I like the OG thin tongue more. The leather used on the Protro tongue isn't that great and not very flexible/breathable. If they really wanted better comfort and padding they could have took the nylon fabric tongue from the Elites. The tongue from the GT Cut 1 also heavily reminded me of the 8s...
It's so much missed potential. The black Lakers away pair could easily have been the Amnesty colorway, while the white Lakers pair could have been the Achilles game colorway. Those were "basic" team colors with solid black/white uppers and no graphic prints, but they had great stories behind...
Because it’s cheap. It literally took Nike the lower cost of mass-producing the all-white Halos and painting the swoosh and heel logo to make those lakers homes.
I like the college PEs of the OG 8s from 2012 better than what they're doing for the Protros. The new ones look like glorified TBs whereas the graphics on the OG Duke PEs have a lot more personality.
I'll add that, assuming both pictures are DS pairs, that the eye stay part of the upper is tighter and more straight compared to the reps. The reps upper looks like it was sloppily wrapped onto the last.
I liked the engineered mesh, flyknit, and jacquard/performance woven stuff from the mid to late 2010s, shoes like the Kobe 8/9 and Jordan 29. Overlays on the toe or heel made of leathers or suedes are a plus (Kyrie 4 and 6 is a good example).
Textiles are cheap sometimes but at least my examples...