Can't wait!!! Nike stores are going to blow up worldwide http://www.badzine.net/news/nike-enters-badminton-with-a-bang/13874/
Wow great find! This is fantastic news for badminton in the west =). I'm glad that one of the biggest brand names is finally moving into the badminton and helping to support the sport with more financial incentive. Their point about badminton players earning much less than tennis players for the same effort is one of the biggest disparities between the two sports' popularity world wide for pro players. Perhaps Nike's debut in badminton sponsors will lead the path for other big names to follow suit as well, because well come on, they're Nike. So what's everyone's picks in the top 10 who took the Nike sponsorship? You can probably rule out all Chinese players because that'd be an offense to their national pride. They didn't exactly state which area of badminton they took the top 10 of, but I'm sure it'll be great. "We have already started working on some projects even if we can’t reveal all our strategy,” said the U.S. Manager, “but we have already managed to organize an exhibition, where one the best shuttlers in the world will play a game with Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods and John Mc Enroe. This will be a world’s first and everyone is looking forward to it. It will be broadcast live all around the world from New York’s Madison Square Garden" This is simply going to be amazing. Minus Tiger Woods, this is going to be some serious publicity, especially from the tennis community with Johnny Mac attending. It'll be great to see what he will think of badminton after this exhibition! Edit: Upon more careful consideration I seriously hope this isn't an April Fool's joke because it's on March 31. If it is, Nike has evil and terrible taste =(. Actually it would be Badzine's. If it's already April 1st where they are then I guess that's that.
Errr... I think it's April Fool's Joke though. Nike made some lukewarm efforts in research the Californian market years ago and they haven't come up with anything substantial yet.
well, while the article is an April Fool's article. the reality is actually not a joke. couple of years ago, i was given a pair of prototype Nike badminton shoes to test. it was Nike attempt into creating shoes for badminton. unfortunately, it was really just rather so-so. so it is still plausible that they are going into badminton. but not the way the article suggests.
i wouldnt be surprised if they started making badminton shoes... i mean they already make top notch tennis shoes lol (nice shoes in general) but badminton rackets....thats a different story
If Nike would get some athletes to endorse, it would be some european players and Malaysia's Lee Chong Wei. Who is an "unofficial" endorser of Nike off-court.
With Nike being a western based company, the odds of them entering badminton are low. The only reason that sporting companies sponsor athletes is to sell more of their product. As most of the badminton products are sold in the east and since Nike really is not strong there (unless it's fake), malaysia, indonesia, korea, china, japan... etc. there is almost no incentive to do so. If Nike was going to start making rackets it would not be badminton rackets, they would start with Tennis for sure.
Nike produced 2 models of shoes. One was a proto-type that was floating around in California, and one model was released and never seemed to gain any popularity. Nike was working with a California badminton club and another club in Washington to develop badminton products but ceased development shortly before the 08 Olympics. They were going to debut their products at the Beijing games but decided not to enter the market. They had done extensive research, but for some reason they got scrapped before going into production.
thanks for putting my hopes up :'(.. Haha it was well written... until I scrolled down and saw April Fools!
Same. I'm so glad that I actually read it...I was about to send the link to my friends from my high school's badminton team through Facebook. Haha.
