Austin Reaves shoes, explained: The touching reason why Lakers star wore pink sneakers vs. Pacers

Professional athletes sometimes use their attire to send messages to fans or loved ones. We often see this with the NFL’s popular “My Cause, My Cleats” campaign. Other times, athletes will write messages on wristbands, shoes, eye black, or undershirts. 

The Lakers were on the road against the Pacers on Wednesday night, with Indiana wearing alternate white jerseys with yellow and black accents on the sides. Los Angeles decided to go with its road purples in the game. They are purple jerseys and shorts with yellow lettering and a yellow outline around black numbers. 

Any pop of color would stick out like a sore thumb in the dark uniform combo. Lakers guard Austin Reaves knew this and used the opportunity to his advantage while sending a message to his family, in particular his brother Spencer. 

Here’s why Austin Reaves was wearing pink shoes in Wednesday’s game. 

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Austin Reaves pink shoes, explained

During the NFL season, Eagles WR A.J. Brown would wear pink cleats so that his daughter could see him on TV. It reportedly worked like a charm and his daughter, as well as several other fans, were easily able to place Brown on the field.

Reaves took a chapter out of Brown’s book. On Wednesday night, he wore pink cleats because he wanted to be seen, but the move wasn’t selfish. Like Brown, it was for his family. Reaves donned the pink sneakers to help his brother Spencer with a gender reveal. Spencer will be having a daughter. 

Spencer is Austin’s older brother. He also plays basketball, but hasn’t had the success his little brother has. Spencer started out playing at the Division-II level, but then transferred into Central Missouri. While playing overseas, Reaves has mainly played in Germany and is reportedly a member of Mitteldeutscher BC. Spencer was watching Austin play and revealed that his little brother knew his (Spencer’s) baby’s gender for weeks. 

Austin Reaves stats

Here are Reaves’ per-game stats for the 2024-2025 NBA season.

• Games: 63
• Points: 19.7
• Rebounds: 4.5
• Assists: 5.9
• Steals: 1.1
• FG%: 45.1%
• 3FG%: 36/3%
• FT%: 87.4%

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