MLB Embarks On Aggressive In-Season Marketing Campaign For League's Young Stars

MLB says that it is "going all out to market its stars this year, producing commercials and other content featuring young stars" like Angels CF Mike Trout, Dodgers RF Yasiel Puig, Pirates CF Andrew McCutchen and Dodgers P Clayton Kershaw, according to Liz Mullen of SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL. The effort, which is "being produced with players despite their busy in-season schedules, counters a knock on baseball that it doesn’t spend enough time marketing players." MLB CMO Jacqueline Parkes said that the league has "created 293 pieces of content featuring all 30 clubs and 76 players so far." By the end of the season, MLB should "have more than 500 unique pieces of film content to air on television and social media." MLB COO Tony Petitti said that the league has "focused on players before but never as aggressively or intensely as it has in this campaign." The new campaign is "different in that it focuses on players’ athleticism and personality on film and highlights events on the field as well as their interactions with fans in the stadium." MLBPA Dir of Business Affairs & Licensing and Senior Counsel Tim Slavin said that highlighting the players "has long been something that the union wanted," and something that MLBPA Exec Dir Tony Clark "had been pushing the league to do." Both Parkes and Slavin said that the union "helped the league in making players available to be filmed." Before the season, MLB "targeted nine" players -- Marlins RF Giancarlo Stanton, Tigers P David Price, Orioles CF Adam Jones, Brewers CF Carlos Gomez and Mariners P Felix Hernandez, as well as McCutchen, Trout, Kershaw and Puig. MLB "added players as they became stories during the season." The commercials and other film "was produced" by MLB's new creative agency Anomaly, N.Y. (SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL, 6/22 issue).