Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Upstate NY
Posts: 10208

Baseball sells 'Spider-Man' ads on bases; Nader rips deal
May 5, 2004
SportsLine.com wire reports

NEW YORK -- Spider-Man is coming to a base near you.




In the latest example of a sponsor's stamp on the sports world, ads for the movie Spider-Man 2 will be placed atop bases at 15 major league ballparks during games from June 11-13.

The promotion, announced Wednesday, is part of baseball's pitch to appeal to younger fans -- and make money along the way.

"This was a unique chance to combine what is a sort of a universally popular character and our broad fan base, including the youth market we're trying to reach out to," said Bob DuPuy, baseball's chief operating officer. "It doesn't impact the play or performance of the game."

While commemorative logos have been on bases for special events such as the All-Star game or World Series, the Hall of Fame knew of no other commercial ads on bases, spokesman Jeff Idelson said.

Nowadays, ads can show up just about anywhere in sports.

Telecasts of major league and college football games, for example, include virtual ads visible just to TV viewers. College football bowl games are named for advertisers. Boxers' backs bear stenciled ads. Just last week, a court ruled that Kentucky Derby jockeys could wear sponsors' patches on their uniforms.

"I guess it's inevitable, but it's sad," said Fay Vincent, a former baseball commissioner and former president of Columbia Pictures, which is releasing Spider-Man 2.

"I'm old-fashioned. I'm a romanticist. I think the bases should be protected from this. I feel the same way I do when I see jockeys wears ads: Maybe this is progress, but there's something in me that regrets it very much," he added.

The movie promotion has been in the works for more than a year and will include ad buys and ballpark events, such as giving masks to fans, said Jacqueline Parkes, baseball's senior vice president for marketing and advertising.

The ads, about 4-by-4-inches with a red background and yellow webbing, won't appear on home plate.

"Spider-Man 2" opens June 30, and the weekend in early June was picked because it is during interleague play, which draws higher attendance than usual.

"We need to reach out to a younger demographic to bring them to the ballpark," Parkes said. "They are looking for nontraditional breakthrough ways to convey Spider-Man messaging. ... It's the future of how we generate excitement inside the stadium and about the game itself."

Baseball will receive about $3.6 million in a deal negotiated by Major League Baseball Properties with Marvel Studios and Columbia Pictures, a division of Sony Inc., a high-ranking baseball executive said on condition of anonymity.

The New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox will get more than $100,000 each, one team executive said, also on condition of anonymity. Most of the other 13 teams playing at home that weekend will get about $50,000 apiece, the team executive said.

Parkes said the amount a team receives depends on the level of its participation. Geoffrey Ammer, president of marketing for the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, was not immediately available for comment, spokesman Steve Elzer said.

Ralph Nader, a presidential candidate and consumer advocate, criticized the deal. He wrote Tuesday to baseball commissioner Bud Selig, denouncing the decision to have ads on uniforms during the season-opening series in March between the Yankees and Tampa Bay Devil Rays in Tokyo.

"It's gotten beyond grotesque," Nader said. "The fans have to revolt here. Otherwise, they'll be looking at advertisements between advertisements."

Gary Ruskin, executive director of Commercial Alert, called for baseball fans to boycott Sony products. Nader is the chair of the organization's advisory board.

In separate promotions, the bases also will feature pink ribbons Sunday as part of a Mother's Day promotion to raise breast-cancer awareness, and they will have blue ribbons on Father's Day, June 20, to raise prostate-cancer awareness.

John Hirschbeck, head of the World Umpires Association, said the ads won't make it harder for umpires to make calls at the bases. And it wouldn't bother him if umpires' uniforms had ads -- as long as they share the profit.

"We've got it on jockeys' pants. Why not?" he said.

Vincent, brought into baseball by commissioner A. Bartlett Giamatti, wondered how his friend would have reacted. Giamatti, who died in 1989, rhapsodized about baseball is essays such as "The Green Fields of the Mind," in which he referred to second base as a "jagged rock" in the middle of the field.

"Wherever he is, Bart is spinning," Vincent said. "It's a good thing he's not around."

http://cbs.sportsline.com/mlb/story/7307857
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Doubly disgusting, since I get to agree with Ralph, too.

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Registered: May 2002
Location:
Posts: 9001

It's retarded, but that's just another reason to hate Selig.

The sport is still rather quite nice.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: LfuckinA
Posts: 3383

I fucking HATE Bud Selig. Aren't his four months as interim commisioner up yet? Bastard.

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Registered: Aug 2001
Location: SF Bay Area
Posts: 581

I predict we'll see the infield grass cut into the shape of the Hulk's head by the time the playoffs roll around.

