Marbury Becomes Starbury Off the Court

Stephon Marbury has taken another step towards becoming the NBA’s best "Good Guy." Earlier this week, Starbury announced he would be coming out with a new shoe which would cost all of $14.95. No matter how much I hate Stephon Marbury on the court, I cannot deny the good he does in his community.

The inexpensive sneaker is not the only good thing Stephon does. In his native New York, specifically near Coney Island, he pays seven barbers to give kids free haircuts. He has donated a million dollars to relief efforts for national disasters. Stephon Marbury is Starbury off the court.

As for his kicks, who knows if his efforts will be successful. The cheap sneaker route hasn’t been overly popular for Shaq, but it can be argued the Shaq shoe design was the reason.

If I had to make a bet now, I would be reasonably confident I would be able to win if I were to bet against Stephon. The sad fact is, in our culture, shoes are viewed as a status symbol. Who cares if the shoe is the same quality or if the price is marked up ten-fold; the cheap shoe just has to suck. Why else would shoes still fly off the shelf despite prices in excess of $100? (If you want to read some good discussion on that culture of shoes, here’s a good place to go.)

In my eyes, it is going to take a player that had a premiere expensive shoe to join Shaq and Stephon before any cheap shoe becomes successful. Just think if a player like LeBron James had the price of his shoe drop down to $14.95. In, it would sell if it had the "swoosh" and "LBJ" logo on it.

At the end of the day, we will just have to see how Stephon does in his mission. The worse he can do is shift the focus on the shoe companies for unreasonably high shoe prices.

Finally, Marbury has shown why he is Starbury off the court.

In the meantime, I will reminisce on the times in which I could get a pair of T-Mac’s for under $20... but even those were the "outdated" version. Too bad I bought my shoes on Wednesday (a deal for $30).