The latest Jordan ad is amazing.

I still love Mars Blackmon.

I kinda love the new Adidas 15 second spots for some kind of Giga (?) shoe.
One has a bunch of frogs of varying sizes all lined up in a row and croaking and the biggest one is in front until he realizes his voice is too deep and he jumps over the line to the back and then the song flows. (I'm probably not explaining this too well.)
There's a few more with kangaroos and football players.

I love the new Jordan ad, but while I appreciate it, I'm not sure the target audience will understand it at all. The most recent moment happened almost eight years ago.

I have a feeling that a lot of those references will be to old for the younger athlete to recognize. There are guys in the league who just toddlers when Jordan was winning slam dunk contests.

As a lifelong Bulls fan who enjoyed the Jordan years, this ad brings back great memories. Every single play is a lasting image in Bulls history. I think any basketball afficionado who has watched any "greatest plays" compilation will recognize these classic Jordan moments. It's even sweeter for those of us who are old enough to remember the actual games they come from.

I mentioned this over in "Commercials we love", but there's a new-vs-old comparison for the new Jordan ad.

The title of this thread reminds me of a classic family story --

So my parents are on a vacation in Martha's Vineyard. Mom's doing some shopping and Dad is wandering around by himself. As he is, he suddenly notices Spike Lee, about three blocks away, also walking down the street in Dad's direction.

Now, there are many things Dad could have said when they passed each other. Dad could have commented on DO THE RIGHT THING, on SHE'S GOTTA HAVE IT, on MALCOM X, or on any of his other films. But instead, Dad waited until they were just about to pass each other, and as Spike Lee glanced at him, Dad looked him in the eye and asked, "So, IS it the shoes?"

And Spike Lee cracked up and shook his hand.

Has anyone seen the commercial where Steve Nash shoots getting by all the other tall knicks...I love the music that plays and the narration. It is a quote by Mahatma Gandhi, and it goes like this - " Strength is not measured by physical capacity. It is measured by an indomitable will". Just Brilliant.

I am so surprised that the Nike legal department allowed the scene in the Vince Carter ad with the kid jumping off the ladder in order to dunk. Despite the don't try this dislcaimer, it is totally something I would have done at his age after watching the commercial. It is also something I would have busted myself up trying.

OK, having scoured the net for the Nike "Tailgating" ad, I came across the studio (?) that shot it and had put up a 640x480 version. I am now 99% sure that's Terry Crews (now of "Everybody Hates Chris") in there as the office dude.

Thanks for posting that link, arc -- and props to whoever put in the work to make that video. Great attention to detail in that ad, even the Craig Ehlo guy is spot on. By the way, how iconic is Jordan that whenever I see someone posting up and holding the ball out with one hand, I instantly think of him? Legendary.

I'm don't think the target audience is necessarily younger guys because LeBron, D-Wade, etc. have a lock on that now. I think the Jordan shoes are aimed at guys in their 20's and 30's, who still hoop it up -- and when they do, they're wagging their tongues. Up until the final scene in that ad, unless you're a Jordan fan, people probably think they're watching a collection of various kids playing basketball, not replaying vintage Jordan moments -- so there's almost an "insider" feel to the commercial. You recognize "Oh, that's from the '92 Finals" or "Hey, that's when Bryon Russell got posterized," and I think that's the audience the ad is going after.

I hope the people who market ads with athletes come some day to realize that WE DON'T KNOW who some of these people are. I can't tell you the number of times I've seen a commercial with a "sports star" (usually basketball which I don't watch since I find it boring) and I'm supposed to know who he is in order to appreciate the ad. Do some of us a favor and show their names at least so we have a clue what is going on!

Nike is always good for good ads. There was a series of ads (I think it was called "Symmetry") that showed people doing one sport then cutting to a totally different sport, but the same body position. I'm describing them poorly, but they were astonishing in their coolness.

I know it's not technically a sporty ad, but "Terry Tate, Office Linebacker" is one of the greatest series of ads ever. "You NEED to put a COVER SHEET on your TPS REPORTS--hey, Gina!--MOTHAFU--"

Are you talking about the Nike "Move" ad? It is one of my favorite commercials - great music, concept, editing... I am totally in love with Wieden + Kennedy.

http://www.boardsmag.com/screeningroom/commercials/250/

That link you posted arc was awesome...

Ah, yes, Loqi, that's it! Still looks cool. I love the unexpected sport things in that ad too--the guy playing Golden Tee, the little kid falling back into the pillows, the base jumper.

"The Michael Vick Experience" is a fun ad, too.


ETA because it's a q, not a g.

The "click-clack" Under Armour ad that they played during the draft really got me excited for football. Sure, it got old after the 30th time I'd seen it, but there's nothing like a good football commercial.

I'm still absolutely amazed by the Gatorade commerical that has the famous sports moments (Jordan, Dwight Clark, Jeter's Throw) not happening because (I guess) they weren't drinking Gatoradre.

The beginning of the commerical when Jordan misses that shot against Cleveland is completely jarring. I'm impressed at how they spliced the actors in to mix with the old footage so well.

