Commercial CRitic: Athletes a No Show for Super Bowl

Commercials. No Jordan, no Bird, not even Peyton or Brees during the NFL Network commercial. Athletes pockets are empty this Super Bowl as the endorsement deals went elsewhere.

I was anticipating a long night squirreling together a blog post as the resident commercial critic, but I get to hit the sack early tonight.

Hollywood dominated the commercial space digging into Stan Lee's waste basket to find a blockbuster. Eminem's anti-endorsement mantra snags him two deals eclipsing the entire rosters of the NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL combined.

Unless A-Rod was actually previewing a Rom-Com with Cameron Diaz about popcorn, commercial execs are wildly throwing their money at a new approach that leaves athletes having to actually be good at their sport to earn a paycheck.

And yes, I did see Danica Patrick. Enough said.

-Commercial CRitic, CR Dunbar

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Commercial CRitic: Super Bowl Special

Few commercials featured athletes this year as the timeslots were dominated by NBC promos and movie trailers. Here are the Commercial CRitics thoughts on the biggest ad day of the year:

GoDaddy lowered its standards hand in hand with Danica Patrick. "I can do anything so I want to see Danica in a shower." C'mon, for a commercial that was supposed to be somewhat believable, this one didn't come somewhat.

Nobody told me that Ray Lewis was going to make an ass of himself in 3D. Otherwise, I would have commandeered a set of glasses to critique with full capability. Nevertheless, props to the Ravens (I think they were all Ravens) for laying it ALL (maybe it was good I didn't have 3D) on the dance floor.

So that is what a murderous lizard looks like. Thanks SOBE for the heads up.



Not going to comment on the Heros vs. NFL All-Stars commercial. NBC did enough self-gratifying to deserve any mention.

I would say 95 percent of Olympic athletes are amateurs and need to work at Home Depot to make a living while they train. Somehow, Carlos Boozer is the Olympian to receive the extra endorsement check from Overstock. Possibly the least minutes played on the basketball team and skipped out on a blind man while he wasn't looking for millions in Mormon country. Swing and a miss Overstock.

I heard rumors about the Coke Zero-Polamalu commercial and was ready to pan it for lack of originality, but I must say that I was impressed. It had physical violence, which I am always a supporter of. Plus, it integrated Coke Zero's previous schticks with infringement claims. Well done.



That's it, minus a boring G2 commercial. We get it Gatorade, you have a lot of money. But shouldn't Tiger be schleping his own flavored water?

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Commercial CRitic: Right Guard's New Sex Panther Line

We all know that imitation can be construed as a form of flattery. In the marketing world it is more of a concession that the competition's strategy is better. Enter Right Guard.

Without seeing numbers, one could surmise that Old Spice has snatched market share in the deodorant market from the sad commercial attempt put forth by Right Guard.

Using Old Spice's tongue-in-cheek alpha male humor stylings best epitomized by Will Farrell, Right Guard signed only-known-to-fantasy-players Chris Paul's face to rub its scent on the public.

Embodying his inner most Dwayne Wade, Paul unleashes an incoherent unfunny rambling from a stilled body, which is copy-catted from a Conan O'Brien routine.



From the company that brought us the infamous line of "Anything less would be uncivilized," we are now told Right Guard is the official sponsor of Chris Paul's pits.

The new spot only poses questions about Chris Paul, nothing about the actual product. Is he being funny? It's not funny. Is he trying to be a pretty boy? He looks like Tattoo. Should I be teaching my kid to put three fingers together horizontally on his shoulder to be cool at daycare?



In a nod to Will Farrell, as I guess how Right Guard would want it, I will deem this ad as Sex Panther. A sexy presentation that actual reeks like a used diaper filled with Indian food.

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Commercial CRitic: Canon Reveals Harsh Reality

As any publicist for an upcoming Disney starlet will tell you, being too cute can cause problems (see publicists for Vanessa Hudgens, Cheetah girl, Lindsey Lohan's private parts).

The new Canon Powershot commercials with Maria Sharapova attempted to be cute with nobody interested in taking a picture of the attractive, famous athlete, choosing instead the little mutt featured in previous commercials.



The too cute Canon commercial inadvertently showcases a harsh reality about women's tennis. The shelf life of these young athletes expires as quickly as the movie careers of genitals exposing celebutantes. It is easy to pass up Sharapova for the next cute thing that charms the public.

Canon highlights that Sharapova is not that special, there is a replacement for her simply a tournament or season away. Kournikova, Venus, Serena, Hingis, Hantuchova, a never ending string.


