Gatorade (or, “G,” if you prefer) is releasing a new Michael Jordan Gatorade in preparation for his Hall of Fame induction. I have received  a sample of it, and it is awesome. It is, in fact, better than real Gatorade. (Proof you say? How about this: I exercised after drinking it. And I’m a blogger who’s scared of the sun. What more do you need, kind sir/madam?)

Anyway, the G peeps are doing a big push on it, and it makes sense: while Gatorade is symbolically embraced within sports culture, no one athlete is more recognizable with the brand than Jordan himself. And part of that push is the new commercial for this G product that you see below.

Double bonus? Everybody’s favorite pop-culture-meets-sports blogger Chris Littmann (of FirstCuts fame) was able to find, via HypeBeast, a video of the artsy people assembling the commercial. Naturally, it’s quite awesome.

See it after the jump. Keep reading →

OK, so maybe it’s not actually better. But it’s certainly pretty darn good. You may remember this creative, Guy Ritchie-directed advertisement from Nike, in which we get a first-person view of what it’s like to be scooped up by Arsenal and have everyone love us, dubbed “Take It To The Next Level”:

And here’s the new ad from the FA — the Football Association, if you’re scoring at home — which is even exactly the same length as the Nike spot:

I think Nike could have saved a lot of money if they’d just hired the FA guy to direct.

(Via.)

As was previously speculated (and now is near official), some NFL practice jerseys will feature advertising/sponsorship this season. Does this bother you? Make you mad the NFL is going after more cash? Cheer up, bro. Don’t worry about it. The patches are small. It’s a practice jersey. You will survive. I promise. But, the natural progression will be for real jerseys to sport advertising sometime in the future. It’s a staple overseas on soccer jerseys; I’m actually surprised in our consumerist and money-driven society this hasn’t happened yet.

Oh, but it has.

Monday, the New York Times reported the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury are going the sponsor route, dropping all “Mercury” and “Phoenix” references on their jerseys and in their place “Lifelock” will now appear. The WNBA is calling this “innovation”; Others are calling it “doing anything to not go under.”

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So, if you haven’t noticed, Vitaminwater has been advertising the crap out of LeBron James and Kobe Bryant with this 24 vs. 23 campaign. It’s been a staple during commercial breaks on TNT during the playoffs, and a supplement to the debate on ESPN.com. Or maybe I shouldn’t call it a supplement … I SHOULD CALL IT A SITE TAKEOVER:

This originally worked out well for Vitaminwater. Everyone thought the Cavs and Lakers were going to the Finals, and that would have meant more exposure and more money for them. Also, everybody likes debating about LeBron and Kobe because it makes them feel special inside. But this brilliant marketing ploy is starting to crumble.

LBJ and the Cavs are down 3-1 after last night, and the Nuggets are giving the Lakers a run for their money in the West, as that series is knotted at two games each headed into tonight’s game.

According to Darren Rovell, Vitaminwater might be scrambling to use two of its other endorsers that play for the opposing squads:

As we eluded to last week, Orlando Magic center is a Vitaminwater guy. Well, so too is Denver Nuggets guard Chauncey Billups.  If it’s Magic-Nuggets, expect the folks at Vitaminwater to utilize both Howard and Billups in some sort of spot. Ad insiders are certainly watching to see how quickly the brand can put something to market and whether they’ll just do Web advertising and YouTube or if they’ll be nimble enough to put something on the air.

Another option? The Lakers win and it’s Dwight vs. Kobe. Then Vitaminwater can just dub Howard’s face on top of LBJ everywhere in the existing ads, and call it a day. No one will notice.

And by “no one” I mean “everyone.”

With each passing year, March Madness On Demand gets even more boss. This year, with the ability to toggle video quality, (at its best, the picture is really quite fantastic) there being no virtual lines to wait in to watch a game and little buffer time or bugs, you have quite the terrific streaming video service. Other places should take note.

CBS just sent out a PR e-mail about MMOD through Sunday and the traffic numbers are pretty impressive: 5.6 million unique visitors have arrived at the video player, up 60 percent from a year ago. The total hours of live streaming video and audio consumed is 6.5 million, which is up 71 percent from last year. These are numbers your portfolio would kill for right now.

But, on the tube, the growth isn’t there. From Michael Hiestand at USA Today:

CBS lucked out in primetime Saturday, when marquee teams Duke and Gonzaga won close games to produce a game rating up 20% from the comparable time slot last year.

But in total overnight NCAA game ratings through Saturday, CBS is up only 4% from comparable coverage last year. Its games have averaged 5.1% of TV households in the 56 urban TV markets measured in overnights.

That’s not saying much. National ratings for last year’s tournament averaged 5.6% of U.S. households, the only time that NCAA tournament average has dipped below 6% except for 2003, when basketball coverage was interrupted for reports on the Iraq War. The long-term trend: CBS’ tournament game average last topped 8% in 1994 and last topped 7% in 1998.

But, setting that aside: TV is still king. Hiestand later notes that in totality last year, CBS’ TV coverage attracted 132.2 million viewers, which obviously blows the online player out of the water.

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Tiger Woods returns to action this weekend at the WGC Accenture Match Play Championship. So, Nike made a somewhat humorous commercial about it. Observe:

Ha, that’s funny. The party is over for the likes of Trevor Immelman, Stewart Cink, Anthony Kim, Justin Leonard and Carl Peterson. Except, as Josh Alper points over at NBC today, this really doesn’t make any sense at all.

The problem is that the party’s just starting for those guys. With Woods back, more eyes will be watching tournaments when Kim plays well and that will benefit him the way it helped guys like Sergio Garcia and Phil Mickelson grow in stature as would-be Woods killers. Woods has to slow down at some point, that’s just a guess since he’s never shown a sign of it, and whoever emerges as the world’s best player will reap massive benefits as the man who slayed the king.

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Woods’ tide lifts all boats, both in financial renumeration and amount of attention. Just ask Rocco Mediate, who went from anonymous tour member to media darling because he lost to Tiger at Torrey Pines.

This is an interesting take, and I’ll say that it makes a hell of a lot of sense, especially to the casual golf fan. Woods is golf. Golf is Woods. But hey: I suppose Nike can slip up here and there and we’ll still be gobbling up their commercials.

They do have an impressive track record, after all.

Don’t you hate ads? You do, don’t you? You hate ads so much you actually start watching “The Office” and “30 Rock” like 20 minutes late, just so you can fast-forward through them. You realize this activity may be hurting two shows you dearly love — after all, that’s how TV shows generate revenue: ads — but you don’t care, because you just hate sitting through ads so much. Always with the Drinkability and driving mechanics. Enough already.

Now, realize the hatred you have for advertising. It’s deeply ingrained, isn’t it? And then realize how great an accomplishment this is: Nike’s ads are not only good. They’re not only catchy. They don’t merely create that consumer itch for sick sneakers. They’re genuinely, unironically enjoyable pieces of televised art. Observe:

First, the Jumpman ad that aired throughout the All-Star Weekend. It was shot by Dark Knight cinematographer Wally Pfister. Yeah. (That last little Carmelo Anthony dunk grunt is utterly sublime):

Each time that came on over the weekend, not only did I not fast-forward, I watched it a couple of different times. Touche, All-Star Weekend.

Next is this Nike Soccer ad, via Dave Warner and the ShareBros. Again with the awesomeness:

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