Nike Kyrie 5 EP 'Taco'
Colorway: Multi-Color/Multi-Color · Style code: AO2919-902 · Release date: November 23, 2018 · Price: $309 · Availability: Available now
More colorways: Nike Kyrie 5 EP 'Black All' (AO2919-001) · Nike Kyrie 5 EP 'Just Do It' (AO2919-003) · Nike Kyrie 5 EP 'Friends' (AO2919-006) · Nike Kyrie 5 EP 'Metallic Gold' (AO2919-007) · Nike Kyrie 5 EP 'Chinese New Year' (AO2919-010)
Travis Bennett has gone by Taco since he was a teenager in Los Angeles, where he joined Odd Future in 2007 as a DJ, hype man and occasional vocalist alongside Tyler, the Creator and the rest of the collective; acting work followed. What he did not have was any basketball pedigree, which is roughly the point. Nike handed him a colorway of Irving's fifth signature shoe anyway, and it turned up on court in November 2018 during a Celtics game against Milwaukee.
The design treats the shoe's knit upper as a canvas. A camouflage-style graphic covers it, cut through with bright orange, and an oversized grey Swoosh runs across the lateral side. Taco's name and Irving's logo sit on the tongue and insole.
Underneath was a real mechanical change for the line: an updated Air Zoom Turbo unit shaped to follow the contour of the curved rubber outsole rather than lying flat inside the midsole, so the cushioning tracks the roll of a guard's foot instead of fighting it.