When Does It Hurt The Brand?
by AndyPanda on Mar 7, 2010 8:36 PM PST
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PrintThat's the main question left when digesting continuing events in Eugene. While marveling at how certain powers that be appear to have fired the Ducks' winingest basketball coach ever, the research was interrupted by the latest arrest of a football player.
Linebacker Josh Kaddu, 19, was cited Saturday for being a minor in possession of alcohol, according to a Eugene police report. An officer observed Kaddu trying to pry open a car door shortly after midnight, and when questioned, the sophomore appeared to be intoxicated, and was unresponsive, police spokeswoman Melinda Kletzok said.
Kaddu was cited and released. At least he wasn't driving, though maybe that would have only been a matter of time.
When will the general public make a change in a buying decision in response to Nike's association with the University of Oregon? Will they ever?
Will a major Eugene area corporate sponsor/advertiser ever hear from their customers that association with the never-ending series of problems has prompted some of them to distance themselves from the situation?
When, or if, this happens, watch how quickly changes are made. Until then, one can only wonder, do Mike Bellotti and Chip Kelly honestly think that the UofO brand and image are un-damageable?
Ticket and advertising sales, and contributions, will tell the tale. Or lead to a new deal for the rights to be the "Official Beer of the University of Oregon."
This is a FanPost and does not necessarily reflect the views of SB Nation or the Building the Dam staff. FanPost opinions are valued expressions of opinion by passionate and knowledgeable Oregon State fans.
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You pose a good question, but if you think about it, I don’t know if stuff like this actually hurts a brand. The stronger your brand, the quicker or easier your recovery and let’s face it, uo’s put in work in that particular department. Within the program and the uo community, most people still think they’re the shit and believe each player will be exonerated through due process…
From the outside in I’d say the damage is again minimal. So far this has just been a series of punchlines—Blount pun not intended—with the exception of the very serious, very disgusting charges against James. The DUII’s, MIPs, thefts, assaults, facebook posts and other crap just make it look like a freaking circus down there. Once we get some verdicts and some sentences we’ll be able to determine what damage is done. I will say that if James or Masoli wind up being guilty that’s going to look bad and could potentially ding the uo image.
Won't matter at all
Honestly, Oregon is just the ‘flavor of the month’ with this junk. By this time next year, all will be forgotten.
by I_Hate_Your_Ducks on Mar 8, 2010 12:26 PM PST up reply actions
At some point,
history suggests it will hurt the brand. See Miami and Oklahoma. The question is where is the tipping point.
I raised the brand theme for two reasons.
For one, there are a lot of people increasingly upset by the pattern of problems, and speaking up about it. BUT, they are NOT the ones laying out BIG $, and wielding political clout. They aren’t upset, and won’t be until they see the brand threatened.
Which leads to reason number two.
I continue to hear talk about a lack of “institutional control” in Eugene. Mostly from those who confuse control with an interest in controlling something.
The instant Phil, or any one of several other key supporters, lose a significant contract, and the reason is a desire to not be associated with the way the brand is being run, everyone will find out quickly just how much institutional control they have down there.
Andy Wooldridge, andy_wooldridge@yahoo.com
Go Beavs!
See Miami and Oklahoma.
I think Oklahoma’s brand is still pretty respectable while The U—and even UW—did far more dirt than Oregon has done this far this off season (still six months, I know), so the comparison is a little difficult to make there.
I definitely agree that if the right people cared, this could be fixed or at least addressed. Doing all the dirty laundry behind closed doors has its advantages (privacy, etc.) but it also lets everyone in the community guess and hypothesize about what’s happening or, worse yet, what’s NOT happening.
Never
The events in Eugene pail in comparison to some the atrocious things that have occurred at Florida and Alabama in recent years. (And the corresponding punishments are ridiculous.)
It would behoove this blog to do a little research, find out the offenses perpetrated by players at big name schools (Florida, Alabama…) in recent years and the punishments allotted to the offending players. You’ll be able to draw little comparison between the severity of Kelly’s punishments and the severity of other big-name school coach’s punishments.
As long as there is such a disparity as this, Nike will be able to point to Oregon as having ‘higher expectations’ and therefore being the most worthy of the brand… or something like that…
You’ll be able to draw little comparison between the severity of Kelly’s punishments and the severity of other big-name school coach’s punishments.
The jury’s still out on this, wouldn’t you say?
As long as there is such a disparity as this, Nike will be able to point to Oregon as having ‘higher expectations’ and therefore being the most worthy of the brand… or something like that…
I don’t know what you’re trying to say here. Disparity in offenses/punishments? Do you really think that’s the reason Knight/nike kick down funds into the uo athletic dept?
So does that mean you are worried about us worrying about you worrying about our brand?
its spelled "S-H-U-F-E-L-T-O-B-L-I-G-A-T-E-D-T-O-D-O-I-T"
I’m very, very worried.
Worried like Beckham gets worried….
by ArbyOSU on Mar 8, 2010 4:22 PM PST up reply actions 1 recs
David. David Beckham. Has-been english soccer star. LA Galaxy? Come on Shu—I don’t even follow soccer and I know who he is. Of course, it stems from my intense love for the Spice Girls.
