Call me a sucker but I really love the LeBron/Kobe puppet commercials. I think they’re hilarious and probably the best example of NBA-related marketing since Mars Blackmon declared “It’s gotta be the shoes!”
My question, however, is if people perceive an actual rivalry among the two superstars. Unquestionably, they’re the two best players in the NBA, but are they really rivals? They’ve never played against one another in an NBA Finals or competed for a scoring title. One could argue that, maybe, they fight for the annual MVP trophy but Kobe and LeBron have only finished 1-2 in the voting once (last year) and it wasn’t even close enough to say that the vote was split along the rivalry’s fault lines.
A rivalry requires either a true, mutual hatred –– think Knicks/Bulls or Knicks/Heat –– or a competitive environment with an extremely big payoff, akin to Larry Bird’s rivalry with Magic Johnson. I don’t get the sense that Kobe and LeBron hate eachother and, as we already know, they’ve only played a handful of entertaining but ultimately meaningless regular season games since LeBron entered the NBA in 2003.
My sense is that the puppet commercial is great fun…but someone might want to tell that to ESPN since they seem to market the twice-annual Lakers-Cavs games in a disingenuous way.
Thoughts?
My question, however, is if people perceive an actual rivalry among the two superstars. Unquestionably, they’re the two best players in the NBA, but are they really rivals? They’ve never played against one another in an NBA Finals or competed for a scoring title. One could argue that, maybe, they fight for the annual MVP trophy but Kobe and LeBron have only finished 1-2 in the voting once (last year) and it wasn’t even close enough to say that the vote was split along the rivalry’s fault lines.
A rivalry requires either a true, mutual hatred –– think Knicks/Bulls or Knicks/Heat –– or a competitive environment with an extremely big payoff, akin to Larry Bird’s rivalry with Magic Johnson. I don’t get the sense that Kobe and LeBron hate eachother and, as we already know, they’ve only played a handful of entertaining but ultimately meaningless regular season games since LeBron entered the NBA in 2003.
My sense is that the puppet commercial is great fun…but someone might want to tell that to ESPN since they seem to market the twice-annual Lakers-Cavs games in a disingenuous way.
Thoughts?
2 comments:
Interesting points... I think that Nike is trying to trump it up more than it is... because they only play each other twice per year right now. however, nike was really banking on them meeting in the finals last year (and maybe this year too). Right now, they are rivals in the sense that they both want to be MVP and NBA champs... they just haven't met up yet in the playoffs.
I'm not a big fan of the puppet commercials right now. However, if there was some sort of competitive, or rivalrous, aspect to the puppet commericials, i feel like they would be much better. Instead, Lebron and Kobe are like Bert and Ernie.
Maybe come playoff time they'll come out with a more rivalrous puppet commercial.
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