The Nike coverup continued Wednesday when Under Armour endorser Tom Brady showed up to a news conference with a piece of tape over the swoosh on the left arm of his official team sweat shirt.
In Week 1 of the NFL season, Washington Redskins rookie Robert Griffin III made headlines when he wrote the word "heart" over the Nike logo on his warm-up shirt. The league told Griffin not to obscure the logo in the future.
Nike is in the first year of its deal as the official outfitter of the NFL. Its swoosh appears on practice and game apparel. We wonder if all this logo-covering defeats the purpose of obscuring a logo. Isn't this just drawing more attention to Nike? That swoosh is so ubiquitous I doubt people even notice it anymore. Covering it draws attention to it. We know what's under there, Tom.
The swoosh is still the most powerful logo in sports and commands attention wherever it is; I don't know how noticeable it would be on a practice T-shirt or a sweat shirt worn at a press conference. How many people saw that picture of RGIII warming up after he covered the logo? How many fewer people would have seen it otherwise?
Maybe it's good marketing for Adidas and Under Armour. My guess is the stunt made casual observers -- the kind of folks who are swayed by endorsements -- associate RGIII with Nike.
It's like when an insurance company mentions another insurance company in a commercial and all it seems to do is raise awareness of the competitor. It's your commercial, Allstate! The instant you mention Geico, all I'm doing is thinking about those stupid cavemen. Then I'm confused as to which company's advertisement I just saw.
Thanks, @UniWatch