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How do you be different when begging for the services of the world’s most talented basketball player. If your Mike Girts, Ad Executive for the world famous Leo Burnett, the answer is simple, you stop begging.
If you have been living under a rock the last few days you might have missed that LeBron James is a free agent and everyone wants him. Even the Mavericks have been pining for an audience with King James even though they don’t have a prayer of landing LeBron. Last week Lebron’s camp sat down with the Knicks, Nets, Heat, Cavs, and Clippers who all begged Lebron to come there. They pitched him everything from celebrities to the powers of being a global icon and getting him to the billion dollar summit someday. However it was a bright guy from the city of Chicago who, with the help of a friend, decided to approach it differently.
Every city has been begging Lebron to come to them. Girts decided to dare him. It’s a novel approach since we live in an age where hero worship is at an all time high but it makes sense when you look what playing in the city of Chicago would mean for Lebron. There is that figure, that legend, that looms large over the basketball world and stands tall and untouched in the city of Chicago.
The conventional pitch would be to explain to Lebron that while Jordan did play here, it was over a decade ago and the city is ready for someone knew and never shall their two paths cross. But this isn’t a normal player in Lebron James and neither is the shadow Jordan had cast over the city and over the sport.
So Girts figured the best way to attack Lebron was be front and center with the legend of Michael Jordan and know that it didn’t matter what city Lebron went to, he’d have to take on Jordan someday if he wanted to be considered the best of all time.
The campaign was simple. Get the talented creative team from Leo Burnett to come up with some things to send Lebron to dare him to come to Chicago and take on the legend of Jordan head on. So they sent him a picture of the city of Chicago. With Jordan’s shadow cast over the city. And they asked “Can you Cast A Shadow This big?” They sent him a case filled with seven empty championship boxes and asked “Can You Fill These Boxes?” And last but not least they sent him a shoe box with the inscription:
“You’re a King but can you Live Up To A Legend? Can you take on the greatest challenge in sports. Look history in the eyes every night and refuse to blink? The fans of Chicago have one question for you: Do you dare to fill these shoes?”
Inside the shoe box were a retro pair of Air Jordans. Girts had dared the King to take the throne of a living legend. He dared him to challenge greatness. In the next few days Lebron will settle on his team, with the likely suitor being his current team in Cleveland. But if Lebron passes he’ll know that the challenge was thrown down to take on the greatest of all time on his home turf and he passed and answering the question in the processs.
Check out these pictures of the campaign Chicago presented Lebron James with:
