a lot of people ask me this question all the time how do I determine if my shoes
are wearable or not well I'm telling you right now if your shoe looks like this
and it's talking in the back like that that's how you know you can't wear these
things no more today I'm gonna be dropping dimes on how to prevent these
things from happening and what you should do in the future and what shoes
you should purchase understanding what they're made out of so you know why
these things happen welcome back to the channel what's up with you guys how you
doing how you been if you did not know by now my name is DJ and this is the DNA
show you haven't already go ahead and hit that subscribe button join the
family man drop a comment down below and let me know that you are new to the
family so I can give you a warm welcome drop a like on the video because
obviously that helps the algorithm oh so much we want to get more content out to
the family and obviously the extended family that haven't seen the videos yet
so I think it's time that we break down how this stuff happens why it happens
what shoes that happens to the most and what you should look for when you're
going to purchase the shoe sell a shoe store a shoe all these different things
all these different questions I want to answer them for you guys today this is
an original Air Jordan 2 in bruh every single time I touch them they begin to
crumble and as I open the shoe up and show people and tell stories about the
shoe different things like that the upper pristine the problem is the
foam on the midsole and that is what begins to deteriorate over time so the
first question is what is the most durable shoe when it comes to the Air
Jordans and having these things in the long haul and different things like that
so what I think is the most durable shoe over the time and that's why it holds
its value over the years and continues to gain value when it comes to the newer
retros and different things like that is going to be the leather and because
there is no foam on the midsole and you have a rubber midsole and outsole in
each stitch directly to that it doesn't have any reason to crumble or anything
like that 9 times out of 10 you're gonna see heel drag on the shoe and that
starts to deteriorate over wear over time before you see the shoes start to
separate and fall apart or anything like that you know I can't even pull this
thing apart right now but if I were to tug on those with that fall like that
I can't push my finger into it and my finger go through the foam or anything
like that so that brings it to the next topic when I say push my finger through
the foam a lot of people are like confused about that right what's a huge
thing so I want to take it back to the early 2000s air right you got your fours
you got your fives you got your Elevens you got your threes you got all these
different classics iconic color ways that people only covet yet they start to
fall apart they start to deteriorate whatever you like to call it the shoe is
20 years old let's just think about that for a second the materials the glue all
that different stuff is twenty years old now this shoe was purchased and at the
time it was worn you can see from time what it has done to the plastic so here
on the back tab it has fallen off as broken is dried out you can see that
it's starting to get ashy and it's starting to crack right here and crumble
and the leather is nice we understand that we know the leather is always gonna
be nice that's gonna be legit but the two things that a lot of people have
problems with when it comes to these shoes like the Air Jordan for the Air
Jordan 3 the Air Jordan 6 they have the plastic tab on the back and when that
plastic tab gets old it starts to crack it starts to break similar to people
struggles with the DMP 6 and that was from around 2006 right so for this one
we have a rare example of the back tab breaking yet the midsole is not falling
apart or crumbling now these right here I had repainted I want to say close to
10 years ago you can see there's a lot of tread off of this shoe but because I
wore the shoe and I kept that foam compact and I didn't allow it to stay
brand-new and deadstock for this many years and decide to wear the shoe later
that's what allowed me to keep the shoe together and not falling apart and
that's where it comes another big struggle with people they want to have
deadstock sneakers yet at the same time they want them to be wearable years
later and that's rare to find when it comes to certain shoes so here for
example I'm gonna show you two different shoes released on the same day but
treated completely different over the past 20 years and that's gonna be the
infrared 6 now this right here is a dead stock version of the shoe this is one of
my favorite shoes and I always said I'm gonna keep a dead stock version but what
when I bought this shoe back in high school was I made sure that I put the
shoe on every couple years every year whatever maybe and literally just walk
around in my bedroom and keep that foam intact because I never wanted them to
fall apart and crumble and what I did with this parent that will rocked and I
mean beat up over time as they got beat up they started to fall apart the
midsole started to crumble that also started to come off as you can see
they've been worn heavily you can see here on the back of the heel all these
different things literally the same shoe but two different outcomes so this one
was stocked worn a couple times around the house literally like not even worn
just put on walk back and forth walk back and forth tied back up put back in
the stash as these got beat up and I mean thrashed that's when the foam
starts to fall apart because a lot of people rock their OGIS until they crack
until they crumble so you have two different strategies when it comes to
this now if I were to take the other method of not doing that to the shoe
when I press right here on the midsole normally what happens is if I push on
this phone right here with my thumb and pull I'm applying a lot of pressure
