After winning the championship with the Heat in 2012, Dwyane Wade’s announcement shocked the world. Instead of continuing with the Jordan brand, The Flash chose to sign with Li-Ning. At the time, the Chinese brand wasn’t known for basketball shoes, but now, 12 years later, he already has a lifetime deal with the brand. But he hasn’t forgotten about previous shoes which helped them reach this point. Or rather, the fans have a nostalgic memory of one of those sneakers.

A fan of the Heat legend and Way of Wade collector added a story about ‘Li-Ning Way of Wade 4 All-Star (2016).’ Dwyane Wade re-shared it on his story and later added one more story about these kicks. This time with the caption, “Moments ⭐.” Only 100 pairs were available at the time of release, with each pair receiving its unique number inside of the tongue. The official release date was February 12th, 2016, 2 days before the All-Star game.

Since it was only available in limited quantities, the price of the kicks was $250. As per StockX, currently, they have these shoes available for bidding, where the last sale was for $750. That’s how far Dwyane Wade and Li-Ning’s partnership has grown, which was his initial aim as well.

“In the end, the pros outweighed the cons. Jordan might have that cool factor, but I’m at a different point in my career. I want to be involved in building something.” It was his third brand of sneakers, first, he started with Converse and later switched to the Jordan brand in 2009.

Dwyane Wade’s move to Li-Ning wasn’t a popular one

Bleacher Report mocked the move, questioning, “What’s so revolutionary about signing up with the same company Shaq worked with? And not even awesome Shaq, but broken-down, ring-chasing Shaq?” Even the company wasn’t performing at the level it was expected to. In 2013, their stock price dropped by 15% and the first release of the shoe received mixed reaction.

“The brand that allowed me to come in, start my own brand, get into the creative side… start building something than not just be someone who’s endorsing something.” Dwyane Wade once spoke about choosing to start something of his own. A motivation he had looking up to his GOAT Michael Jordan.

Even though the Way of Wade is not as big as the Jordan brand, the 3x NBA champion had more opportunities to showcase his creativity. While also being in control of things, which was not possible with his stint with the Jordan brand. So, a $10 million deal evolved into a lifetime partnership. And now other players are too in association with Li-Ning, thanks to Dwyane Wade.