After Texas A&M‘s season-opening win over UTSA in August, Deacon Stanfield made his way down to a tunnel at Kyle Field. KC Concepcion met him there.

The Aggies’ new star receiver was looking to do a handoff. He passed two pairs of his team-issued Adidas cleats to Stanfield. In exchange, the artist promised he would hook him up with more of his finest work.

Custom cleats are a burgeoning business in the era of name, image and likeness, as college football players invest their own money into upgrading their in-game attire. When Concepcion and his Aggie teammates Rueben Owens II, Terry Bussey and Will Lee III are looking for something unique during their 10-0 start, they hit up their shoe guy in Houston.

“That’s the whole thing: You don’t want to look like everyone else, right?” Stanfield said. “You don’t want to have the same drip as the guy next to you.”

Stanfield has worked with Travis Hunter, Ryan Williams and Jeremiah Smith. He’s painted cleats worn by pros such as Travis Etienne Jr., Emeka Egbuka and Carlos Correa. He’s even painted custom Nikes for Caitlin Clark. He’s been customizing shoes for six years — and he just turned 20. What started as a high school hobby has evolved into a successful side hustle. When he’s not spray-painting kicks, he’s playing wide receiver and taking classes at Houston Christian. His teammates at HCU call him “The Cobbler.” Stanfield tries to slow down orders in the fall to focus on being an FCS student-athlete, but he’ll make exceptions when high-profile athletes pop up in his Instagram DMs.

He started this passion in 2019. His art teacher in junior high assigned the class to paint something on an unconventional canvas, so Stanfield tried a pair of shoes. As he watched more tutorial videos on YouTube about the customizing process, he wanted to keep learning and saved up to buy an airbrush and compressor.

“A lot of it was self-taught,” Stanfield said. “I just started, and I ruined so many shoes in the process, just messing with my own shoes.”

His father, Dusty, works in athlete marketing and helped get this hobby kick started with his connections. Deacon painted custom creations for NFL players Trayveon Williams and Case Keenum in 2020, but his first pair that garnered attention were “Duck Hunt”-themed Nike cleats for Hunter Renfrow, a pixelated tribute to the classic NES video game.

“I think with phones and devices taking up so much of their free time, it seems like kids these days are kind of delayed in finding their passion and finding what they really want to do,” Dusty Stanfield said. “So for him to figure that out, it’s something as a parent that’s very fulfilling to see.”

Deacon got opportunities to customize cleats for Etienne and several NFL players as part of the league’s “My Cause My Cleats” campaign. He has also partnered with Panini, which has flown him in for Super Bowl week each of the past three years to create custom cleats for pro athletes at their hospitality suite. Every shoe helps as Stanfield tries to grow his brand and business.

He put on a brave face in a surreal setting for a teen, joking that his “whole body was shaking” as he handed custom Nike sneakers to Eli Manning before this year’s Super Bowl in New Orleans. But nothing compared to the nerves of prepping a pair of Nike Blazer Mid ’77 for Clark to commemorate her Rookie of the Year season with the Indiana Fever.

“She is literally the definition of aura,” Stanfield said. “When she walked in, it felt like the entire room stopped talking and looked at her. When she opened them, she looked over at me and was like, ‘These are so cool. Did you make these?’ It was definitely one of the coolest experiences of my life.”

This is an enterprise that wouldn’t have been possible before the NIL era arrived and modernized college athletics in 2021. It’s run by an active college athlete and supported by athletes who finally have disposable income to spend. Stanfield’s timing couldn’t have been better. And this fall, the Aggies are keeping him busy.

Stanfield did custom sets of maroon, black and white cleats for Bussey and former A&M quarterback Conner Weigman last year and was quickly deluged with more orders. He came up with black Louis Vuitton-themed cleats for linebacker Taurean York and green camouflage cleats for Weigman.

Now he’s producing new shoes for Concepcion, the SEC’s third-leading receiver, every game this season. First it was black cleats with Chrome Hearts brand crosses and then gray Louis Vuitton cleats for the road win at Notre Dame. Stanfield got especially creative for the Aggies’ throwback uniform against Florida, painting an A-10 ‘Warthog’ shark mouth on gold cleats for Concepcion.

It’s not easy to run an airbrush-heavy business out of his Houston Christian dorm room, so Stanfield makes the 30-minute drive home to Fulshear, Texas, on Thursdays, his day off from football, to get his custom orders done out of his garage workspace.

Last Thursday, he put in another marathon session in his workshop customizing four pairs of cleats over 11 hours. Concepcion, Owens, Bussey and Lee got them back just in time to wear them for the No. 3 Aggies’ comeback win over South Carolina.

“I think it’s super cool that Coach [Mike] Elko is relaxed about that,” Stanfield said. “Some coaches won’t let their players wear anything other than black or white.”

