You might not know it from their ad budget, but Nike’s had brand problems for a while now. They make the right moves with the indie crowd, but they can still come off a little…evil. And their latest Chinese forays may not help. A rule of thumb: When you start calling for the heads of your critics, you may want to reconsider your PR strategy.

Gawker reports on a rumor that Nike had hurdler Liu Xiang fake an injury and drop out of the Olympic Games because of his poor chances. It’s not the most damaging rumor Nike’s faced—after all, the haters are always with us—but (as Gawker points out) they’ve come under fire for tampering before. And as bad as the scandal is, Nike’s response has been even worse. They reached out to their friends in the Chinese government to “investigate those that started the rumor,” meaning some poor blogger is about to get reeducated. A mess of back-pedaling followed, which ended up making everyone involved look worse.

It’s familiar business to anyone who’s seen Rollerball»

Image via Selectism

It turns out even the great MOTH Malcom McLaren isn’t immune to a little swindle now and then. His historic punk clothing line—originally titled SEX, but eventually known as Seditionaries—has run into a nasty counterfeiting trade run by Simon Easton. Of course, the 30-year-old threads are collector’s items by now, so the price tags get pretty high. WWD reports that Easton has sold 80,000 UKP worth of fake merch to collectors, including artist Damien Hirst.

McLaren comments in the article, “I would never have thought 30 years ago when I was making this stuff on my kitchen table that someone would want to copy it like a Goya or a Van Gogh.” Of course, knowing McLaren, the thought has probably crossed his mind dozens of times, but it’s a little too flattering. The clothes are more like history than fashion or art. The reason collectors and museums are clamoring for them—and creating a market for counterfeits—is because of McLaren’s own swindle. His SEX shop in 1977’s London was the first time anyone had thought of charging top dollar for ripped, stained clothing.

He did it all with a knowing smirk, but it didn’t stop him from getting rich. Surely he wouldn’t begrudge a fellow con man a swindle of his own?

The trajectory of Kanye West’s Blog has been strikingly similar to Kanye’s own trajectory. At first, it was written off as gimmicky and well-connected. But, through frighteningly earnest enthusiasm, it’s gradually worked its way into our heart.

Which is why this morning’s scandal comes as such a shock.

No one knows better than us, it’s hard out there for a blogger, and more than a few have speculated that it must be hard for Kanye to tour, blog, make music, and star in vodka commercials without something giving way. A ghost blogger, perhaps»

If you’ve been watching hockey at all this season - and given that you’re reading a men’s fashion website, there’s only about a 20% chance of that - you might have noticed that Sean Avery, forward for the surging New York Rangers is a little bit of an odd bird. But WWD tapped us into a whole new level of the left wing’s oddness.

More on Mr. Avery’s shocking new vocation»

Since fashion magazines exist mostly to be talked about, it’s hard to know what counts as a controversy.

For instance, what should we make of the squabble over Vogue’s April cover? Various blogs took Annie Liebowitz’s Lebron-Gisele pairing as a racially-inappropriate King Kong reference. (For the record, we were more concerned with the effect on Lebron’s shot at the championship.)

But making the press rounds, there haven’t been many folks willing to weigh in. The NAACP has gone on record saying it prefers to deal with “weightier issues,” a back-handed way of saying, “don’t call here again.” LeBron himself seems to think the playoffs count as a weightier issue.

And he’s probably right.

Mass-market preppy outfitter J. Crew has apparently been running short on inspiration, so much so that they’ve turned to biting The Sartorialist’s style. Their spring preview just surfaced, and one of the shots (on the right) bears an uncanny resemblance to a pic the Sartorialist posted in June of ‘07 (on the left).

J. Crew’s main addition seems to be the sickly-colored blazer, but the poofy pocket square remains gloriously intact»

As intrigued as we are that the networks’ nightcaps are back on the air, we (and the entire viewing audience) couldn’t help but notice the new sidekicks on both the Late Show with David Letterman and Late Night with Conan O’Brian—big, fuzzy beards.

According to their respective owners, both wooly patches were inspired by a confluence of strike solidarity and the typical lax in fine grooming that most TV stars adopt when on hiatus.

What is Dave hiding?»