#TBT Thanksgiving Edition: Bad Things, Man
By Mike Cardillo
Allow me, on this Thanksgiving holiday, to indulge in a little nostalgia. Apologies in advance and admittedly I myself wonder, “why this is post?”
Anyways, for a period in the late 1980s to mid 1990s sports commercials were very important, mostly from Nike. Granted it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to wax nostalgic for a corporation such as Nike, but for whatever the reason their ads were awesome, captivating and — a lot of times — the only time you saw athletes outside of the games and or the VHS highlight tapes that came when you renewed Sports Illustrated. I guess when you’re a “kid” you don’t really consider the power of advertising and corporate profits or whatever, you just like to see cool stuff.
Remember this was before YouTube, social media, etc., so there remains a fond spot in my heart for the Mars Blackmon Michael Jordan spots, the Bo Knows campaign, Charles Barkley telling everyone “I am not a role model,” Lil Penny, Kevin Garnett’s Fun Police and even that crazy soccer ad where Eric Cantona fought a team of hellspawn. There’s a lot of them and again, nostalgia is almost always personal and if I overlooked one of your favorites, it wasn’t intentional.
Two decades after the fact I still don’t know what to make of Nike’s campaign NFL campaign around the league’s 75th anniversary. On paper it sounds patently insane: Dennis Hopper plays a burnt out (possibly homeless) former football referee and raves like a maniac/stalks Troy Aikman, Bruce Smith, Barry Sanders, Sterling Sharpe and other stars of the era to sell Nike gear.
Somehow, circa 1994, these crazy Nike commercials worked, man.
I don’t know if a counterculture icon of the 1960s actually helped sell football turf shoes, but they sure were fun to quote during seventh period study hall.
On this day of thanks, let’s remember these throwbacks to a kinder, gentler time of selling athletic wear.