The three biggest skate videos released by shoe companies over the past decade went on to be three of the biggest skate films of their time. A good thing, right? Well yes, that is if you're prepared to deal with the "Curse Of The Shoe-bino." Just like the "Curse of the Bambino," a superstition that the reason the Boston Red Sox did not win the World Series for 86 years is they sold Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees. They made the Babe famous, but in the end they couldn't afford him with the likes of the mega bank account of the New York Yankees looming. A similar situation has occured in the world of skate video, especially to the shoe brands. After their videos achieved all their success, and had skateboarders around the world talking of their highlights, it happened, to each of them, and rather quickly too.

One of the best things about making a really good skate cinematic experience is a lot of people are going to see that video. That means a lot of eyes on each member of the team, and some of those eyes are going to be big shots at other shoe brands; guys that can make offers you can't refuse. And that my friends is the "Curse Of The Shoe-bino," after the dust has settled, key members of the team move onto greener pastures, in more ways than one. I'll give you my three examples, probably the three biggest shoe brand videos of all time: eS' Manikmati, DC's The DC Video and Lakai's Fully Flared.

I'll start with the Manikmati, a video that featured one of the best shoe teams at the time, eS, by one of the best skate videographers ever, Fred Montagne, aka French Fred. Here's a little rundown of who left town after the video was released: Erick Koston went to Lakai, Arto Saari went to Etnies (part of the same company) then to Gravis, Paul Rodriguez went to Nike and Bob Burnquist went to IPath. Now, not to sound cliche, or like a big dork, but those are some big shoes to have to fill.

Next, we have the DC Video. It too featured one of the best shoe teams of it's time, and also lost a few key members. DC didn't have it as bad, but they did part ways with following: Stevie Williams went to Reebok, Anthony Van England went Vans and Brian Wenning just left. That's the thing with the DC Video, it didn't get as many guys stolen, because Wenning just kind of gave up. He was skating in Timberlands for a little bit, then talked of going to Axion, and now he's just MIA. Minus that, the loss of Williams and Van England at the time must of been pretty big for DC.

Finally, we have Lakai's Fully Flared, called by many the greatest skate video to date. Here's it's rundown: Alex Olson left to Vans almost immediately after it's release, Anthony Papalardo went to Converse and Eric Koston went to Nike. What's the lesson here? These are American companies, and America is capitalist country, so if you make a big video that gets a lot of eyes on your team. That's just what it does; gets a lot of eyes on your team, and some of those sets of eyes can make things happen. I'll leave you with one last thought. Emerica is the next big shoe brand about to drop a big video which is going to be called, Stay Gold, so stay tuned for how that goes for them.

Photo: Eric Koston breaking free from one of the Lakai bosses, Mike Carroll.