Spiderman in Red Square

OK, this might just be the biggest non-news story of the year.

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.

Here's what the ad is comprised of:

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

The only reason this has any chance of being a successful advertising campaign, is because it's been picked up by every news outlet in the free world. How the hell is a 4-inch square going to convey its message to anyone watching on TV or sitting in the stands? At best, you would be able to discern that it is, in fact, a square-shaped marking on the base, and that it's some shade of red.

It's actually quite a genius bit of marketing, create a "controversy", and get the enlarged image of your ad splashed all over the TV and the internet. It worked for Moveon.org's proposed Super bowl ads. Also, check out this rationale behind the ad campaign:

"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."

By putting little red squares on the bases? Are you high? Do you really want to attract a younger crowd? How about doing something about ticket prices so that maybe, just maybe, the average working stiff could actually afford to take his kids to a ball game.

"Daddy, Daddy, can we go to the Red Sox game this weekend? I want to see those little four-inch red squares on the bases. That would be real keen! I've never seen four-inch red squares before!"

Sheesh.

UPDATE (5/7/04): Well, surprise, surprise, surprise!

A day after announcing a promotion to put advertisements on bases next month, Major League Baseball reversed course yesterday and eliminated that part of its "Spider-Man 2" marketing deal.

No shit, Sherlock. There's no way I'm the only one who sees this latest turn of events as nothing more than how this was planned all along. Why pay for an expensive ad campaign when you can get the national media to do it for you? If the Associated Press wants to promote your product worldwide for free, you'd have to be a moron of epic proportion to pay anyone for a smaller-scale promotion. Notice though, at first glance, this write-up makes it appear as if Major League Baseball was the party who pulled the plug on this, but we read a little further to find:

"(President of worldwide marketing for the Columbia Tri-Star Motion Picture Group, Geoffrey) Ammer said his group approached baseball about pulling the bases promotion."

File this one under "Duh".