right now if I apply a lot of pressure the thumb will literally go right
through the phone and you block bro these were dead stock all this time and
it just stuck my thumb through that midsole and you're like devastated right
because you try to keep this shoe dead stock over the years so another way to
test that method is always pressing on the foam start gently and then apply
more pressure as you go filling on there just to determine hey is this still
intact and a lot of areas right here where the foam is very thin it begins to
crack right here as well close to the toe and then made part of the foot this
pair right here I had these for a very long time they came out in what 1999 so
it's obviously been over 20 years since this shoe released and as you can see
right here it started to crack on me I put these on and wore them around the
house and they began to crack so that's when I knew immediately like there's no
more I can't do that anymore often when you buy a 20 year old sneaker and you
weren't the owner for the past 20 years and didn't treat it correctly and
properly story and all those different things speaking of that I have a video
on how to properly store your sneakers so click on the link above for that for
more information on that topic but if you didn't properly do that over the
past 20 years you bought the shoe five years ago and
yes you get it properly but you don't know what happened the first 15 years of
owning that shoe right what people do they buy OG shoes off the stock tanks
and different things like that but you don't know because you didn't touch that
shoe and when it comes to body old sneakers I always recommend purchasing
old sneakers in person because that way you can do it and understand like hey is
this shoe actually wearable is it in the condition that I want it to be how is it
stored give me the backstory different things like that which brings to the
next topic when you're buying shoes from people in person and they are og when
you want to stick your thumb so that midsole if you do that you're gonna end
up having to buy the shoe from the person because you just ruined it in
front of their face so what I would always recommend is have them do it have
them present that the midsole is still intact in front of your face and not you
stick your thumb through their midsole because then they're gonna be pissed off
they're gonna want you to purchase the shoe and you're gonna be like hold up
you just I don't want to buy it now because it's now it's burnt out like I
just stuck my finger through it and clearly they're not worried but to make
sure that the seller is showing improving that the shoe is still
wearable so you don't have to worry about going through those struggles or
getting home and immediately the shoe crumbling or anything like that so from
those shoes they have a very similar midsole while we're talking about the
Air Jordan 2 through 8 right so with that you have the same foam type
material when it comes to the midsole now let's take it to a different shoe
that doesn't have that foam type midsole but still has a problem with separating
and that's the Air Jordan 11 now this is a very sticky subject because a lot of
people have different experiences when it comes to the shoe and I've personally
gone through the same exact experiences as well I have four different Jordan 11
here that I want to show you guys so let's go ahead and break down the
differences in understanding why they separated in certain places and why they
held together in certain places and different things like that so starting
with the first of all we have an original Air Jordan 11 bread 11 right
here and what I'm talking about in tact these things are intact that's because
they have been worn over the years they have been stored right I bought them
from the proper collector the first thing that a lot of people have is
separation here on the toe and when I say separation here on the toe I'm gonna
show you a shoe that's a little bit younger or not as old whatever you like
to call it but that's the Jordan 11 I eat and as you can see right here
there's separation in the toe now this shoe is still wearable I actually wear
this shoes still because it is so damn comfortable I don't even care if my toe
is talking to love of it another thing on separation is here on the outsole you
can see it right here you see where it's separating right there now the shoe is
technically still wearable because it's connected at the front and the back a
little wobbly in the mid foot right here and a lot of people always have the
disconnect right here when it comes to the carbon fiber and the outsole
connecting in this area where they glued it down and that's just simply time the
glue falling deteriorating you know not built to last forever and that brings
another question when people ask about yellowing and their opinions about that
drop comments down below about your opinion about yellowing me personally I
think it brings character to the shoe it shows its age it shows his history when
it comes to the sneaker some people hate it some people love it I'm personally a
fan of it because it's able for me to determine the different areas of a shoe
when I see somebody rocking it down the street
okay so now I want to speed it up we're talking about a lot of shoes that came
out closer to 20 years ago I want to ramp it up just a little bit
more for you guys and help understand different things that made it came out
maybe 10 or 15 years ago so that way you have a better understanding for
something like this now the black laser for as you can see on the midsole right
here they are starting to crack the paint is
cracking but the midsole is not cracking so what that means is the paint that
they put over the layer of foam over time as you wear the shoe it causes the
paint to chip off over time that does not mean that the shoe is not wearable
also another thing to notice is my air bubbles you see that
our foggy that's simply from time these are two things that you can fix you can
go and repaint some insoles you can do different things to give
