I’m not a sports guy, so I’m only dimly aware of who LeBron James even is. And I think Nike’s advertising has become increasingly pretentious and unappealing over the last decade or so. Which means this TV spot is nearly insufferable to me, clocking in at a patience-straining minute-and-a-half in length, nearly all of it consisting of James asking variations of the rhetorical headscratcher, “What should I do?” (I know he recently ditched his old team for a new one in what I gather was a very uncool fashion that made a lot of people very unhappy, so the ad actually comes across — in my eyes, at least — as a childish “screw you” to his former fans, which doesn’t seem like an effective way to sell overpriced sneakers. But as I said, I’m not a sports guy, I really don’t understand LeBron’s situation, and I’m not the target demo for this ad, so what the hell do I know?)
However, there are ten seconds in this drawn-out pile of hokum that are actually really cool, from about 0:56 to 1:06. Take a look:
It always brings a smile to my face to see one of my old fictional friends, and I thought this little cameo was exceptionally well done, recapturing exactly the right tone and world-weary nobility in only a few quick brush strokes. Of course, music helps immeasurably. For the record, that is the authentic, original series music playing in the background. Just in case y’all aren’t enough of a fan to know…
I am so lost. This is what I get for not having a TV. Then again, this is why I don’t have a TV to begin with.
Robert, I’m surprised you didn’t get this. I know you don’t have a TV now, but the bit of the commercial that got me excited is referencing a pretty major pop-cultural phenomenon from the ’80s…
The white guy who’s waxing philosophical is the actor Don Johnson, reprising his iconic Miami Vice role of Sonny Crockett, right down to the signature costume and facial stubble. As I said, the tone of the old series and character is spot-on, and the music playing in the background is the authentic “Crockett’s Theme.” Hence the big smile for me, an old-time Vice fan.
Lebron James is a giant douchebag. The way he left his old team (the Cleveland Cavaliers) was as disgusting as anything I’ve seen an athlete do in recent years. If any big-name athlete right now karmically deserves a serious injury — say, a ripping asunder of both ACLs — he’s the one. I hate the guy.
Jaq, how exactly did he leave the Cavs? I don’t dispute your opinion in any way, I’m just wondering what he did that was so awful…
I got the Miami Vice reference, though I confess that I never actually watched the show even in the 80s. It’s the rest of the commercial that confused me. Especially at the end, where it turns out that it was supposed to have been about shoes?!
Oh, I see… that’s what I meant about the Nike ads getting pretentious. Over the past few years, there’s been a trend toward commercials that don’t directly reference whatever they’re selling, and Nike is one of the worst in this regard. They seem to think that there’s something deeply entertaining, or moving, or something, about barely literate, overpaid man-children waxing philosophical about… nothing much of anything except themselves. (Not that I have a bad attitude toward pro athletes over anything, no, not me…)
Well, James’s ties to the Cavaliers go back to when he was a kid. He grew up in Akron, OH, very near Cleveland, and he was a highly touted young basketball player very on. When he was drafted by Cleveland, there was a big sense that he was the hometown kid coming home to bring his long-suffering team and fans a winner. And for a while, it worked — his Cavs were usually good, and the last two years, they were VERY good, coming close to winning the title both years (losing the Conference Finals one year and the NBA Finals the other).
But then his free-agency year came, and he started very publicly courting other teams and making a big show of deciding where to go. He continuously maintained that Cleveland was in the mix, but it turned out that he and two other very good players who were also free agents were basically planning to all end up in Miami together. He then told ESPN that he wanted to have an hour-long live show where he would announce his decision, and ESPN obliged him. That was when he told everyone that he was going to Miami — when he had told Cleveland just minutes before the show aired about his decision.
This all came a month or so into the free agency signing period, so by the time Cleveland learned that their efforts to retain their superstar player were fruitless, most of the other good players available in free agency had already signed elsewhere. He basically put the Cavs in a very tough situation, didn’t tell them what his plan was, and screwed them publicly. It was absolutely despicable. I’ve never seen anything like it before in sports.
A clear case of overweening ego. I agree, despicable and pretty unbelievable, even by the standards of pro athletes and their usual displays of arrogance. (How can you tell I’m not a fan?)