It was 1993 and Michael was going through a difficult time in his life. In August of that year his father had been found murdered. Shortly following this news he decided to retire from basketball and try his hand at baseball. While the NBA was filled with talent, things definitely weren’t the same without the greatest of all time. Well, the marketing geniuses at Nike didn’t let this stop them. They took the rather bleak news and turned it into a pretty funny and clever marketing campaign by insinuating that Michael Jordan had come out of retirement and was playing under the name Johnny Kilroy. We know the outcome of the story but aside from this being just another limited edition shoe paying homage to a memorable ad campaign the Jordan IX Kilroy also signifies (IMO) the turmoil going on at the time for Mike, how much the fans didn’t want to see him go and how sometimes even the strongest of us need time away when life gets crazy. Check out the original commercial below and the Kilroys above!