The Air Jordan 15 arrived around 2000 at a hundred and fifty dollars, designed by Hatfield after the X-15 rocket plane and the SR-71 Blackbird, with a woven upper and an extended tongue meant to echo the way Jordan stuck his tongue out when he played. It was ambitious and divisive.

It was also the first Jordan Brand model Jordan did not wear on an NBA court, since he had retired again. With no on-court moment to anchor it, the 15 has always been judged on looks alone, and that protruding tongue has kept it near the bottom of most rankings.

The Columbia and Stealth colorways are the ones collectors revisit. The 15 is the line learning, for the first time, how to exist without Michael playing in its shoes, and the growing pains show.