Originally released in November 1993, the Air Jordan IX model was the first model released after Michael Jordan's retirement. Jordan never played a full season of NBA Basketball wearing these shoes. This model was inspired by baseball cleats that Jordan wore when playing minor-league baseball.

Like the VII and VIII models, the Air Jordan IX featured an inner sock sleeve and nubuck accents. The sole featured different symbols and languages of different countries. The Air Jordan IX has been the shoe chosen to adorn Jordan's feet for his statue outside of theUnited Center in Chicago, Illinois.

In popular culture, in the children's movie The Little Rascals one of the bullies, Butch is wearing a pair of these shoes. American rap iconTupac Shakur also wore Air Jordan's in a popular "Thug Life" photo set in 1993.

The Air Jordan IX was originally released from 1993 to 1994. It was retrod in 2002, 2008, 2010, 2012, 2014-2015.