I love how they have Craig Ehlo jumping up and down, hands raised triumphantly. It's the perfect counterpoint to his actual reaction.

I don't remember what it is for (perhaps Gatorade?), but the commercial featuring the travails of USA soccer to the tune of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" is really growing on me. It does a good job of creating an "underdog" vibe for the team.

That was great. And as a born-and-raised Buckeye fan (my parents met at THE Ohio State University), it was awesomeawesomeawsome to see A.J. Hawk. Apparently, Under Armor is very strict about airing only non-enhanced displays of physical ability, so all the feats you see in UA ads are 100% real, which makes this even cooler: A.J. Hawk was so fast when running with the weights & chains on him, the cameras literally could not keep up with him. A.J. Hawk is the man (although his "click-clack" seemed a little off beat).

I just saw that spot (called "Winning Formula" if Youtube deletes it again); thanks for mentioning it, Darkknight.


It is awesome how the deleted scenes from that season have finally come to light... Ah well, I'm glad the writers didn't go that way. (grin)

(edited to change URL since Youtube removed the one I first linked to.)

Sprite is running this ad in the NBA playoffs called "Destination: Dunk". It's just dunk highlights with a mega-boring announcer trying to be exciting, saying things like "Stupendous!" as if he's never (1) seen a dunk before, (2) watched basketball before, or (3) heard that word used to actually describe a stupendous event before. It's so bad it sucks any energy out of a room. I mean, I was watching an exciting game tonight and any time that commercial came on I lost at least 25% of my enthusiasm for basketball (and life in general).

So, xaxat was all...


And I'm like...
Yep, it's Gatorade.

I'm not that much of a soccer fan, but this is one of my new favorite sports ads now. It's a clever inversion of every cliche usually put out in that sort of thing: the team isn't just an underdog in the 'the spread favors the other team way', the US team's apparently despised when they get there, and by the end it looks like they've won (at least some of) the crowd over.

It's a million miles from the sort of 'send a Dream Team over and dominate' sort of ad you'd get in other, similar situations.

Nike's new "Joga Bonito" ("play beautiful") soccer campaign is pretty good, and I'm always a sucker for nifty ballhandling tricks. I like their music choices too, particularly the song for the "Joy" commercial, the one where Ronaldinho plays a bit of indoor soccer cut with him doing the same thing as a little kid.

It took me a bit of searching to find the song was Baiao Destemperado by the Barbatuques. (Apologies for not getting the accent marks correct.) The info was from this blog page, which also has helpful Youtube links to the five videos whose music he ID'ed.

Is anyone else horrified at the FSN commercials currently running for the local baseball teams? The voice-over is announcing a play in which the runner and catcher collide at the plate and the video is showing all kinds of "regular" people running into people and totally flattening them. The tag line is "we're all (insert local team here)" I realize there are some rabid aggressive sports fans out there but I didn't know we were applauding them now.

Speaking of ballhandling tricks, a couple of years there was an ad featuring the Brazilian team dribbling through an airport doing really nifty tricks. Does anyone know what product this was for? My favorite soccer related ads remain the Nike ones produced for the last World Cup that feautred the world's best playing cage ball to a remix of an Elvis song. Great music, great ballhandling and an inspired star turn by Eric Cantona.

My favorite sports related ad right now is the long version of the Rip Hamilton Boost Mobile one with him as a funeral director. The pimped out hearse with the custom RIP plates, the pyrotechnics gone bad and him patting the guy on the ass before the funeral make me laugh every time.

I love the new Gatorade "Big Head" commercial with Wade, Jeter, KG, Jennie Finch and Peyton Manning.

"Shut yo big head up!" Bwah!

Nike, "Airport '98", directed by John Woo. In the 90 second version, Cantona can be seen in the airplane they dribble by for a second. BTW, Nike's "Secret Tournament" campaign in 2002 was directed by Terry Gilliam.

BTW, you gotta be impressed with Nike's campaigns for the World Cup. Adidas is the actual official sponsor and will remain so for the next two Cups too, yet in 2002 more Brits thought Nike was the official sponsor.

Thanks for the info arc! I was poking around trying to find it and found this site that you might appreciate. It has dozens of old soccer related ads from companies like Nike, Adidas, Coke and others, including Nike's Good vs Evil which I had forgotten about (and features Eric as a player!)

I agree with you that Nike's campaigns pretty much bigfooted Adidas' during the World Cup. But from what I have seen so far this year, I prefer the Adidas campaigns this year. The reactions on everyones face in the Jose +10 ad, when he picks Beckenbauer and he actually shows up makes me laugh every time. I learned soccer in the '70's watching "Soccer Made in Germany" and Franz was the man!

I LOVE that commercial. It is so freakin' cute. D-Wade is the best IMO. Everything about that commercial is just adorable.

I really like the Adidas ad with the little Latino kids choosing all the different World Cup players for their soccer game. I can't say why, but I enjoy it verily, and that's that.

