Air: Fact-Checking The Movie’s Nike & Adidas Urban Myths

Air might be a colorful version of a true story with some creative licensing, but it’s the movie’s discussion of Nike and Adidas’s urban myths that are the most eyebrow-raising. Air’s true story follows Sonny Vaccaro, a Nike marketing employee, who believes the company should spend its entire $250,000 sponsorship money on just one basketball player instead of three or four. That player is the 21-year-old Michael Jordan, who was just a promising up-and-comer in the world of basketball at the time. Against all odds, thanks to Sonny’s determination, Michael signs a contract with Nike over Converse and his personal favorite Adidas.

Air’s reviews are so good, and that’s because, outside of the award-worthy performances and the exciting energy, it airs sports brands’ dirty laundry and is full of fascinating anecdotes. The basketball movie is full of inside baseball, and it’s hilariously full of Nike, Adidas, and Converse employees insulting each other’s brands, and that’s if they aren’t criticizing themselves. The film also gives answers to questions that consumers have long asked, even if they’re just folk tales. Between Nike calling the Adidas CEO a “Nazi,” the colorful way Nike found its now iconic slogan, and Nike’s absolutely absurd 10 principles, Air throws out a lot of myths that require some extensive research.

What Are Nike’s 10 Principles?

Nike’s 10 principles are real:

1. Our business is change
2. We’re on offense. All the time.
3. Perfect results count — not a perfect process. Break the rules: fight the law.
4. This is as much about battle as about business.
5. Assume nothing. Make sure people keep their promises. Push yourselves push others. Stretch the possible.
6. Live off the land.
7. Your job isn’t done until the job is done.
8. Dangers Bureaucracy. Personal ambition. Energy takers vs. energy givers. Knowing our weaknesses. Don’t get too many things on the platter.
9. It won’t be pretty.
10. If we do the right things we’ll make money damn near automatic.

Nike’s 10 principles are proudly displayed throughout the brand’s head office, most notably scrawled across the wall in Nike CEO Phil Knight’s (Affleck) private office. The principles were made in 1977 before Nike had gone public and way before it had signed Michael Jordan. Phil says himself several times in the movie that the principles are what made Nike so successful in the first place. The principles perfectly reflect how competitive and ruthless the company was in that era despite facing a debt that could have bankrupted it. The range from of Nike’s 10 principles hint at a grueling but rewarding place to work.

While it isn’t stated in the movie who wrote the principles, it’s heavily alluded to that Knight was the one who sat down and penned them. However, it was actually Rob Strasser (who is played by Jason Bateman in the movie) who typed out the list (via Business Insider). This comes as a surprise not only because it had always been attributed to Knight until recently, but the movie depicts Strasser as anything but the anarchist who seemingly wrote the principles. Air’s Strasser absolutely doesn’t want to take risks, which is made clear when the prospect of losing the Jordan deal makes him question his job safety.

RELATED: Why Michael Jordan Isn’t In Air

Did “Just Do It” Come From A Death Row Prisoner?

Air briefly explains where Nike’s iconic slogan, “Just Do It,” came from. Those three words are universal and known across the world, but the movie reveals that they have a rather dark origin. The slogan was created by Dan Wieden from the marketing company Wieden + Kennedy, which was hired by Nike for the brand’s first major television campaign. But it’s explained in the movie that those were the last words of a death row inmate before he was shot to death by a firing squad. The person who originally remarked, “Just do it” was Gary Gilmore, and it turns out that the slogan’s origin is completely true.

The commercial aired in 1988, and 21 years later in 2009, Wieden recalled, “None of us really paid that much attention. We thought ‘Yeah. That’d work'” (via Business Insider). Gilmore was a Utah resident who robbed and killed two people, a gas station attendant and a motel worker in 1976, which was weirdly just one year before Strasser wrote the 10 principles. He was sentenced to death by firing squad just a few months later. It’s ironic that one of the most well-known slogans of all time was lazily stolen from a death row inmate. But it totally worked and those three words are echoed every day by millions of people.

Was The Founder Of Adidas Really A Nazi?

Given that Nike only had a 17% market share in 1984, and the competitors were giants by comparison, it’s hardly surprising that Nike employees didn’t exactly have positive things to say about Adidas. However, of all the insults that are hurled around about the German sports brand, one of the worst has some truth to it. The first part of Adidas’s name comes from the founder’s name, who was referred to as Adi, but his full name was Adolf Dassler, and there’s no more of an unfortunate first name in history. But while Air makes many changes to real life, Adidas does have ties to the Nazis that go much deeper than the name.

Dassler was a card-carrying member of the Nazi Party, which he joined in 1933. His shoe-manufacturing warehouses were turned into weapons-manufacturing plants, though it was against his will and something that most companies in Germany had to deal with (via Snopes). It was reported that Dassler wasn’t interested in politics and only focused on what was best for the business, though it’s hard to clearly understand the extent of his involvement with the Nazi party.

RELATED: What Happened To Sonny Vaccaro After The Events Of Air

What Is The Nike Tick Supposed To Be?

The end of Air sees Sonny finally ask Knight the question that audiences were waiting to hear: what is the Swoosh supposed to be? Knight’s extremely cryptic, explaining nothing other than that it was simply a logo that he bought for just $35 years earlier and that he didn’t like it. It is expectedly casual and unconcerned, just like everything else to do with the company, such as its iconic slogan. And even the name Nike was decided upon because Knight was told that consumers like four-letter words. However, while the CEO doesn’t give anything away, the logo is a lot of different things at once.

“Swoosh” is the perfect onomatopoeia to explain what the Nike tick conveys. As Nike was originally a running brand before it began making basketball sneakers, the Swoosh is meant to depict a sense of speed in the most minimalist way possible (via The Oregonian). And it’s amazing how many other interpretations there have been given how simple of a design it is. It has been speculated that it’s the wing of the Greek goddess of victory, who is not coincidentally named Nike. It could also be seen as a corner of a running track, which would fit with the brand at the time. But Air’s explanation is much less detailed.