1997 Pete Sampras Multi-Match Worn Air Jordan Prototype (1/1) Sneakers Designed & Gifted to Him by Tinker Hatfield....

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1997 Pete Sampras Multi-Match Worn Air Jordan Prototype (1/1) Sneakers Designed & Gifted to Him by Tinker Hatfield. Nike designer extraordinaire, Tinker Hatfield, is best known for authoring the Air Jordan III through XV, which helped Michael Jordan become the most dominant basketball player of the 1990's. However, he also impacted tennis in the 1990's, by outfitting the decade's most dominant tennis player, as well.

Sneaker News tells it best:

"Tinker Hatfield designed the Oscillate for Sampras without Sampras ever wearing the shoe. Instead, he got the feedback he needed from tennis athletes who wear-tested the shoe, and Sampras, who wasn't open to switching what he had worn for years, was 'tricked' into wearing the sneakers when Tinker proposed a pick-up game of basketball. Little did Sampras know that these 'basketball' shoes were actually tennis shoes made just for him, and he liked them so much that he made the switch at the 1996 Australian Open, winning it all in the process.

In addition to the 1996 original release, Nike made a special 'Jordan' edition of the shoe as a 1-of-1 gift to Pete for his 26th birthday. He wore the Jordan Oscillate PE at the '97 US Open and throughout the entire season that year."

Presented here is Pete's birthday gift from Tinker. The Nike Air Oscillates in the Jordan Bred colorway are special in several ways.

First off, and most notably, the size tag is clearly a sample tag. It is such an early sample in fact, that the Nike item code, along with other parameters, are both handwritten (possibly even by Tinker Hatfield himself) and typed. Furthermore, the handwritten code actually corresponds the black/blue/white colorway of the retail Oscillates, because Nike had yet to create a code for the black/red colorway of these prototypes! Additionally, the pair was also sized at 10.25, Sampras' exact size, but 10.5 was printed on the tags because the machines which stamp the tags were not calibrated to print quarter sizes, only half sizes.

Second, the pair also features "Air" in red embroidery on the heels and white leather on the tongues, which further differentiates them from the retail editions which featured white embroidery on the heels and all-black tongues.

Third, these exemplars exhibit incredible multi-match wear by the greatest tennis player in the world at that time, which includes extensive sock pilling, creasing in the leather uppers, and white line paint residue on the outersoles.

Sampras can be seen wearing this style numerous times during 1997, including at 1997 ATP Tour Finals when he finished first (see Getty Images 1921989), 1997 Compaq Grand Slam Cup when he finished first (see Getty Images 1920075), 1997 U.S. Open (see Getty Images 51650718), 1997 Paris Open (see Getty Images 1634790), 1997 ATP World Cup (see Getty Images 1213023705), and 1997 Davis Cup (see Getty Images 1127678130).

The dominant male singles player of the 1990's, Pete Sampras incredible resume includes sixty-four singles titles, fourteen Grand Slam single titles, and six consecutive year-end number one rankings. LOA from Heritage Auctions.