My fiance speaks Spanish (Viva Mexico) and really knows soccer, so he had to explain to me what was happening. Know that I know, I think it's a really cute ad. Still, the only person I can recognize is Beckham.

I love this comercial because even though I don't speak any Spanish and haven't paid attention to soccer in years, I was able to understand everything that goes on. It's beautifully done: from everybody's reactions when Beckenbauer and Platini actually show up, to the way Jose picks up the coin after the toss (saying, I think, "I'm the captain."), to the chuckles when one of the boys tosses the goalie gloves to Defoe (who's a striker).

There's a second part that I think has just started to air, and that one's full of great details, too.

My favorite sports ad is the Lance Armstrong one where he's just riding, and riding, and riding, and then: Just Do it. It's the perfect tie in of branding and an actual sports star, and it gets me every time.

And pretty much any sports-related ad during the Olympics makes me cry, but that's just me. I'm an Olympics whore.

I think the ads for the Baseball All-Star game are irritating, because of their stupid slogan, "This One Counts!" As opposed to what, exactly? The other all-star games? The regular games during the rest of the season?

Well, in fairness, other league's all star games have no impact on the playoffs at all, so.

I like this commercial too, but I am a total soccer dummy. Are people surprised Beckenbauer showed up because he's old now (I did a quick search for him, so at least I know who he is now!)?

Also, the Big Head ad kind of disturbs me. I don't like to see big heads on tiny bodies. But I do love "shut yo' big head up!" I say that to my husband at least once a day.

IIRC, the winning league earns homefield advantage during the World Series. But, like the NFL's Pro Bowl, most don't play like it counts for anything. (Pride, anyone? If you're afraid of injury in a 'meaningless' game, let someone go who wants to earn his spot, not just have an excuse to get drunk all week).

That's part of the joke, I think that everyone assumes that they are picking current stars, and wonders why Jose wants to pick someone who's best days were in the 70's, but then (through the magic of special effects and to everyone's surprise) we see Beckenbauer as he looked back in his prime running onto the field.

Speaking of sports commercials, I haven't read any comments about the current series of Nike commercials that has a young (high school or college-aged) actor playing a football player, which opens with Deion Sanders playing his dad, Don Shula as a coach and sees him get leveled by Brian Urlacher, among other cameos. It's absolutely surreal. Any comments?

Nike's ads are always a little out there. Who's the blonde babe who's playing Deion's missus?

I was watching swimming this afternoon (to see Michael Phelps, of course!), and I saw some cute commercials.
My favorite showed some kids drawing a swimming pool with chalk on their sidewalk, and when their mom called them to come inside, they were all wet, and one was wearing goggles :-)
Aww, go swimming - it's cute!

I really liked that swimming commercial with the kids' chalk drawing, too. I watched every commercial break during the weekend swimming coverage carefully, but that was mainly due to the Michael Phelps speedo commercial. They should have that on 24-hour loop somewhere.

Was Mary Poppins watching over them?

The new one for the NFL network with the tagline: The Manning's are ready for football season.

What's with the apostrophe? It's a national ad and there's no one proofing the on-screen text? I know I'm a grammar Nazi, but COME ON! (tm Gob Bluth)

One: Manning. More than one: Mannings. It's simple.

I liked that one too - and not because I was a swimmer and I coach swimming! Also, I know it's been played a lot, and will continue to be played over the next week until the Open is over, but I love the Nike Maria Sharapova ad.

Oh for Pete's sake. I haven't seen that commercial, but that's pathetic.


How about NASCAR commercials? Dale Jarrett's UPS Racing the Truck ones are so wonderful. And there's so many that are good. Anybody else a NASCAR fan? Or is it just me?

rebl rn, I love the Jarrett commercials for UPS and the Michael Waltrip commercials for Aaron's with DW and his NAPA commercials, especially the old ones with Junior. The Coca-Cola ones with the multiple drivers and the Lance Armstrong-Tony Stewart-Bobby Labonte one where Tony starts shaving his legs are riots, too.

Love the Sportscenter ad where the Manning family (Archie, wife, three sons) are touring the ESPN studios and Peyton and Eli act like a pair of primary schoolers.

Re: the Sharapova "I Feel Pretty" ad: is that Mary Pierce as the blonde usher/security guard or are my eyes just wishing it so?

Has anyone seen the new Nike commercial that uses Johnny Cash's version of "Hurt?" I can't explain it, but the use of it just seems wrong in a sports commercial given the origin of the song. The use of the original NIN version would be just as bad as using Johnny's version. They are showing the struggles that athletes go through, but way to take this incredibly emotional song literally. I'm sure Johnny Cash was thinking, gee, Nike could really get some miles off of this when he recorded it. Also, I wonder if Trent Reznor has any say in Nike using the song, since he did write it and he owns the song, technically. He's not the type to allow his music to be used in commercials. Eh, maybe I don't like it because it's one of my favorite songs of all time and I hate seeing my favorite songs used in million-dollar ad campaigns.

I love this one too, but somehow had no clue that was the Manning family; just thought Peyton and Eli were somehow along on a random group tour. Now really I want to see it again!