In February 2023, A’ja Wilson received a surprise message from someone she’s spoken with thousands of times before. It was then that Wilson’s coach at South Carolina, Dawn Staley, informed her that she would be a Nike signature athlete. She would have a collection and a signature sneaker.
While Wilson was still playing at South Carolina, Staley told the 6-foot-4 forward that Wilson would one day have her own shoe. As a child, Wilson said she always dreamed of having one. But it wasn’t until the Las Vegas Aces star won her second WNBA MVP in 2022 that she said she thought it could become a reality. Staley had long believed in her, however, which is why she gladly played the role of the messenger.
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“That was truly a special moment that she could share that to me,” Wilson said.
It was fitting that Staley did so, not only because of her ties to Wilson, but because in the late 1990s, Staley had a signature Nike sneaker of her own.
The Nike Zoom S5 was short-lived, but it made Staley one of the just over-a-dozen current or former WNBA players ever to have had a signature sneaker. That’s the rare company Wilson is joining, with Nike announcing on Saturday, ahead of the Aces preseason game on South Carolina’s campus — where Wilson already has a statue in her honor — that she would become the brand’s latest signature athlete.
The answer to the question 💅🤭 pic.twitter.com/WgXSDMmbwE
— A'ja Wilson (@_ajawilson22) May 11, 2024
“It really is an honor,” Wilson said. “I’m super excited, and then to be able to showcase this on the stomping grounds that literally has watched me grow up is truly gonna be something special.”
When Wilson’s collection releases in 2025, she will be one of just four active WNBA players with a signature sneaker on the market (Breanna Stewart, Sabrina Ionescu and Elena Delle Donne being the other three). Wilson will be the lone Black player to have one.
Conversations about if, and when, the two-time MVP and two-time WNBA champion would receive such an accolade have been common across the sport’s discourse in recent years. They were heightened, however, in recent weeks, as Caitlin Clark, as first reported in mid-April by The Athletic, agreed to a future signature shoe deal of her own with Nike. Nike hasn’t publicly confirmed that Clark will be a signature athlete.
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This past week, Wilson reiterated to The Athletic what she tweeted as reports of Clark’s agreement surfaced: “What is delayed is not denied,” Wilson said. “That’s something coach Staley told me in college. I never really truly understood it until I was in this moment where I had to have those hard conversations and kind of be real with myself.”
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It wasn’t easy for Wilson to stay quiet on the news , however.
“I hate that they had to wait this long. That’s full transparency,” she said. “But we’re here now, and I’m very happy where it is. I’m very pleased with where it is and how it can grow from here.”
Last fall, Mark Davis, the owner of the Las Vegas Aces, vouched for Wilson to have a signature sneaker.
“I know that she’s one of the greatest athletes I’ve ever seen and she deserves whatever she gets,” he told The Athletic.
More recently, Stewart, whose sneaker is with Puma, said, “I think there’s no question that A’ja should have a signature shoe. For what she’s done for this league, how she continues to build herself on and off the court. As a friend of hers, as a competitor of hers, I’m really hoping that she gets that because she deserves it.
“Also, there’s a lot of people throughout this league that deserve it and I feel like we’re moving at a snail’s pace with the signatures on the women’s side.”
One sneaker launch, even for someone as high-profile and accomplished as Wilson, might not immediately shake the market. But Wilson does hope that her release inspires a future generation to believe that they, too, could one day have a signature sneaker.
Wilson has been working with Nike for more than a year to create her collection. She shared her aesthetic and performance requests, and didn’t hold back on her feedback. “There were moments where we kind of just threw the whole shoe out and said, ‘Let’s just start all over again,’” Wilson said.
The collection draws inspiration from Wilson’s life. She said loves her logo. Wilson wanted a shoe that was lightweight and comfortable to play in, but that also was fashionable off the court.
“I want this to be something that’s so classy, but yet sassy,” she said. “It’s a shoe for everybody like it’s a bad a— shoe, and that’s how you should feel when you’re in it. And that was just my inspiration.”
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It might take a little bit of time for it to hit the market. By the time it does, Wilson could add a third straight WNBA championship, a third WNBA MVP and a second Olympic gold medal to her resumé. And even though it’s her shoe, the rights for who gets to try it out first have already been claimed by someone else.
“(Coach Staley) definitely made sure that I understood that she needs to get the first pair,” Wilson said. “I think she wants to wear them before I can even put them on my feet.”
(Photo: Jeff Bottari / NBAE via Getty Images)
