In the next few weeks, I’ll be mixing it up between new footwear coverage and some recaps of the first-half cleats from the ‘08 MLB season. One of the best stories to develop this year has been the return of the Ken Griffey Jr. signature shoe.

For the past few seasons, Griffey has worn PE’s of his older signature models on newer Nike midsoles as well as a few PE’s of non-signature shoes. They looked great, but as one of baseball’s greatest enduring stars, it was surprising to see Griffey go without a new signature cleat since 2004. This year, Nike decided to change that with the Air Swingman Remix:

While it’s technically not a completely “new” shoe (it combines the iconic designs of the Griffey 1 and Griffey 2), this is clearly one of the most exciting cleats that we’ve seen in years. They feature 20 “dots” on the upper to commemorate Junior’s 20 years in the league, a Swingman logo embossed into the medial side in addition to the logo on the Griffey 2-inspired heel, and a few other design elements that just make these look amazing (pics via NT’s gotta be tha shoes). The cement pattern on the above shoe is part of the PE — it won’t be on the retail version. The pictured model is shown on Junior below:

(AP Photo/Al Behrman)

Griffey has worn a few other colorways of these this year (including black/red, black/white/silver, and all black pairs), but most of these should be available for purchase this fall (see page 3 of the ‘09 catalog updates here). A bizarre thing has happened with this signature shoe, however — other MLB players are getting player exclusives of them. Nike might be doing this to honor Griffey in his 600 HR milestone year (or they might just be pushing these hard for their upcoming release). My guess is that the players wearing them have been hand-selected by Junior himself.  Griffey has often spoken out on the lack of African-Americans in baseball, so it would make sense that he’d have Nike send PE’s to Jimmy Rollins, Orlando Hudson, and Carl Crawford…

(AP Photo/Tom Mihalek)

(AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)

(Getty Images/Al Messerschmidt)

Regardless of the reasoning behind this, I’m not complaining at all. Crawford’s PE’s in particular are absolutely beautiful, and a cleat like this is perfect for Rollins and Hudson, two of the flashiest infielders in the game. The more we see of this shoe, the better, and I’m guessing we’ll see several more versions before the season’s end.

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