Hantuchova dares Sharapova to break a leg

In reality, female tennis players need the endorsements to stay relevant. Otherwise, they are unceremoniously knocked from their high horse with an early exit from a tournament where an attractive counterpart remains to heed the spotlight. Let's just hope that the next women's tennis player that catches our eye has more of an everyman appeal by not naming their lap dog after a highfalutin fashion designer.

The commercial very well may sell cameras in time for the holiday season. However, it did no favors for Sharapova or women's tennis by showcasing the sad reality of women's tennis.

Commercial CRitic: Guitar Parent Advisory

Did my eyes just fail me? Did I just see an accused rapist, drunk driver, accused adulterer, but definite stripper aficionado , and Tony Hawk dancing around in their underwear selling a product to children?



Proceeding from my awestruck, this commercial may have a reverse affect by providing thousands of kids an "oh shit" moment when they see Phelps riffing. "Is that what I look like?" "I rock the axe cooler than him, right?" "Maybe I should dust off Madden."

Let me explore the space a little more on Michael Phelps. I thought he was going to pull a hundred million in endorsements after his record breaking Olympic Games. All I have seen is a low budget AT&T commercial. Don't gold medals have a life expectancy of 3 months? I already see a gymnastics rock jam coming to a city near me. I know he is not struggling already pulling in over $5 mil a year and living with his mom, but he might want to stop scratching the dog and kick it up a notch.

Back to the commercial. Why is Kobe lip syncing? Does the game have an attachment that measures lip and tongue movement? Because the knockoff that Guitar Hero is knocking off requires actual singing. Come on Kobe, aren't you America's sweethheart again? Isn't that why you received a call to do this after being sent to the corner for 4 yrs, ehm Sprite, ehm McDonalds. I thought you were this great competitor? Let's hear those pipes.

Unfortunately, this commercial was set to fail the moment A-Rod pranced onto the screen. Everyone knows if an athlete is going to be the spokesman for Guitar Hero, the first call is to this guy:

Commercial CRitic: Amp’d Cliché with a Twist

I caught the Dale Jr. vs. the gorilla Amp commercial yesterday for the first time. While for some this may be old hat (Rusty), I do not watch cars going in circles.



The 800 pound gorilla metaphor has been driven into the ground so much so that I checked to see if it was the example used in Wikipedia for the definition of “cliché” (it wasn’t).

However, I must give credit to the folks at Amp for putting a unique twist on the metaphor so that it caught my eye. Or perhaps it was the fact that the family and I had just returned from the zoo and now I love gorillas because they actually moved (I knew I knew a Kenyan name).

In the end, the commercial did not mimic the 800 lb gorilla metaphor, which was most recently done by AXA Equitable Life with the talking gorilla representing retirement security. It took a page from one of the most famous Super Bowl commercials of all time that I think readers of this blog can well appreciate.



I am always in favor of physical comedy. If the gorilla would have bull rushed Dale’s nuts, I might have even tried an Amp Energy Drink.

Commercial CRitic: Hanes Are on Who?

Maybe I have been watching too much Jon & Kate Plus 8 or maybe the Commercial CRitic is getting to the adverting industry, but it seems there has been a serious drop off of athletes in commercials. However, since the guys who write the nonexistent checks will soon show up at my door with socks filled with lemons, I better write about something.

The Hanes commercials with Michael Jordan have irked me for some time now. The latest one features Hollywood banter between His Airness and Charlie Sheen. This is quite the marketing ploy by the Hanes Corporation. It seems Hanes is seeking the 40-50 year old male cheating divorcee demographic.

The commercial is obviously geared toward showing the casual male or family side of the actors. For instance, the commercial begins with MJ on the phone asking if his mother received the flowers. Why mom?

Enter Charlie Sheen who is now more famous for his bitter divorce to wild thing Denise Richards than his brilliant acting in Hot Shot Part Deux. Teamed up with R. Kelly inspiring Jordan who Forbes recently ranked as having the most costly celebrity divorce, you have the Ace & Gary Dynamic Duo of family life.

The lifestyles of these two may be inspiration to some (prolific gambler, prostitute connoisseur), but I would guess that many of us would prefer to play basketball or have the work ethic of Michael Jordan rather than his family life. (I am still trying to think of a reason to be like Charlie Sheen). Hanes may want to rethink its use of MJ, although 7.6 percent of the population is a male 40 -50 years old, approximately 15.3 percent are divorced, 80 percent wear undershirts and .8 percent of males have a favorable opinion of Charlie Sheen, that could total up to a lot of t-shirts.

Personally, having apple children like the Fruit of Loom guys seems like a better future to me than being in the tabloids for harassing my ex-wife.

Commercial CRitic: Barney Loans Staff to Reebok

The Reebok/Dick’s Sporting Goods commercial featuring Stacy Keibler, Torry Holt, Chad Johnson and Matt Hasselbeck may have been written and produced by the crack staff of Barney and Friends.

