Rap was still a relatively new genre of music 40 years ago. So young that it was considered groundbreaking when Converse incorporated it into a commercial with some of the biggest stars in the NBA.<\/p>\n
The \u201cChoose Your Weapon\u201d commercial \u2014 featuring six of the NBA\u2019s biggest stars in Magic Johnson, Isiah Thomas, Kevin McHale, Mark Aguirre, Bernard King and then-reigning MVP Larry Bird \u2014 debuted the Converse Weapon basketball shoe in multiple colorways in 1986. Each player delivered two bars in a commercial then viewed as a bit \u2026 edgy?<\/p>\n
Even if the content wasn\u2019t explicit, the newness made some apprehensive, since rap music had only been around roughly 13 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cRapping was so young,\u201d said Aguirre, a three-time NBA All-Star with the Dallas Mavericks and a two-time league champion with the Detroit Pistons, one of the players in the commercial. \u201cWe didn\u2019t know what we were doing. \u2026 We were just putting this together.\u201d<\/p>\n
The commercial also included Thomas, King, McHale, Johnson and Bird rapping about what the Weapon did for their respective games. It\u2019s one of the first times a major brand incorporated the emerging hip-hop culture into basketball advertising.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was a big change for the sports world that they would choose rap in order to be a go point,\u201d Aguirre said. \u201cThat was a big change, big change.\u201d<\/p>\n
There have since been several instances of basketball culture and hip-hop culture merging for advertising. Reebok paired rap star Jadakiss with Allen Iverson for a now-iconic Answer 5 shoe commercial<\/a> in 2001 \u2014 and followed with a commercial for the Answer 6<\/a> the following year.<\/p>\n Nike has incorporated hip-hop elements in commercials for years. From pairing Kobe Bryant with Kanye West to having Tyler, The Creator and Doechii narrate commercials last year, Nike has leaned heavily into hip-hop at times for its marketing.<\/p>\n The rap-basketball crossover isn\u2019t limited to sneakers. Such an example is the 1998 Sprite commercial<\/a> that featured Bryant, Tim Duncan and rap legend Missy Elliott.<\/p>\n But infusing the rap game into ads wasn\u2019t the norm 40 years ago. Run-DMC was a trailblazer by becoming the first rap group with a sneaker deal when they signed with Adidas in 1986<\/a>. Now, sneaker brands collaborate with rappers routinely for commercials and their own shoes and apparel.<\/p>\n But the Converse Weapons commercial was different because it featured active players rapping. The commercial was an acknowledgement the new genre was more than a fad and was becoming ingrained in culture.<\/p>\n Converse hired Boston-based advertising agency Ingalls, Quinn & Johnson to produce the ad. The ad agency, acquired by Holland Mark in 1999, was shut down in 2001.<\/p>\n Converse was the preeminent basketball shoe brand at the time. The Weapon was the latest release from Converse, which had been a sponsor of the 1984 Olympics. At the end of the commercial, at the bottom of the screen, one might notice, \u201cConverse is the official shoe of the NBA.\u201d<\/p>\n That commercial debuted during All-Star Weekend in 1986 at a time when Nike was making a push in the sneaker industry with Michael Jordan and the Air Jordan. Converse featured its biggest stars for the commercial, with the idea of highlighting the talent on its roster.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was kind of like a player\u2019s shoe,\u201d said Chris Chase, co-founder of WearTesters, which reviews shoes. Chase has also researched several shoes, including the Weapon.<\/p>\n \u201cEven at the end of the ad, it was really cool to see it be like, this is what professional players are choosing as their weapon, which was the whole purpose,\u201d Chase said. \u201cThey were kind of, like, trying to stay away from that signature, but they were definitely making player team edition-like colorways.\u201d<\/p>\n Bird and Johnson were arguably the game\u2019s biggest stars at the time. Johnson was coming off his third NBA championship with the Los Angeles Lakers in 1985. Bird was on his way to winning a third consecutive MVP and his third championship with the Boston Celtics in \u201986.<\/p>\n McHale was one of the league\u2019s best post players and had won back-to-back Sixth Man of the Year awards (1984, \u201985) and was on the verge of his third championship that season with Bird.<\/p>\n King was an elite scorer who led the NBA in 1984-85 with 32.9 points per game for the New York Knicks. Aguirre was the No. 1 pick in the 1981 draft who\u2019d make three All-Star teams and would eventually join Thomas as part of the Bad Boy Pistons and win back-to-back championships. Thomas is perhaps the best small guard in league history and was emerging as a threat to the Celtics by 1986.<\/p>\n \u201cI think they built it around the fact that all of us were Converse All-Star people,\u201d Aguirre said. \u201cConverse was being sold, so they wanted to get us under a contract before Converse got sold. That was the idea, so we were all good for it.\u201d<\/p>\n