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Registered: Feb 2001
Location: Oakland-ish
Posts: 6036

your movie must really suck if you have to go to such extremes to remind people to go see it.

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Registered: Mar 2004
Location: Iceland
Posts: 974

quote:

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Originally posted by Inky
your movie must really suck if you have to go to such extremes to remind people to go see it.

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Registered: Jun 2001
Location: Charlotte, NC
Posts: 1006

Good to see all this advertising and my ticket prices on the rise....

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: zanzibar
Posts: 10477

"We need to reach out to a younger demographic to bring them to the ballpark," (Baseball's senior vice president for marketing and advertising Jacqueline) Parkes said. "They are looking for nontraditional breakthrough ways to convey Spider-Man messaging. ... It's the future of how we generate excitement inside the stadium and about the game itself."

What a moron. At least just say "Hey, I am doing my job and bringing in more ad revenue." How would Spiderman advertising bring someone to a baseball game?

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Registered: Sep 2003
Location: Knoxville, TN
Posts: 413

man, that really really pisses me off.
im a baseball purist. i hate the DH. I think the AL is far inferior to the NL. I love seeing 1-0 ballgames. I love the strategy of the game, I think that seeing a properly executed hit and run or sacrafice fly is just as exciting as a home run. But man im telling you...that really pisses me off selling ads on the bases

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Yeah, I'm there
Posts: 3304

quote:

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Originally posted by MstrG
"I guess it's inevitable, but it's sad," said Fay Vincent, a former baseball commissioner and former president of Columbia Pictures, which is releasing Spider-Man 2.

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Registered: Mar 2004
Location: Iceland
Posts: 974

Vyper speaks clever!

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Yeah, I'm there
Posts: 3304

teh clever is me!

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Upstate NY
Posts: 10208

They changed their minds!

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: zanzibar
Posts: 10477

Its funny, I was thinking today that Universal could just back out and give the reason as respect for the game. They ended up with more publicity then they planned for, but also would have received it for free.

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Registered: Nov 2003
Location: armpit, wv
Posts: 1217

Too bad. Just think of all the steroids they could've supplied their teams w/ the money being paid for the ads. Baseball may never be the same.

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: The Bottom of the Toyem Pole
Posts: 9466

Good to see this didn't come to pass.

Spiderman 2 looks like a great flick, btw.

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Posts: 10318

well i don't see the point anyway, nobody can see the top of the bases, at least with any detail, other than the players themselves. The exceptions being something like a close call at first base where they may show an overhead view replay. But even being rare, it really cheapens the game, and alters some pretty general and well-established ... uh was gonna say perceptions but I think facts is more accurate ... about the game (like bases are 15x15 and white without cartoon characters on them). Nearly every flat surface in MLB ballparks is an ad as it is, and I don't really have a problem with that, but I definately think any advertising needs to stay outside the field of play. I also think the players who claim they do it all for the "love of the game", need to come out and publicly state that this is too far, but unfortunately I think the lack of the love of the game in todays players, and the pure greed that is present in baseball today, have already stifled any potential player protest.

Now if you really wanna hate MLB, I submit Carl Pohlad, the owner of the MN Twins, as a case study. Pohlad, a billionaire banker who made his fortune forclosing on family farms, has maintained the lowest payroll in the MLB for years (3 or 4 at least, maybe as far back as 93, I don't care to research atm). We are teh major league farm club, we find and train the talent so other teams can recruit them. Despite playoff appearances year after year, which really can't be explained by anything other than luck, he refuses to re-sign our stars, or even meaningfully negotiate with some of them, and even with some even publicly stating that they're willing to play for less in MN. So the fans watch their favorite players walk away every year, some destined to become superstars, and then see it repeated the next year, and the next.

And that's the start, this year he decided to hold the entire state for ransom. Nobody can see the Minnesota Twins play baseball on tv this year, except for something like 19 Friday games, except on pay-per-view in select areas. Seriously. Not that there weren't any bids from local, and even national networks, it's all about suckering more money out of the game. He struck a deal with some new startup all-sports channel called Victory Sports to carry the games, and now Pohlad & Victory are trying to strong-arm every cable company in MN to carry their retarded network on standard cable but at HBO rates, and there's no doubt Pohlad gets a kickback from every one who signs on.

I love the Twins, but this whole situation is so sour i've taken to watching niggerball. Go T-Wolves!

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: zanzibar
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quote:

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Originally posted by Dingle
We are teh major league farm club, we find and train the talent so other teams can recruit them.

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