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Swing and a Miss

Opening Day for the Rockies at Coors Field is just two days away and we’re pumped. We’ll be rooting for you, Rox. But this ain’t no sports blog, so let’s talk about advertising.

The Rockies have created six new commercials for this season. A few are already in rotation. Check out two of them here. Or, if you’re busy, let us give you the short version. Take some weak jokes, throw in some bad acting by professional athletes and POW! that’s a foul ball to our funny bone. Wait, that wasn’t our funny bone. That was our solar plexus. Oh jeez.

For comparison, here are three new spots for the Toronto Blue Jays, created by Publicis, Toronto (via Glossy). Admittedly, these aren’t grand slams (sorry) either, but they have something really cool – footage of athletes being athletes and not trying to be actors. The idea focuses on the athletes in their youth, portrayed by young actors, displaying early signs of super human athleticism. Each spot is punctuated with game footage of the real heroes in action. Not a new idea, but the execution is nice. Good job, Canada.

Now here’s our point: Playing professional baseball takes tremendous talent. Doing comedy also takes tremendous talent. There’s no shame in admitting that you can’t do both. You don’t see Gallagher trying to throw sliders at Wrigley, right? So fellas, in the future don’t feel obligated to get in front of the camera for anything other than games and champagne-soaked victory celebrations. We love you for being you.

One more note on the Rockies creative. Over the past few years, the work has featured the Rockies “R” in the context of other words. Gen“R“ation. Humido“R”. Thunde“R“storm. And so on. Can you please stop doing this? We get it. A lot of words feature the letter “R”. Neat.

There has been plenty of great work produced for professional sports teams all over the country. If you have any favorites, please share. Just not the “Broncos Country” work. We’ll tackle that in the fall. (Get it? Tackle? Man, that’s good stuff.)

41 days ago / / Link

Comment

  1. Thank you for adding the work from Publicis in for comparison. It is the perfect illustration of the point many have been trying to get across on the Egotist, what most of Denver considers great is pedestrian when held up to much of what the rest of the country is doing.

    And please, please, please stop the R campaign. It would have been embarrassing back in 1980.

    — hack boy · Apr 2, 05:41 AM · #

  2. Is the Rockies stuff by an agency? Or is it some sort of DIY job by the team’s marketing deptartment?

    — Andy Bosselman · Apr 2, 07:53 AM · #

  3. That’s a good question. We’ve been trying to find out. We’ve heard it’s an in-house operation. Judging by the treatment of the graphics, that’s a safe assessment.

    Anyone out there know?

    — The Denver Egotist · Apr 2, 08:07 AM · #

  4. Hack, I don’t think any of us are under the illusion that the Rockies ads are great.

    — justinpaluch · Apr 2, 08:44 AM · #

  5. It is a completely in-house operation. And I believe it just a solo “Creative Director” doing all the work.

    The Oakland A’s do a lot of really nice work (that I can’t seem to find). But the A’s are also a great organization that looks at player talent in different ways to work within their small budget. They are very successful with it on the field, and I think one of their print campaigns was in C.A. a while back.

    — Baller · Apr 2, 09:41 AM · #

  6. I feel like they missed an opportunity to capitalize on the success they had last year.

    — dorns68 · Apr 2, 10:19 AM · #

  7. It wasn’t about whether they are great or not. It is about this being the face of Denver advertising the rest of the country sees.

    On a regular basis, we allow hack work to represent us outside our borders. Can you say you wouldn’t honestly like a shot at doing the creative for the Rockies? This is another example of a squandered opportunity for Denver to shine.

    — hack boy · Apr 2, 10:54 AM · #

  8. Why wouldn’t the Rockies spend SOME money on their advertising’s creative with someone here in Denver?

    Maybe it’s because Tulo has already raided the petty cash box. On second thought…Tulo could fund the entire ad budget himself after his new contract this year.

    Sometimes you wonder if the Rockies think what they’ve done inhouse is good creative… why bother trying to convince them what REALLY is good creative.

    go *R*ockies!

    — Jay Weise · Apr 2, 12:10 PM · #

  9. R campaign needs a facelift.

    — Randall Erkelens · Apr 3, 02:23 AM · #

  10. “why bother trying to convince them what REALLY is good creative”

    Did I seriously just read that?

    — names have been changed · Apr 3, 08:13 AM · #

  11. I heard that Todd Helton freelanced on these.

    — Mike King · Apr 5, 11:05 AM · #