Von Miller warmed up in the first Yeezy cleat, then played in something else

Von Miller had been Super Bowl 50 MVP for seven months. On 8 Sep 2016 he jogged out for warm-ups at Mile High in something the league hadn’t seen on a field. It was a Yeezy 750 built for football: ankle-high, off-white suede, the strap across the laces, the perforated toe, and studs where the Boost should be. The opener was a Super Bowl 50 rematch, against Carolina.

He’d posted the box that afternoon, thanking Ye and adidas Football and saying he couldn’t wait to test them that night. adidas confirmed to ESPN’s Darren Rovell that it was the first Yeezy football cleat, and Complex had it up the same night. It came 19 months after the first 750 sneaker went on sale in New York.

Warm-ups only

ESPN’s first story had him playing in them. He didn’t. Rovell corrected it the next day: Miller warmed up in the Yeezys and switched before kick-off. Getty’s first-quarter photos have him in white three-stripe adidas, which Nice Kicks named as the Freak High Wide. Denver won 21-20 anyway.

A touchdown, and a $6,000 fine

adidas showed the full set on 13 Sep 2016, in a first look with Complex’s Matt Welty: the 750 cleat and a 350 cleat in the Turtle Dove knit. Miller’s was the 750. He didn’t have the field to himself for long. On opening weekend Adrian Peterson, Eric Berry and DeAndre Hopkins wore the 350, and Hopkins caught a touchdown in his against Chicago on 11 Sep.

The NFL fined him $6,000. League rules say a shoe needs one dominant base colour, and the Turtle Dove pattern doesn’t have one, ESPN and the Associated Press reported. Asked if he’d wear them again, Hopkins had an answer ready.

“Only if Kanye wants to pay the fine.” DeAndre Hopkins, to reporters, Sep 2016

The 350 cleat sold out on adidas’s own site regardless, USA Today’s For The Win noted.

Miller came back to the 750 cleat on 26 Dec 2016, in black this time, Complex reported. He warmed up in them, then played in white Freaks again.