For some reason, Matt Hasselbeck’s Facebook page is the only place I can find it on the World Wide Webs. http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10058619575&oid=19558708928

The light banter reminds me of the dialogue of the aforementioned television show.

Stacy: Matt do you like to dance?
Matt: Yes, watch. [begin to dance]
Chad: Heeheehe
Torry: You’re funny, Matt
Stacy: Hehehe, I like chocolate.

(There are much better photos out there. Fun research)

I expect a little more from Reebok even if they want to do a light piece. At least they show the athletes (sure I will give the WWE Diva the loose moniker) running with the shoe, but I doubt the spot will help gain market share.

Commercial CRitic: You Rich Enough to Watch the Tournament

The CRitic has been on a hiatus through no fault of his own. There has been a serious lack of sports-themed commercials.

There have been a few noteworthy commercials such as the Dr. J, 10 second ad for Converse. Short, sweet and to the point, well done.

There have been some travesties such as the Subway commercial with Tony Parker and Tony Stewart congratulating Jared for not continuing a lifestyle that would kill him young. It is reminiscent of how you can pay celebrities to come to your birthday party, ahem Peyton Manning ahem. We once looked into having Jack Nicholas come to my grandma’s birthday, it wasn’t worth it.

There is another commercial about how Reggie Bush’s quick, which must be referring to his legs, smells like French Toast. I think Ray J may have revealed why on The Tyra Banks Show. (4:24)

But what I have particularly noticed, since I have been watching college basketball for the past three weeks to prepare for my family’s bracket for the opportunity to win $20, is the theme of college basketball commercials.

Have you ever caught yourself in middle of a series of commercials for tampons, yeast infection medicine and birth control pills and think to yourself that maybe I shouldn’t be watching this show?

Well, if you are not approaching retirement or an investor, you should not be watching college basketball. Hartford Financials, Pacific Life, Charles Schwab, T. Rowe Price and Fidelity are only a few of the financial companies advertising trying to get your cheese during college basketball games.

The marketing data must be screaming at these companies about the demographics of a typical college basketball fan.

College fan = college educated = mo money = mo problems.

Commercial CRitic: League of Bandwagon

The following commercial was forwarded to the CRitic for reasons that many would find obvious.

Gatorade jumped on the Eli and Giants bandwagon. I am surprised that they didn't take Nike and Reebok's route and focus on the Patriots missing the sacks rather than Eli breaking the tackles.



Did Trent Dilfer get this many advertising deals when the Ravens defense carried him to a Super Bowl victory? Or, are we finally seeing why Archie helped his boy throw a temper tantrum during the draft? New York media is like a lottery winner in a titty bar.

At first glance the commercial seems cliche with the music, but after visiting the website it is clear that the climatic chanting music is a theme for the League of Clutch, so I will cut them a break. The league also uses the increasingly popular moving photograph. Cool technology, I know Scott Baio is a fan.


I don't have many problems with the spot other than the fact that they are insinuating Eli Manning is consistently clutch. Sure that play was clutch, no doubt about it, but shouldn't there be a historical precedent in order for a professional athlete to join the league.

According to the website it currently includes Sharapova, Dwayne Wade and Manning...Peyton. No signs of Eli, not even in the coming soon section. It looks like Gatorade joined the league of companies scrambling to put together a commercial to knobjob Eli.

Commercial CRitic: Nike & Reebok Love Losing

Talk about kicking a man when he is down.

Nike and Reebok both made commercials celebrating the Patriots' loss in the Super Bowl. Both were insistent on poking the entire New England region in the eye with the word "perfect."

The overarching theme of the commercials are snide. It is one thing to congratulate a team for a great Super Bowl win, it is completely another to hark on the other side of the ledger celebrating a loss. Do Nike and Reebok now celebrate failures?

Sure, both spots make mention of the Giants, but they are overwhelmingly pro-loss than pro-win.

Another problem is that Nike's spot doesn't make sense. Is there an English major in the ad
department?

Perfect terrible beginning. (To this commercial)
Perfect injured Plaxico.
Perfect second loss.
Perfect broken Shockey.

??? I understand the chronological theme, but can't they make phrases that are literate. I don't even know what they are grasping for or how I am supposed to read it in my head. Is it...Perfect, Shockey's injured again.

Reebok!?! What are you doing giving Mercury Morris airtime. Isn't it enough that we had to suffer through him the entire postseason. I can't believe you were suckered into paying him.



If I were a New England fan, I would be looking at Adidas for my athletic wear.

