Few professional athletes have ever been bigger than George Herman “Babe” Ruth.
His achievements on the baseball field were epic, garnering him the nicknames “The Sultan of Swat,” “The Colossus of Clout,” “The Titan of Terror,” “The King of Crash,” and of course, “The Great Bambino.”
Arguably, the greatest player in the game today is Alex Rodriguez. A-Rod has a few nicknames, too:
- After leaving Seattle for a “contender,” he signed the largest contract in baseball history to play with the Texas Rangers—a team that has never contended—he became “Pay-Rod”
- He’s known as the “The Cooler,” since teams go cold when he joins them and hot when he leaves
- Several nicknames I won’t repeat due to his philandering, most notably with Madonna
- In light of the recent steroid revelations, he’ll forever be known as “A-Roid,” “A-Fraud” and “Alex Roidriguez”
Still, prior to the steroids news, baseball fans held out Rodriguez as the one person that might be able to remove the asterisk from Barry Bond’s home run record.
What does all this have to do with Responsible Marketing?
Baseball has a trust problem, and last April I asked the question, Can Responsible Marketing save baseball?
In it, I was hopeful that some of the things the MLB was doing might be able to help baseball regain its footing.
But as the highest paid player in the game, A-Rod’s irresponsible and fraudulent actions have a reverse halo effect (also known as the ‘devil effect’) on the MLB brand.
So, now I’m left asking the question again, do you believe Responsible Marketing can save baseball?
What’s your take?
