidas is more than happy to hop on board the eSports bandwagon as the company has recently revealed the sneaker collaboration that they made together with popular Fortnite streamer, Ninja. Dubbed the Ninja Nite Jogger, this pair of sneakers features a mesh and leather upper in a blue finish that is typically associated with the streamer. The sides of the shoes also feature Ninja’s name as well as “Time In”.
Adidas and Ninja first announced their collaboration back in August earlier this year, but it seems that it is only now that the design has been unveiled it full. It is an interesting shift for companies who are starting to pay the world of eSports a lot more attention. Recently, it has also been highlighted how eSports have become so lucrative to the point where even the prize pool has exceeded that of more traditional sporting events.
Adidas is also not alone in trying to appeal to gamers where just recently, Puma unveiled a pair of “gaming socks”, which we’re not sure how exactly it works, but definitely shows the company’s interest in trying to appeal to a market that they might not necessarily have looked at in the past.