Commercial CRitic: Super Bowl Edition

As part of my non-paying job of critiquing sports-related commercials, I was expecting to be busy last night. I even timed my piss breaks during Terminator commercials. However, I was sorely disappointed in the amount of commercials with sports figures considering this was a sporting event and the male 18-35 demographic would be tuned in.

Nevertheless, one commercial stood out that was right up ol' Dunbar's alley. Shaq Jockey.

Before there was Peyton Manning, there was Shaquille O'Neal. His hundred megawatt smile and willingness to put on any show and take any dollar made him a mainstay in the advertising business. He came charging back last night.

Glaceau Vitamin Water Superbowl Commercial: Shaq as Jockey

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The commercial immediately grabs your attention with the rolling thunder of horse hooves. The announcer brings you in further, but is drowned out plugging the product and the reasoning that Shaq is riding Chunk of Love. It doesn't matter. Shaq riding a horse next to small jockeys is funny.

Using his assets to his advantage by pushing off jockeys and holding a horse's nose back with his wingspan to win is just good jockeying.

The kicker for me was that after a couple hours I was able to remember that it was for Vitamin Water. Like everyone else, it takes me awhile to remember what the commercial was for, but this one came right back to me.

Although I wasn't sure whether the horse took Vitamin Water or Shaq, it made sense that either one was going to need a boost to win the race.

Congratulations Vitamin Water, you made a good Super Bowl commercial.

Congratulation Shaq, you roared back into the advertising scene, and it looks like you are going to need the new source of income really soon.

The Others:

Pepsi used its grab-someone-out-of-Ariel's-latest-magazine approach to advertising and had Tony Romo say "Justin?" in an otherwise interesting spot. What we learned about Tony Romo, he drives an SUV, may or may not know Justin Timberlake.

Peyton Manning and Derek Jeter have Poison Ivy's ability to make plants grow by touching them when drinking Gatorade2.

Ben Roethlisberger was taken down a notch with an American Idol promo. The bigger they are, the harder they fall, ey Big Ben.

Commercial CRitic: Nike Leaves Nothing but Questions

Nike attempted to replicate its magic.

Nike unveiled one of the best commercials of the year at the beginning of the football season with an animated sequence of Shawn Merriman and Steven Jackson titled Leave Nothing. The commercial was innovative and fun to watch. I turned my head to watch it when I heard the music, similar to the Burger King commercials a season before when you heard The King's music.

For the Super Bowl, Nike took a short cut and created a Madden version of the commercial for Strahan and Osi Umenyiora's trip through the playoffs. It flopped.



The animation starts well with the Umenyiora sequences against Tampa Bay, good DE moves. But then makes a wrong turn with Strahan. Is Strahan playing Strong Safety? Then he gets up to cover a kickoff?

It was as if the animators took their time doing the first two animations and then their feet were put to fire to finish it.

Strahan sacked No. 6 on the Packers. I checked, there is no No. 6 on the Packers. It would have made more sense to put Brett Favre on a stretcher throwing the ball in the NFC Championship game.

On a side note, it is nice to see when the animators for Madden are paid good money for a commercial they still can't have the offensive linemen make a block on their man. Watch the Left Tackle for the Packers trip while blocking air. Classic.

Nike forced this one and dragged down the Merriman/Jackson piece and Madden with it. I hope they have something better for the actual Super Bowl.

Commercial CRitic: Legendary Voiceover

Nike made me witness a new commercial this weekend. The new inspirational Air Jordan spot entitled "Become Legendary."

The commercial begins with Jordan boldly stating that "it is not about the shoes." An interesting concept for a shoe commercial. It is clear that this is going to be a classic inner-strength Nike spot.



The commercial takes advantage of the resurgence of high school video from the YouTubes. We have all seen the Reggie Bush high school montage and the amazing junior high kid that dominates hockey. We love old school footage.

The spot has strong overtones of the commercial from Mel Gibson's What Women Want (don't ask me why I know this) with the voiceover, but these tomes are Lombardi-esque and smart. Another issue is that while I consider myself a sports fan and can recognize just about any athlete during a interview, I can only guess to whom some of these athletes are. Since we are giving props to them as high school athletes, can't they put in the corner in an elegant font the name of the person and the high school? Maybe then I can comprehend more thoroughly the desire of the athletes.

However, the biggest concern is the contradictory nature of this commercial for Nike and the shot Mars Blackmon takes on his credibility. For years, I have been under the impression that "it's gotta be the shoes." Admirably, Jordan refutes the claim to Mars and is consistent with this voiceover, but as Mars showed, that is not the position of Nike.

The question is then if it is no longer about the shoes, why should I buy Air Jordans rather than Starbury Ones?

The commercial has a good message, but it fails to promote the product, the Air Jordan XX3, which I guess boxers, basketball, football and baseball players wear.