Be Like Mike: The Gatorade Pack That Turned a Commercial Into a Grail

The rarest chapter of the Be Like Mike Pack, dropped for the 25th anniversary of MJ's iconic Gatorade commercial. All-blue tumbled leather, orange lightning bolt on the collar, icy translucent sole.

Some sneakers tell a story about basketball. This pack tells a story about a jingle.

Back in 1991, Gatorade dropped a commercial that did something no sports ad had really done before — it turned an athlete into a myth. "Sometimes I dream / That he is me" wasn't selling a sports drink so much as it was selling a feeling: the impossible, electric wish to move through the world the way Michael Jordan did. "Be Like Mike" became more than a tagline. It became shorthand for an entire era of basketball fandom.

Twenty-five years later, in December 2017, Jordan Brand and Gatorade linked up to put that feeling back on shelves — this time on foot.

The Pack

The "Be Like Mike" collection reimagined the Air Jordan 1 Retro OG High through the lens of Gatorade's most iconic flavors, translating each beverage's color identity into premium tumbled leather. The details go deep: Gatorade-branded NIKE AIR tongue tags, embroidered lightning bolt hits on the collar, and translucent, colored outsoles with Nike and Jumpman branding visible underneath — a nod to the see-through bottles that made the drink instantly recognizable on a sideline cooler.

It wasn't just a colorway swap. It was a full sensory callback — sneakers built to feel like the commercial looked.

The Grape Chapter

Of the four colorways in the pack, the Gatorade Grape / Rush Violet is widely considered the rarest — the one collectors hunt hardest for. All-blue tumbled leather up top, that unmistakable orange lightning bolt on the collar, an embossed Wings logo on the heel, and an icy translucent outsole that ages into a beautiful, hazy patina over the years. It's a shoe that wears its two and a half decades of hype well.

We're honored to have a moderately used pair of the Grape colorway back in rotation right now — and it's not just the shoes. This pair comes with the original box (complete with "BE LIKE MIKE" printed inside the lid), the Gatorade-pattern tissue paper, and the original Gatorade x Jordan branded sweat towel and wristband set. The full collector experience, intact almost a decade later.

Why It Still Hits

Hype cycles come and go, but "Be Like Mike" pack endures because it wasn't chasing a trend — it was preserving a memory. It's a pack for people who remember watching that commercial and feeling, just for thirty seconds, like anything was possible in a pair of sneakers.

That's the kind of story we love giving a second life to.

Find the Gatorade Grape pair, box and accessories included, in our current rotation. Every purchase fuels the SneaksGeeks mission — 30% reinvested into the next pair we rescue, 35% recycled, 35% donated to communities in need.

Sustainability is the new fresh. 💛