I took the sell-out route last time when I used Coors Light in my comparison to Terrell Owens (see: here). It’s not really my style; I’m more of a craft beer kinda guy. But when the beer is cold and someone is good enough to offer up one of his own brews, who am I to turn my nose? That would be sinful, no? Not to mention it would go against any and all social norms.
So while I sat in my neighbour’s garage on my fold-out lawn chair awaiting the start of the Cowboys-Giants opener, I was handed said beer, which happened to be King Bud. Honestly, it has been ages since I’ve had a Budweiser. Sure, I have seen about a thousand commercials, most of which I happily recite because frankly they are quite good, but not one drop has reached my mouth in well past forever. Before I even opened my mouth to sample the beer, I looked at the label and was reminded of those commercials. Would the beer disappoint, or does it really warrant the attention it gets, and the price it demands?
While I was set to watch the Giants, my Budweiser can best be compared with a New York based football player, but not for the Giants. Tim Tebow is the Budweiser of the NFL. Simply put, he is a below average beer that has been hyped to death to the point that some people actually think he is a legitimate beer, err, player.
What is it that makes so many people buy into Tebow? The most common explanation is “He wins”. Jesus, really? Talk about looking at the glass half full. Look from the other side of the table and you might notice that perhaps his team would have won more but for his ineptitude. Yes, he plays very hard, I won’t take that away from him. As a long-time Florida Gators fan I have followed his career for ages now it seems. But I think his proponents are very eager to believe he was responsible for the wins, but fail to realize many of his loses might not have been loses with an average NFL quarterback. His record in Denver wasn’t horrible in that he had a nice win:loss ratio, but the wins simply cannot be attributed to Tebow.
I finally cracked open my Bud, flung my cap haphazardly at the plastic bag my host had hanging for garbage, and swigged. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but on the positive side, at least it was cold. The best way to describe my overall thoughts of Budweiser is that it’s like the most boring cereal… you know, those corn-type flakes. It’s just uninspiring, with a bland taste and no finish. It’s not horrible, even though it seems as though that’s the decision it seems that I’m going to eventually arrive at. It just has no “wow factor”. So why is it the most popular beer on the planet? Well, it might be one the most hyped products anywhere, in any industry. Well, apparently Tebow’s PR person spends his or her time off in the Hamptons with the Marketing guys from Budweiser.
Tim Tebow is a household name, and there is no denying that. In fact, it would be interesting to compare his popularity with very good quarterbacks amongst non-football fans and I bet he beats many. I’ll give you Peyton, Ben, Tom, and Eli, (and Vick, for not-so-good reasons), but do you think Rogers, Brees, Stafford, and Rivers are more recognizable than Tebow? I’m not so sure. My point? Sometimes it’s all in the packaging. The bigger the package the better – most women will agree.
As I finished my Budweiser, well into the Cowboys-Giants game, it came to me; “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder”. What I see in Budweiser is the label – the corporate sigil branded on my beer, and in my face almost every time I watch football. It’s not the beer I dislike, it’s the marketing. Why? Well, because I said at the outset, I really enjoy sampling beers produced by small-time brewers, not the gigantic brewmasters. The problem is that before I even tasted my beer, I already had preconceived notions. I made up my mind that I wouldn’t like it. Similarly, people have that notion of Tebow.
I’m certainly not going to defend any of his horrendous statistics, because after all, I’m like most of you are in my bewilderment of how people can think he is “good”. That said, I bet many people who have determined that they dislike Tebow (due to his play…some dislike him because of religious beliefs, which I have purposely avoided discussing) arrived at that decision well before seeing him play a great deal. It’s not wrong, it’s just our nature.
So the next time you see a Bud commercial, or watch someone “Tebowing”, take a minute to decide for yourself why it is you have chosen to either like or dislike. It seems that in both Tebow and Bud’s case there is no middle ground – you are either a fan, or not.
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