The guy in the glasses? Wait. What were we talking about?
This is a thread about the spread offense, right?
Just so I got it right…
What I see when I look at that picture:
What you see when you look at that picture:
its spelled "S-H-U-F-E-L-T-O-B-L-I-G-A-T-E-D-T-O-D-O-I-T"
by JShufelt on Mar 8, 2010 4:43 PM PST up reply actions 2 recs
Shouldn’t you guys be worrying about things pertinent to Oregon State athletics, such as the $5.5 million deficit the Athletic Dept. is running? Just sayin’…
probably not.
Life is about growth. People are not perfect when they're 21 years old. - Bill Walton
by NEP on Mar 8, 2010 4:34 PM PST up reply actions
Yeah
I think everyone is under estimating this whole thing. This much stuff with Chip not taking any action really puts a Black Eye on the Program nationally. And these are just backup players, the wins will also be in jeporady if Masoli is found guilty.
I Hate Your Ducks
i dont agree. w/ spring and summer practices, i think the potential loss of any player would be minimal unless its a Vince Young type of player that whole offense it based around. whatever happens w/ LMJ, it will hurt his individual brand (NFL) innocent or guilty.
Life is about growth. People are not perfect when they're 21 years old. - Bill Walton
by NEP on Mar 8, 2010 4:46 PM PST up reply actions
Of course little brother is worried
What is bad for the ducks is bad for Oregon and as such bad for the barkrats. Our on field success has led to people outside of the state paying attention and noticing that there is a school in Corvallis. They dont want us to become the next decades UW and Wazzu any more than we do.
I think you're missing the point.
Namecalling aside (which doesn’t help anything to the conversation, BTW), the incidents are typical of a program on the rise. See the multiple arrests in the last 4 years at Florida (27), Georgia (30), Tennessee (21), etc. I don’t see any tarnish on their branding. People may label them as such, but they are still getting top athletes and (in some cases) winning games.
While I as a Duck fan am not happy to see any Oregon student-athlete get into any sort of trouble (academically as well), we seem to forget that they are young and starting to see the limelight on a national level. Some people don’t know how to handle it until it is too late. One thing is for sure; the ones that can handle it and want to succeed, don’t screw up. That is it.
I have confidence that Belotti and Kelly will handle things as they should be handled. If its something law related, let the law handle it and make it a school issue second. If its school related, let the school handle it. It will all work out in the wash.
May we hand you your taints on a silver platter...
I preferred marcoladuck's name calling! Why do you have to be so mature?
I mean, barkrat is so cutting edge…
I’m interested to see what happens when everyone has their day in court. Two things I found interesting was that the DUII kid pleaded not guilty and then the whole facebook fiasco. College kids are capable of some amazing stuff… In the meantime, I’ll continue reserving my energy for things more important… like reading on the toilet and going to the grocery store.
Gilbert Arenas and Zach Randolph hurt a brand; college kids don’t. there’s almost nothing a 19 yr old kid can do to hurt a universities’ brand. they can only help by winning and the accolades that brings. college kids don’t stay at a school long enough to do that kind of damage (see Baylor basketball), the kid either graduates or leaves the program in a short amount of time. the reason brands take a beating is when they have to use resources to continuously re-build and start over instead of growing. oregon does this as well as anyone.
Life is about growth. People are not perfect when they're 21 years old. - Bill Walton
And to a college team’s credit, you don’t sign 6-7 year contracts with your players/students… well, unless your name is Joevan Catron.
that why the kill brands. and the $100 mil contracts that they aren’t making up in ticket revenue. I was at a conference once where Larry Miller (President of the Blazers, ex brand mgr of the Jordan Brand/Division of Nike). he was basically hired to rebrand the blazers from the front office to the court. College sports will never have the same problems he had to deal with. heck, John Calipari is a saint in Kentucky.
Life is about growth. People are not perfect when they're 21 years old. - Bill Walton
by NEP on Mar 8, 2010 4:41 PM PST up reply actions
Please don't take this all the wrong way,
But I would think with all the examples of other schools being thrown out (Miami, UW, Florida, Alabama, Penn State…), couldn’t you look in the mirror and answer your own question?
Is your school still suffering from the damage of the Headline Cafe, Sheepgate, or Al’s Busshelter Cruise?
The Headline Cafe incident with four players beating a guardsman (on leave from Iraq) unconscious for marrying the wrong race is worse than anything any Duck has been accused of. Who did Riley kick off the team following that? As I recall, Rudolph ultimately transfered out after failing to adjust his attitude, but he wasn’t kicked out over the incident, and the rest of the players got right back on the field. Seigert was cited for DUI with a freaking STOLEN SHEEP in the bed of his truck. Afalava got drunk, smashed his car into a bus shelter, and ran off. Was Seigert even suspended? And Al got, what, 1 game.