HCU coaches have been no less supportive of Stanfield’s entrepreneurship ever since he joined the program last year. The 6-foot, 160-pound scholarship receiver is on the Huskies’ two-deep and travel squad this season and has played six games as a redshirt freshman.

He’s learned how to design mock-ups on his tablet or phone because the prep phase for customizing a shoe can be lengthy.

Stanfield starts by sanding down the shoe’s exterior and wiping it with acetone to strip the original factory finish, taping the soles and areas he won’t paint. Typically, he says, this can take up to two hours — if you’re doing it right.

Once he’s working with a clean canvas, it’s time to airbrush several layers of acrylic leather paint while often incorporating stencils. Stanfield has been doing this long enough that he can mix paint and make Aggie maroon by eyeballing it. After he’s done hand-painting and carefully detailing, the shoes get sprayed with a protective matte finish.

Stanfield can scroll through his camera roll and point to hundreds of cleats and shoes he’s customized, but nothing has gone viral such as the pair he customized for Alabama‘s Ryan Williams last season. Williams ordered a custom pair from him during his senior year of high school and asked for another with his “Hollywood” nickname painted across Nikes last season. After Williams’ breakout performance to beat Georgia, Stanfield did one more for him. Williams gave him creative license to paint whatever he liked.

Stanfield hand-painted a portrait of Williams with red braids over black Nikes. He even recreated the “SC Top 10” chain with gold and silver rhinestones. The pair took him at least 10 hours over several days to produce as he carefully painted the portrait, placed the stones and perfected the details.

Stanfield shared the shoes on his Instagram account, and Williams reposted them after Stanfield had gone to bed. Stanfield’s jaw dropped the next day when SportsCenter’s Instagram account shared his work with the world, in a post that got more than 113,000 likes.

Stanfield typically charges between $100 and $350 for these custom jobs depending on the difficulty.

Some players ship him their team-issued shoes. Others ask him to find a particular pair and add it to the bill. He’s not charging as much as many of the more established creators in this niche industry, mostly because he wants to stay affordable for high school and college athletes.

Keisean Henderson, ESPN’s No. 1 ranked quarterback recruit in the 2026 class, has ordered plenty from Stanfield, including a pair this offseason with his favorite Davy Crockett racoon-skin cap painted on the sides. The Houston commit collaborated with him again this summer on a black Louis Vuitton-style pair covered in UH emojis.

“He is one of one,” Henderson told ESPN. “He can take a thought from your mind and make it reality.”

This is how Stanfield is trying to get his foot in the door in a competitive business by connecting with the next big stars before they blow up. Stanfield did three pairs of custom cleats for Ohio State superstar Jeremiah Smith during his 7-on-7 days with South Florida Express. He would love to work with Smith again, but the Buckeyes don’t wear custom cleats during games.

Some connections endure for years and some pop up in an instant with an unexpected DM. Last summer, he was scrolling through his message requests on Instagram and spotted one from Leanna De La Fuente. She was inquiring about pricing and was looking to surprise her fiancé. When he clicked on her profile and realized she was referring to Hunter, he was astonished and immediately replied.

Stanfield shipped custom black cleats that featured Hunter’s Instagram handle. De La Fuente sent him a thank you video from the two-way star, who promised he would wear them for a game. The artist waited all season, wondering when Colorado‘s Heisman Trophy winner might break them out. Hunter saved the pair for his finale with the Buffaloes in the Alamo Bowl against BYU.

College players who can afford customs are typically wearing them for only one game to complement a specific uniform combination, while high schoolers tend to wear them all season. Henderson, the No. 4 recruit in this year’s SC Next 300, said he currently has four pairs of customs from Stanfield with more to come.

“You can stand out and express yourself without saying words,” Henderson said. “The game of football is made for you to stay in uniform. When I see the opportunity to make it my own, I try my best to showcase how I feel from my cleats.”

Back at Houston Christian, Stanfield tries his best to juggle all his responsibilities. He wore his own work, a pair of orange Louis Vuitton cleats, throughout spring and fall practice with the Huskies. Bachtel credits offensive coordinator Mike Besbitt for starting “The Cobbler” nickname in the spring, and it stuck with teammates. He’s done color swap customs for a few of them, but they know he’s already plenty busy at this time of year. The head coach would like a pair someday, too.

“I told him, ‘Look, I’m not as flashy as you. I don’t need all the Louis Vuitton and all that,'” Bachtel joked. “Just give me something we can wear in recruiting and maybe on the sidelines.”

As much as he would like to someday go full time in shoe customizing, Stanfield says he’s loving his experience in college football and not looking to fast-forward past it. Everybody tells him he’ll miss it when it’s over, so he’s trying to enjoy it. He’ll be back open for business in the offseason and eager to see what creative requests come next.

