Ahead of his astonishing ninth appearance in the NBA Finals, Nike rolls out a new spot recounts a tale of how the Cleveland Cavaliers super star ended up with his famous tattoo.
The new spot, created by regular Nie creative agency Wieden + Kennedy Portland, carries a simple message: the biggest believer in James’ as a sportsman and a human being is LeBron himself.
Leveraging spiking hoops excitement around the 2018 NBA Finals, the sportswear behemoth puts arguably its biggest athlete ambassador front and centre of a new ad campaign launched on the eve of Game 1.
The ad’s narrative sees a (CGI) young man enter a tattoo parlour in 2002 and hand an ink artist a piece of paper. The tattoo artist initially questions the teen’s choice before eventually agreeing to do it.
As the story evolves, the camera pans up to reveal a young LeBron wearing a St. Vincent-St. Mary’s college hoodies, before the last shot zooms in on the paper to reveal the ‘Chosen 1’ design.
The endline appears on a black screen reading ‘Always Believe’: a phrase used to describe him on when he was the cover story of Sports Illustrated aged just 17.
First launched via the player’s own personal channels,
the campaign then rolled out on all the usual Nike channels and on television from 30 May.
It’s one thing to put words on your back. It’s another thing to live up to them. #alwaysbelieve #nike @KingJames pic.twitter.com/q04oVa6gNc
— Nike (@Nike) May 30, 2018
The content pieces also carry the hashtags #alwaysbelieve and #nike.
Comment:
The ad is based on James’ tattoos: he really does have the phrase tattooed on his back.
For a man often considered the greatest of all time (often in competition with Michale Jordan), the Cavaliers star has been to the NBA Finals eight times in a row.
It is thus safe to say he’s lived up to the “Chosen One” billing given to him 16 years ago.
Racking up 5m YouTube views on Nike’s own channels, as well as a further 4m on the player’s Instagram feed, the Nike/LeBron combination continues to impress in both creativity and engagement.
After picking up the Cleveland Cavaliers and carrying them on his back to the NBA Finals, James – who has been in the Nike sports star stable since 2003 – once again faces the daunting Golden State Warriors.
This is the fourth consecutive time the two have squared up in the finals with Golden State winning in 2017 and 2015, while the Cavaliers won in 2016.
Links:
Nike
https://www.youtube.com/user/nike
https://www.instagram.com/nike/
https://plus.google.com/u/0/111647990267476504720
Wieden + Kennedy Portland
