Europe Here We Come!

You had to know it was only a matter of time before we took a page from our European counterparts and started turning our athletes into walking billboards. I just don't know that we thought it would happen this soon. You can blame it on the recession, our slumping economy, or the pressure on businesses to make a few extra bucks, what it really comes down to one simple truth...it makes all the financial sense in the world.

Marketing is about getting one's brand out to the public, we see advertisements on cars, on highways, on TV, even on the bodies of boxers, why not on the jerseys of the greatest athletes in the world? This won't start and end with "LifeLock" being adorned on Phoenix Mercury jerseys, that is only the precipice of the marketing mountain. Quite frankly, the WNBA needs these extra dollars just to survive. But don't be surprised if we start seeing more and more company names and logos on fields, courts and ice.

I think what will be more interesting is how the public reacts to these changes. We all cried foul when Comiskey Park became US Cellular Field, Jacobs Field went Progressive and Candlestick Park became a Monster...how will we feel when a Five-Dollar Footlong is on the helmet of an NFL team?? In Europe, teams and fans seem to enjoy the mammoth marketing machine and here in the States we eat up all those cool-looking soccer and rugby jerseys. Now that ManU has dropped it's sponsorship with AIG in favor of Aon, won't people be buying the jersey just because of the new design? Don't we buy some of those jerseys for the look as much as the team?

But fear not folks, I don't see these material changes taking place in the four major sports for another few years, just don't be surprised though when you relax into your Madison Square Garden seat sponsored by Scion for a match up between The New York Cableguys and The Detroit Dodge Caravans in a 2012 playoff game presented by Pizza Hut.