Jordan Brand Developed Black Mamba Ad Years Before the Snake Was Associated with Kobe Bryant

Michael Jordan was almost the Black Mamba. According to a fascinating new story on ESPN.com by Baxter Holmes, Jordan Brand developed a shoe and ad campaign inspired by the venomous snake in 2003, years before it was the nickname that Kobe Bryant gave himself.

The Jordan 19s had no laces and the front of the sneakers were topped with a techflex design. It reminded people of a snake and sent one Nike executive in charge of marketing to basically Google “the most badass black snake there is.”

Jordan Brand then created an ad campaign and pitched it to Jordan after he retired from the Wizards. Jordan seemed to like it, but eventually revealed that he didn’t like snakes, a secret he had kept close to the vest during his career. Print ads ran with the black snake and the Black Mamba is still mentioned on the shoe’s official webpage.

Instead of the idea being passed on to Bryant by Nike, it seems that he came up with it on his own after watching Kill Bill Vol. 2, which was released in 2004. The snake was first mentioned in an ESPN profile in ’05 and he then appeared on the cover of SLAM with a snake in ’06.

Twenty years later and the snake is synonymous with Bryant.

But as with most things, Jordan did it first.

More NBA on Sports Illustrated