fogging out of the air bubbles speaking of that check out the link above for how
to defog the air bubbles on your Jordans this right here it's still wearable it's
perfectly fine the things that you really want to worry about is separation
disconnections things like that as you can see it's disconnecting already and
from here it's already coming off so I fear for me is like if I lose this piece
while I'm rocking it and I don't even realize it I'm never gonna get it back
and it's gonna be a dope accident to the shoe so does that mean the shoe is not
wearable or does that mean the shoe is still wearable drop a comment down below
me personally I'm still rocking them but I do have fear of someday potentially
losing these little Jordans haves that are connected to the front finally I
want to give you guys the noir look at a noir Jordan right here that recently
came out and just show you guys the detailed look of it just saw hey this is
how it's all put together this is how it looks when it's a one and as you can see
the difference between you know obviously new release compared to older
releases and just kind of understanding like hey this potentially may look like
those 1020 years from now so keep that in mind when you're purchasing certain
shoes you when you know you have a foam like this on the midsole or something
like that understand that hey over time nine times out of ten they're probably
going to end up happening to me as well so if you're a new collector and you're
personally thinking about hey I want to have this shoe on my collection for the
next 20 years think about that consider that on those
shoes that you purchased because at the end of the day they are worth money and
if you do plan on getting money out of them later or whatever it is that you
have for your strategy on what you want to do with your collection and the value
of it and all those different things take those things into consideration and
that's why I think a lot of people are also rocking with the Air Jordan ones
right now because their tanks they don't fall apart they're classic the colorways
are dope and you don't have any problems when it comes to all these different
models with the different materials that are made from the midsole
so I hope you guys enjoyed this video I hope this was helpful there's three
things that I really want you guys to take away from this video and that is
how stable is the foam on the midsole how is the glue looking is it intact
are there any separations or defects when it comes to that
area and number three what is the condition of the overall shoe what is
the future of that shoe and how do you see the potential of it lasting for a
long time if the shoe is already 20 years old and you plan on keeping it for
another 20 years do you think that foam is gonna stay intact or is it wiser to
buy a different shoe that has a longer lifespan like the Air Jordan one when
you notice when you see a lot of Air Jordans that are oh geez you always see
the Air Jordan one first because that one's still intact
it's still holding up after 30-something years a lot of people when they pull out
original Air Jordan twos threes fours fives or 60s when you look at those what
do you see separated missiles separated out so is crumbled everything falling
apart even when it comes to the early 2000 era because at the end of the day I
want you guys to be able to make wise investments and I understand that hey
these shoes do have value they are gonna be worth something over time they're
gonna be worth something later in life because one thing about sneakers is you
always have to spend money to have all this stuff and you don't get everything
for free and it's just simply a fact like everybody that has all these crazy
collections they didn't spent a lot of money to have these crazy collections so
take that into account don't worry about what everybody else got but understand
like hey they didn't spend a lot of money too and I'm sure they're thinking
about the same thing making wise decisions on the sneakers that they
purchase because they have to move smart because 20 years from now if you need to
sell your stuff breath I want you to get your money not everything crumble and
you just lost ten thousand dollars because you didn't wasted all this money
on shoes is falling apart so make sure you buy the right stuff that's all I'm
saying be conscious of everything the reason
why I'm talking about this topic and so passionate about it is because I used to
have an insane amount of original first retro second retro all these og type
shoes first box face box you know back in the 90s shoes order to me I didn't
had all that stuff and the reason why I sold all that stuff is because what it
starts to fall apart over time and it was wise for me to get out of that
specific game knowing that I just was gonna lose a lot of money if I kept it
so I kept select pieces that I really really loved shoes that meant a lot more
to me than every having every single og so that's just kind of my my
interpretation of all this oh geez shoes and all those different
things but again if you want to have a og collection by any means go do it
these are just some ways to understand like hey how can I determine what the
condition is gonna be like and how do I know that this shoe is wearable or not
and if it's work me actually bind so with that being said I know I said
enough today I hope you guys are still here at the end of the video if you made
it to all the way to the end of the video breath I love y'all life is short
breath enjoy every single moment of it tell your family you love them tell your
homies that you love them tell all your peoples don't hold no grudges breath
just enjoy life enjoy all these shoes enjoy these sneakers and draw all that
stuff but man enjoy life and draw the people around you I gotta go I'm sorry
y'all know me I got a heavy heart right now everything has been tough for me
this week I'm trying to get this video I'm trying
to be straight and just do the best that I can right now so bless up man I'm
gonna see you guys in another video my name is DJ I'm signing out I'm gone
peace
you