How is your brand after all this stuff? Because it looks like Riley just sat back, did nothing, let the storm blow by then did a little “clean up” instituting conduct policies long after he might have had to make a hard decision. Al’s Bus Stop was only two offseasons ago. You (by which I mean some OSU critics here) say Kelly’s done nothing, but he’s already suspended a contributing player for the season for just a DUI, with no felonies added on top of it, a much harder line than Riley ever took with players who did far worse. Even if everything rumored about Masoli was 100% true it wouldn’t be worse than the Seigert or Afalava situations, for which those players were barely punished by Riley for things they were proven to have done. I haven’t priced a gay research-sheep or replacement bus shelter recently, but I’m pretty sure they cost more than a Macbook.
How did all this shocking lawlessness negatively affect your brand? Did people stop buying potato salad until Al Reser took his name off of the stadium? Or did the program just keep on rolling once the short attention-spanned media and fans moved on? I don’t mean to bring this up to bash your program, as it seems to be comprised for the most part of well-behaved kids, and Riley is an overall class act. It just seems curious that in the discussion you’ve missed maybe the most appropriate and obvious parallel.
What happened at OSU
did hurt the brand, and took the form of depressed sales, and reduced contributions.
There is only so much that can be done once incidents have happened, because they can’t be undone. Whether the publicly seen actions taken were sufficient and appropriate or not is always a matter of opinion.
As with any problem, what happens next is what tends to have the lasting impact. Proactive changes were implemented going forward, and there have been fewer incidents since.
Which is not to say there haven’t been incidents, of course there have been.
The two football players that got in trouble in Las Vegas were gone shortly afterwards. One wrestler has been sentenced to jail, and another is awaiting a sentencing hearing.
Oregon has surplus demand for football, something Oregon St. generally hasn’t had, so there is some cushion to absorb and replace lost customers, and therefore it is harder to measure any damage in Eugene. If the problems stop, there might not be any effective damage.
So far, the actions taken in Eugene haven’t clearly shown that they will stop the rash of incidents, only some time will tell for sure.
At some point, there is no doubt that this stuff will matter, the question is where the line is at, since it is in a different place at each program.
Andy Wooldridge, andy_wooldridge@yahoo.com
Go Beavs!
None of it really matters
Off-field highjinks by “student-athletes” is something for pundits and bloggers and Joe Six-Pack to blather on and on about but I seriously doubt if you follow the money that anybody up top really cares. Hurting the brand? Yawn. People don’t stop rooting for teams they’ve rooted for forever because of an incident or two or three or four or five or six. They may not like it but they compartmentalize it and move on. Some well-heeled booster may make a fuss and a certain amount of necessary boot-licking and bowing and scraping may be necessary but it’s short-lived. Maybe if it gets Miami Hurricane-esque some mom may convince her blue-chipper kid not to go there, but that’s a stretch.
However, when I’m feeling down I think of wee-tipsy Colleen and her thug/nanny and the rest of that gaggle confronting Canzano in a misguided attempt to defend the honor of her son/backup kicker/party animal and it brings a smile.
Joe A. out…
I think it helps the brand short term... maybe hurts it long term if it doesn't change.
The long term Duck fans will need 2 or 3 years of this before it is too much. The Ducks probably made a few fans out of this. Like this kid that always does the bench press at my gym in a Raider’s beanie… he has been showing up in Duck gear lately.
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Pacific-12 Conference Standings
(updated 1.2.2012 at 11:12 PM PST)
| North | Conf | Overall | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| W | L | W | L | |
Oregon Ducks
|
8 | 1 | 12 | 2 |
|
Stanford Cardinal
|
8 | 1 | 11 | 2 |
|
Washington Huskies
|
5 | 4 | 7 | 6 |
|
California Golden Bears
|
4 | 5 | 7 | 6 |
|
Oregon St. Beavers
|
3 | 6 | 3 | 9 |
|
Washington St. Cougars
|
2 | 7 | 4 | 8 |
| South | Conf | Overall | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| W | L | W | L | |
|
USC Trojans
|
7 | 2 | 10 | 2 |
|
UCLA Bruins
|
5 | 4 | 6 | 8 |
|
Utah Utes
|
4 | 5 | 8 | 5 |
|
Arizona St. Sun Devils
|
4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |
|
Arizona Wildcats
|
2 | 7 | 4 | 8 |
|
Colorado Buffaloes
|
2 | 7 | 3 | 10 |
Pacific-12 Conference Standings
(updated 2.6.2012 at 10:39 PM PST)
| Conf | Overall | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| W | L | W | L | |
|
Washington Huskies
|
9 | 2 | 16 | 7 |
|
California Golden Bears
|
8 | 3 | 18 | 6 |
|
Colorado Buffaloes
|
8 | 3 | 16 | 7 |
|
Oregon Ducks
|
7 | 4 | 16 | 7 |
|
Arizona Wildcats
|
7 | 4 | 16 | 8 |
|
Stanford Cardinal
|
6 | 5 | 16 | 7 |
|
UCLA Bruins
|
6 | 5 | 13 | 10 |
|
Oregon St. Beavers
|
5 | 6 | 15 | 8 |
|
Washington St. Cougars
|
4 | 7 | 12 | 11 |
|
Arizona St. Sun Devils
|
3 | 8 | 7 | 16 |
|
Utah Utes
|
2 | 9 | 5 | 18 |
|
USC Trojans
|
1 | 10 | 6 | 18 |
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