Fly Me To The Moon
It uses special shoebox design. The top right corner PALMADALE is the designation of Paul George’s hometown, which is also the research center of NASA.
The shoe tongue uses the embroidery of American flag and PG’s personal logo. The heelpiece is with the embroidery of NASA and badge of Apollo Moon-landing Project.
It’s worthy to mention that different size of PG3 “NASA” has badges for different Apollo missions. The size that I have is US 8.5, the corresponding badge is Apollo NO. 17, which is also the last mission of NASA to land on moon.
It uses the material of making space suit on the shoe tongue and upper.
It has the exclusive embroidery hang tag as all previous NIKE outer space theme.
Comparing with the multilayer textile covering of traditional basketball shoes, PG3 ensures the strength while minimizing the covering layers. It’s to reduce the weight for canceling the hook and loop fasteners. But it still keeps the shelter on shoe side to frap, which keeps the tight wrapping performance of PG series.
The arrows on the shoe body comes from the outer space gloves of spaceman. It means that George has both attack and defend in front court and back court. This arrows also represent speed, that means this shoes can offer fast movement.
The insole is made of lighter and softer foam, matching with ZOOM Air in forefoot. It offers light and sensitive underfooting response. The outside of midsole NIKE Swoosh is higher than traditional basketball shoes. The advantage is the good anti-torsion performance. It won’t excessively overturn.
The design inspiration of outsole comes from the meteor crater of moonscape. The diameter of each circle is different. It looks comparatively. And it hides some memorable numbers about PG3 in some special circles.
The new NIKE PG3 make great improvement on the weight of shoe body. It’s lighter than PG2.You can move faster. The shoe tongue lining is filled with foam, not thick, but it keeps the ventilation and also ensures the comfort level.
NIKE PG3 First Publishing Colorway
When the second generation signature shoes of Paul George is launched,his quotative word is,“Don’t tell me the sky’s the limit when there are footprints on the moon.”
And this sentence becomes to be the inspiration of this pair of shoes. This model of jointly signed colorway is also the first launched colorway. This pair of PG3 has many details, including the numbers which are related with Paul George,such as the birthday, the uniform number, the quantity of tattoo and the postal code of Palmdale 93552.Certainly, the model of this NASA colorway on the right shoe tongue also has the Patch pattern of American flag.
Cushion on heelpiece
It’s said that PG3 use different density of PG2’s Phylon material on heelpiece. It’s obviously that PG3 is softer than PG2. You will have the feeling of cushion on heelpiece of PG3. It seems like the weaken Bounce. Generally, comparing with PG2, the heelpiece cushion of PG3 has been improved. But the cushion is still not good.
The using effect of forefoot Zoom
This pair of PG3 only uses fanshaped ZOOM on forefoot. For our experience, basically we can make sure that this fanshaped ZOOM cushion of PG3 run through the whole midsole, which is the same as PG2. On the top and bottom of air cushion, there is no extra midsole material filling.
Comparing with the forefoot fanshaped ZOOM of CP11, except the different air cushion thickness, there is a layer of midsole material under the air cushion of CP11. Although the air cushion thickness of PG3 is thicker than CP11, but the forefoot midsole construction of these two pairs of shoes is different. CP11 is insetting air cushion in the insole material. PG3 is separating the insole material and air cushion.
The cushion of PG3 has the faulting sense. As we mentioned in previous performance review of PG2, the air cushion is thick and the material around insole is too stiff, so that the forefoot has the obviously faulting sense.
The ZOOM on forefoot is comfortable, the core power area is comfortable, but the sideward is uncomfortable. Of course, some people would prefer to this sense. I suggest you to have a try and compare.
Support
We think that there are 3 elements of rollover prevention.
- If it has wider design of rollover prevention
- If the insole material is soft or hard
- The height of center of gravity
PG3’s center of gravity is high, but it make a rigid design, which is a functional adjusting design. The outside area of insole is reinforced. For its rollover prevention, it has been widen, but not obvious. And the center of gravity is on the high side.
Although PG3 has the reinforced design on the outside, but the center of gravity is higher than PG2, so I feel that the rollover prevention of PG3 is not good.
Tration
A crater-inspired pattern fills the outsole with circles and never disappointed. No matter the surface condition, traction had my back on all types of movement on both ends of the floor. In addition to multidirectional coverage, the circles just provide plenty of open area where dust can’t accumulate and I never once had to think about what type of step I should make. I never noticed any crazy screeching halts or insanely hard bites – I just noticed I never felt I lost a step. Traction was just as good outside as it was indoors when it comes to function though.
Fit
The shoe does fit on the snug side, but after a little break-in time, it was near perfect for me.
If you are a wide-footer, it’s close, but you may want to lean towards a half-size up. By the time this is published, we shouldn’t be too far from seeing the PG3 on more shelves so definitely give these a try-on in-store if you can.
Overall
PG’s OKC teammate may have a signature sneaker that reflects his speed and aggression on-court, but George’s represent him well also as they are suited for a smooth, two-way player that can get busy when necessary.
If you have a lot of life left in your PG1 or PG2/2.5 then no, the 3 probably isn’t a must-have right now unless you are a big Paul George fan. Honestly, with previous models still available for nearly half the price on sale, it’s hard to argue on saving money going that route. When it comes to 2019 releases, however, I do believe the Nike PG3 (along with the Why Not Zer0.2) sets a pretty nice bar for performers to come.
Generally, this is a pair of improved shoes for PG who is on uptrend. Although the appearance looks ordinarily. But as PG’s signature shoes, on the premise of satisfying the request of PG, and it also improve the problems of PG1 & PG2, it’s good for playing basketballs. It’s no problem to play the basketball on the outfield. Moreover, it’s the cheapest NIKE signature shoes.
