A Closer Look at the Nike Kobe 9 Elite Low HTM "Black"

First highlighted back in April, Nike‘s Kobe 9 Elite Low HTM is not only one of Nike Basketball’s greatest performance innovations, but perhaps one of the greatest pieces to come out of the Hiroshi Fujiwara x Tinker Hatfield x Mark Parker HTM collaboration – the Swoosh’s CEO even dubbed the Kobe signature a “modern classic” in his recent conversation with Gary Warnett for 032c. Unlike is original low-top Kobe 9 brethren, the Elite edition of the sneaker is a faithful takedown of the Nike Kobe 9 Elite, eschewing Engineered Mesh in favor of a Flyknit upper while retaining the high-top’s carbon fiber reinforcements.

While this predominately black HTM release is likely long gone – they dropped exclusively at spots like Nike Stadium Milano and Excelsior in Milan in uber-limited quantities – fans will soon have yet another chance to obtain the silhouette as the non-HTM “Hyper Grape” and “Beethoven” editions of the Kobe signature are due out July 12 and August 16, respectively.