“I’ve never really thought of it as time-consuming,” Stanfield said, “because it’s a job that doesn’t feel like a job.”

Sir Keir Starmer is preparing for a likely visit to China in the new year, Sky News understands.

Political editor Beth Rigby told the Electoral Dysfunction podcast with Baroness Harriet Harman that she had heard from two sources that the prime minister would make the trip – which will be controversial – at the end of January.

Politics latest: Westminster braced as COVID inquiry report

She told the Labour peer: “Now, we’ve had this from a couple of different sources.

“As I understand it, it’s not been confirmed, but I guess until they get on the plane, these things are never confirmed.

“But, you know, they might not really want people talking about the prime minister going to China, given the backdrop of the China spy case, and all of those allegations and all that controversy around China in the UK, the super embassy [proposal].”

She added: “But Harriet, what do you think? The prime minister should be going to China, shouldn’t he? Given that we economically want to grow ties with China? What do you think?”

Baroness Harman replied: “I think he should, but I think there’s no naivety around the government about, although there’s opportunities to cooperate with China on climate change, on trade, that there’s also major challenges that they’ve got to be wary of – so I think they’ll be going, but with eyes wide open.”

The trip is likely to be controversial given the UK’s fractious relationship with China, made worse by recent allegations of spying in parliament.

Read more:
MI5 is trying to send a signal to China with spying warning
Three key questions about China spy case that need answering

Earlier this week, MPs and peers were warned of new attempts to spy on them by China.

The security service MI5 sent a warning to those working in Westminster about two recruitment headhunters to watch out for who are working for Chinese security services.

It followed the collapse of a prosecution of two people suspected of spying on behalf of China.

A spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in the UK said: “These claims by the UK side are pure fabrication and malicious slander. We strongly condemn such despicable moves of the UK side and have lodged stern representations with them.

“We urge the UK side to immediately stop this self-staged charade of false accusations and self-aggrandisement, and stop going further down the wrong path of undermining China-UK relations.”

Rigby said the trip would be a “massive moment”, noting that the last prime minister to visit China was Theresa May in 2018.

Last month Donald Trump met Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea.

The US president described the talks with China’s president as “amazing” and said “on the scale of one to 10, the meeting with Xi was 12”.

You can listen to the Electoral Dysfunction episode in full from 6am tomorrow.

Robotaxi network Waymo is continuing the rapid expansion of its test fleet vehicles in new cities around the US as it looks to offer more driverless ride options to the public. The Alphabet Inc. subsidiary announced three new cities where test vehicles will roll out en route to commercial services, marking Waymo’s second expansion announcement in just three days.

As we recently pointed out, 2025 continues to be a pivotal year for autonomous rideshare developer Waymo, as it expands its fleet of test vehicles and public robotaxis to new cities around the US. This week, in particular, has been quite newsworthy, as Waymo has been announcing expansions to new cities around the US.

Today, Waymo’s robotaxi vehicles offer public rides in Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and San Francisco – three of those cities recently gained freeway access. Two days ago, Waymo confirmed the expansion to five additional cities: Miami, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and Orlando.

This new confirmed previous reports from Waymo that cities like Miami were in the works. Washington, DC, Nashville, and London have also been previously announced. Today, Waymo confirmed expansion to three more cities, with test vehicles rolling out in those regions immediately.

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Waymo to quadruple the cities its vehicles are available

Waymo posted three “new city alerts” on its website this morning, confirming plans to roll out robotaxi vehicles in Minneapolis, Minnesota, New Orleans, Louisiana, and Tampa, Florida. As it has with all the cities mentioned above, Waymo is laying the initial groundwork in new areas, such as NOLA, to “integrate seamlessly with the community and alongside existing transportation options.”

The recently announced rollout will follow the same phased approach used to achieve public robotaxi rides in the five cities where Waymo currently operates, beginning with manual drivers in its test fleet. Those Waymo vehicles currently consist of Jaguar I-Pace SUVs and the Zeekr RT – a purpose-built EV for the company.

According to the company, those test vehicles can be spotted on new city streets immediately, especially ahead of winter in Minneapolis, for example, so that the Waymo team can test its technology in snow conditions. Here’s a breakdown of Waymo’s current and pending robotaxi network:

• Waymo Cities With Public Robotaxi Operations:
  • Atlanta
  • Austin
  • Los Angeles
  • Phoenix
  • San Francisco
• Cities With Plans For Future Waymo Operations:
  • Dallas
  • Denver
  • Detroit
  • Houston
  • Las Vegas
  • London
  • Miami
  • Minneapolis
  • Nashville
  • New Orleans
  • Orlando
  • San Antonio
  • San Diego
  • Seattle
  • Tampa
  • Tokyo
  • Washington, DC

According to Waymo, more cities will be announced as the company intends to more than quadruple the number of cities where its robotaxi vehicles are available to the public.