Poised to cash in on 'magic shoe'

Curt Schilling's masterful performance in Game 6 of the American League Championship Series isn't just the stuff that makes baseball legend. It's also the stuff that sells shoes.

That he wasn't wearing the high-top cleat Reebok International Ltd. designed for him last week hardly matters to the Canton company. Special cleat or not, he was wearing Reeboks.

Every time the camera zoomed in on his feet, 23 million viewers saw the Reebok logo. They saw footage of Schilling changing in and out of Reeboks during last week's pitching practice as he nursed an injured right ankle, and they saw him lace the shoes up on the mound as he led the Red Sox to a historic three-in-a-row, come-from-behind victory to keep their postseason hopes alive.

''Reebok has to be ecstatic about this," said Daniel Ladik, assistant professor of marketing at Suffolk University in Boston.

The timing couldn't be better: The Vero cleat, the shoe Schilling wears, hits store shelves in January.

Already, people are calling Reebok's customer service line asking where they can buy the $95 Vero. Retailers are telling Reebok's sales people that they're thrilled with the publicity around the shoe and that people are coming into their stores asking for it. Reebok designed the Vero in the tradition of the classic cleat, using high-quality leathers and an updated metal bottom.

Schilling has been wearing Reeboks since 1985. He's been wearing Reebok's Vero, the cleats he pitched in Tuesday night, since spring training. Putting an athlete in a shoe before it's available in stores is commonplace in the sneaker industry. Florida Marlins pitcher Josh Beckett, Minnesota Twins pitchers Joe Nathan and Brad Radke, and Houston Astros pitcher Andy Pettitte are also wearing the Vero this season. Red Sox players Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz are wearing another Reebok cleat, Visalia, also due out in stores in January. That way Reebok can build demand for the shoes among retailers like Dick's Sporting Goods, the Sports Authority, and Olympia Sports.

''By having players in the shoe early, you build buzz," said Don Gibadlo, Reebok's director of promotional footwear. ''You can get images of players playing in the shoe for ad campaigns and store displays. You show retailers the kind of athletes endorsing the shoe."

Reebok couldn't buy the kind of exposure it's gotten in the past week. Shortly after the Red Sox said Schilling may not be able to pitch because of an injured right ankle, Reebok engineers quickly designed a new Vero to help him stabilize his ankle.

Fox announcers were calling the special high-top version of the Vero the ''magic shoe." The shoe was featured in major national newspapers, including The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times. Between newscasts and game broadcasts, the regular low-cut Vero and the special high-top version were on television countless times. Before Tuesday's game, Boston.com, the website affiliated with The Boston Globe, wrote ''A Prayer for the Magic Shoe" and encouraged readers to submit their own. The ending:

''And Reebok, if this works out and we win in the end,

I promise: I'll never, EVER, buy Nike again."

Baseball cleats account for a small percentage of the sneaker business. Americans spent more than $196 million on baseball shoes last year, compared to $16 billion on all sneakers and athletic shoes, said Bob McGee, editor of industry newsletter Sporting Goods Intelligence. In the past year or two, however, Reebok has stepped up its baseball program. It struck a shoe deal with Major League Baseball this year, and orders for its cleats for the spring 2005 selling season are up 200 percent compared to last spring.

Ultimately, however, the postseason marketing coup isn't just about selling baseball cleats. It's about building Reebok's image as a performance brand, and competing against industry behemoth Nike Inc.

Maybe not everyone will buy Reebok cleats, said McGee, but they might buy Reebok clothes or another style of shoe. In other words, Schilling's halo effect transcends the shoe.

Paul Swangard, director of the University of Oregon's Warsaw Sports Marketing Center, said the postseason coup is a critical one for Reebok. The sneaker maker, with $3.5 billion in yearly sales, has moved aggressively into the Hollywood and hip-hop fashion scenes as a way to increase its cachet and compete against Nike, a company with $12 billion in annual sales.

The hubbub over Schilling's ankle and the focus on Reebok's cleats reinforces the performance part of Reebok's story.

''The home run for Reebok is Schilling performing at his best in the World Series," Swangard said before last night's game. ''But if the Red Sox lose Game 7, the story ends pretty quickly."

Naomi Aoki can be reached at naoki@globe.com.