Everything You Should Know About the Air Jordan 12 ‘Flu Game’ Return

Next year is looking to be stacked for retro releases, and there’s already plenty in the works including a barrage of OGs. The most recent rumour was that was finally seeing a public release, alongside the ‘Grape’ . Now, 2025 is looking even bigger, with early leaks pointing to a retro return of the legendary ‘Flu Game’.

Funnily enough, the ‘Flu Game’ colourway was already rumoured to land in 2025, but was then cancelled and replaced with a new colourway dubbed ‘Bloodline’. Now, according to reliable source @sneakerfiles, the OG Air Jordan 12 has now been reinstated to launch with the ‘Bloodline’ colourway now nixed from the 2025 release calendar.

The ‘Flu Game’ colourway, which consists of the ionic Jordan Brand black and red tones, is one of the five original Air Jordan 12 colourways that landed in 1996. This particular iteration received its notorious nickname when Jordan Brand played in this colourway during Game 5 of the 1997 NBA finals while sick. It came out later that Jordan didn’t actually have the flu, and instead had a stomach bug, but the name ‘Flu Game’ has stuck almost three decades later.

The 2025 Air Jordan 12 ‘Flu Game’ is not expected to be joining the reimagined series, and instead will boast a build closer to that of the OG. A ‘Black’ and ‘Varsity Red’ scheme is set to be used, with tumbled leather uppers and textured mudguards. The last time the ‘Flu Game’ was spotted on shelves was back in 2016, with retros previously in the year 2009, which had a suede build, and before that, the first retro took place in 2003.

There’s no exact release date for the Air Jordan 12 ‘Flu Game’ as of yet, but stay locked to Sneaker Freaker to keep updated.