From postseason to pitchmen
Cohen, Mack and Trubisky aren’t household names, but they could be soon
When Chicago Bears running backs Tarik Cohen and Benny Cunningham went undercover last month in a filmed promotional stunt as baggers at a JewelOsco store in Gurnee, many customers had no idea who they were.
That’s about to change.
It may not be “The Super Bowl Shuffle” redux, but young and talented Bears players such as Cohen, linebacker Khalil Mack and quarterback Mitch Trubisky could see their marketing value skyrocket as the team makes its first playoff appearance in nearly a decade Sunday against the defending champion Philadelphia Eagles at Soldier Field.
“The Bears are being viewed as a team on the rise, with personalities and players that sponsors and the broadcasters and the media can invest in today because they’ll be around for a number of years,” said Marc Ganis, president of Sportscorp, a Chicago-based sports consulting firm.
The 12-4 Bears went from worst-to-first in the NFC North this season under rookie head coach Matt Nagy, notching their first winning record since 2012 and their first playoff berth in eight years. The sudden success awakened hibernating Bears fans, who have embraced the team with a passion not seen in more than a decade.
Marketers have taken note as well, Ganis said. Beyond the on-field mediocrity, the Bears have lacked character and characters for years, he said, a toxic combination when it comes to booking a spokesman to sell cars, fast food, salves or just about anything that can be hawked by the right NFL stars.
“For the last half-dozen or more years, the Bears have been a generally faceless franchise,” Ganis said. “Even when Jay Cutler was the quarterback, he didn’t really participate much in promoting himself or in sponsor activities. It wasn’t his thing.”
There has been little to stir the passion of fans or advertisers since the 1985 Bears won the team’s one and only Super Bowl. Even the one-off 2006 Bears team, which lost Super Bowl XLI to the Indianapolis Colts 29-17, didn’t boost its players to marketing prominence. Remember that commercial by quarterback Rex Grossman? No, you don’t.
Brian Urlacher, a Hall of Fame linebacker who played his entire 13-year career in Chicago before retiring in 2012, has been the most marketable Bear of the new millennium. His most prominent commercial pitch these days is as the face — or rather, the scalp — of Restore, an Oak-Brookbased hair restoration firm that turned the former Bear’s famous bald pate into a field of fuzzy follicles, plastering his image on billboards and TV commercials for the past three years.
Bears spokesman Brandon Faber said there are no team restrictions or guidelines for players and coaches regarding sponsorship opportunities beyond the governing language in their respective contracts and the NFL collective bargaining agreement.
If the new and improved Bears make it to Atlanta on Feb. 3 for Super Bowl LIII, Ganis said, a whole new crop of players could find commercial success. Topping the list, he said, is Mack.
The 27-year-old Mack, who played college ball at the University of Buffalo, was the fifth overall pick in the 2014 NFL draft by the Oakland Raiders. The AllPro and 2016 NFL defensive player of the year was traded to the Bears in September and signed a record six-year, $141 million contract extension.
His impact was immediate, lifting the Bears defense to the top of the league.
“Khalil Mack is considered maybe the best player in the NFL,” Ganis said. “If he performs the way he can — especially in the Super Bowl — he becomes the defensive face of the NFL.”
In his second year, Trubisky, 24, became only the sixth quarterback in Bears history to pass for more than 3,000 yards in a season, joining Cutler, Grossman, Erik Kramer, Billy Wade and Jim Harbaugh. While he’s not a full-fledged star, a good playoff run and a telegenic presence could make for commercial success in 2019, Ganis said.
Another potential breakout star is Cohen, 23, the 5-foot-6-inch running back who has electrified the Bears offense and was named to the 2019 Pro Bowl as a return specialist. Cohen gained more than 1,000 combined rushing and receiving yards this season, becoming a fan favorite.
“If people don’t use them for endorsements, they’re crazy,” said former Bears coach Mike Ditka, who guided the larger-than-life ’85 team and set the pace for commercial endorsements as well.
In November, Ditka, 79, was hospitalized in Florida after suffering a heart attack. On Friday, he was back on the golf course near his Florida home, handicapping the current Bears prospects for playoff and commercial success.
“I don’t want to jinx them, but I think they’re the
“Khalil Mack is considered maybe the best player in the NFL. If he performs the way he can — especially in the Super Bowl — he becomes the defensive face of the NFL.”
— Marc Ganis, president of Sportscorp, a Chicago-based sports consulting firm
best team I’ve seen all around,” Ditka said by phone between golf shots. “They don’t have any glaring weaknesses, and they can beat you in a lot of ways.”
Ditka said the commercial endorsements rolled in for the ’85 Bears after their personalities started coming out during a dominant season, epitomized by the brash “Super Bowl Shuffle” music video, which was released in December — the day after their only loss, to the Miami Dolphins.
Ditka himself has endorsed more than 50 products over the years, pitching cars, underwear, rustproofing, erectile dysfunction drugs, hot dogs, hair spray and toilet tissue, among other items. So prodigious was his commercial output that in 1989, then-Bears President Michael McCaskey asked his Super Bowl-winning coach to limit his paid endorsements.
The Bears fired Ditka after a 5-11 season in 1992, but his commercial profile has endured. He currently serves as TV spokesman for Blue-Emu pain relieving cream and remains unapologetic for leveraging his fame with paid endorsements.
“There’s a lot of things I probably should have done, a lot of things I shouldn’t have done ” Ditka said. “I’m not going to apologize to anybody.”
Grocery chain Jewel has been a Bears marketing partner for about a decade, mostly through losing seasons. The promotion that enlisted Cohen and Cunningham as baggers at its Gurnee store took place Dec. 10 — the day after the team beat the Los Angeles Rams 15-6 in a potential playoff preview at Soldier Field.
The running backs playfully engaged with customers, giving out free cookie samples, stealing a swig of a soft drink and handling the grocery bags with the flair of professional ballplayers.
“It was just a fun thing we did,” said Tina Browen, director of marketing for Jewel. “A lot of the customers knew who they were, but it was exciting to see some who didn’t know who they were.”
Browen said a Super Bowl victory by the Bears would absolutely improve the value of Jewel’s sponsorship. It would no doubt present higher-profile marketing opportunities for Cohen and his teammates.