No it’s not what you think, today Mike Schaffer and yours truly will be playing a PR version of Good Cop, Bad cop on the PR Breakfast Club for one Tiger Woods.

Here’s a brief excerpt from the site, click the links below for both sides and let us know what you think.

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, chances are that you’ve heard the sports news that has also made its way into the gossip rags and morning talk shows – Tiger Woods is returning to the PGA tour at the Masters.

While the return of the world’s top golfer will help the Tour’s ratings, it also marks an interesting event for the media. In his public apology spoken press release, Woods did not field any questions and has not answered any questions about his marital infidelity.  So while we’d like to say that the media will stick to the tournament at hand, drama sells and the opportunities for juicy questions and an irate golfer are some must-see TV in the making.

But hey, you don’t come to this blog to read about sports or infidelity so let’s get to the root of Tiger’s return to the PGA at Augusta National as a PR move – one that is safe, nostalgic and was strategically planned.  Much like a CEO, Woods is advised by some top notch PR folks who carefully chose when he would return to golf. Given the course’s history, importance and pageantry, the Masters is an intriguing choice for Tiger.  Our two in-house Sports PR experts don’t agree with each other on this topic:

What a great move

Dumb move, Mr. Woods

Remember when MySpace was cool? Don’t lie you had one of those profiles that was pimped out with music, photos and a background that no one could see.  It was cool and hip and more and more people were exposing their lives for the whole world to see. During that time I met Jared Carrabis, who was the founder and content producer of SoxSpace which was the hub for anyone with an interest in the Boston Red Sox. The community grew so large and powerful that it withstood an attempt by MLB to have the site purge all content that mentioned or used their content. At the time he was 18 years old and was starting his journalism career. While there were some folks who wished to throw dirt on the kid, I threw some kind words of advice (not sure if they ever helped) and let him know that if the book he was planning on writing ever hit the presses, I would give it a read. With that being said, here’s my review of the book:

Its no secret that Boston may be one of the most baseball-mad cities in the US (outside of maybe St. Louis).  Here’s a hilarious video from Townie News’ Paul “Fitzy” Fitzgerald, that offers a remedy for the sickness that has hit the Bay State harder than a Jason Bay moonshot the swine flu since the All-Star break – Soxycotin. Enjoy…

There is no question that the NBA wants to see their two biggest stars, and MVPs,  go head-to-head in the Finals. Its even been speculated among talk radio stations that the series may be fixed, but how can they be? Orlando has LeBron on the brink and Kobe can’t seem to get a hold of the gold up in the Rockies.

Regardless of what happens, we will always have a reminder of this playoff season in the awesome Nike video that went viral.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtzQ0eXVoJo]

While I don’t care who winds up in the NBA Finals, the league will want to avoid a series that no one will watch, much like last year’s World Series. the thug,human tattoo K-mart (I would love to be nicknamed after a value superstore) against Superman, dunk champ, RuPaul seriously who wants to watch that?

While the World Baseball Classic is supposed to be a showcase of the best players in the world competing for their countries, the tournament is lacking in drawing power. Whether it’s players pulling out, or pulling up lame fans of their local nine either don’t have their players in the fight or hold their collective breath until all of them return to their teams safely.

So when looking for a silver lining in this albatross of a tournament, its kind of fitting that someone who knows something of returning safely would bring the brightest spot to the tournament in the form of Sgt. Felix Perez, who carried a flag to the game that he brought with him from his home to his tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Image: Newsday

Yahoo: It accompanied Perez to Dolphin Stadium on Tuesday night. He needed some luck for his team, the United States, in its must-win World Baseball Classic game against Puerto Rico. Perez wore a Team USA hat and a Team USA hoodie, and his little sister, Jessica, draped his flag across her shoulders. The United States’ 6-5 come-from-behind victory in the ninth inning sent them into a frenzy. She danced around. He sat in his motorized wheelchair and roared.

On the way out, the 27-year-old Perez placed the flag in his lap and leaned over to a security guard manning Gate G. He was hoping some players from Team USA might sign it.

While this might seem like a small request what happened next was truly remarkable.

“The next thing I know,” Perez said, “I’m getting called to come back in there.”

And so began the coolest 30 minutes of Felix Perez’s life. On an evening when he felt especially proud to be an American – when a group of his sporting heroes wearing his country’s name across their chests banded together to win a game they had no business winning – Perez found himself surrounded by them, doused with celebratory Miller Lites, with the American flag that was with him during the worst moment of his life passed around the room and signed by every player on the team.

“Everybody,” Perez said.

Then they handed him a ball filled with signatures.

“Everybody,” Perez said.

The half-hour went too fast. Jimmy Rollins, who scored the winning run, wanted to chat more. David Wright, who drove it in, couldn’t hear enough about how the New York Mets are Perez’s favorite team. Almost half the team surrounded Perez for a photograph, the flag draped around his torso, a smile on every face, and none brighter than his.

Now that is a true class act from a team that has often felt like the rod team in their own country – These players took time that they didn’t have to give to offer a tribute to a real hero who risked his life so that they could play the game he loves every day.

Even if the team falls short in winning the tournament, yesterday’s event shows that they have already won and hopefully won over some fans.

Image Daylife.com

In the business of baseball, it is important for teams to make as much money that they can. Whether it be merchandising, TV contracts or tickets, the objective is to turn a profit.

When a team has attendance issues, they may install a flexible pricing platform where they raise prices for rivals and appealing opponents (or teams whose fan base travels well Yankees, Red Sox, Cardinals). This is an old practice and probably frustrating for the fans of the local nine looking to take their family out to random games. Take the Tampa Bay Rays for example: An outfield ticket is $17 for a regular game, $20 for marquee games and $24 for Prime games. Note the Rays don’t make it easy to find the definition of each game.

While I see no reason to argue with the pricing model, I do take exception for the new plan that I read about in Sports Illustrated from the . Instead of pricing per opponent, fans can expect to pay more/less pending on who the starter is for 2,000 of the hardest to sell tickets. Expect to pay more for NL Cy Young Award Winner Tim Lincecum each time he toes the rubber.

The price range is between $5-$50 with a day-to-day fluctuation of just $.50. Doesn’t sound bad and initial projections show $810,000 increase in revenue if all tickets are sold for a five-spot.

The plan would make sense, especially for a team looking to find a way to pay Barry Zito’s insane contract. However,

Image Daylife.com

I can’t help but laugh especially when the Giant’s VP of Ticket Services Russ Stanley notes that the light went on for this idea – scalpers during Barry Bonds’ home run chase.

“It was our softest opponent, softest day of the week, and tickets were only $10. We could have been charging $50,” noting that scalpers were bringing that in.

Only in America can scalpers start a trend on tickets in a sport married to its traditions. And if you were wondering the Giants have distanced themselves from Bonds and his legal circus.

Image SICovers.com

There was a time not so long ago that Sports Illustrated was known for putting curses on its cover boys, Life of Riley and a swimsuit issue. However after Riley jumped ship, there was no reason to read the back page and the cover jinx seemed to fade away (here and here).

While the magazine did add Dan Patrick, yes the former ESPN stalwart, that wasn’t the real story — Sports Illustrated turned into a first-class marketer for their authors’ books, even gracing the most recent cover.

First it was Tom Verducci and Joe Torre telling all about his Yankee years. The book excerpt shed some light into the behind the scenes drama. First there was the fallout with the GM and then the hoopla with Alex Rodriguez being a Jeter-junkie and A-Fraud. Then in the most recent issue, the aforementioned A-Rod graces the cover. However, its not for any heroic deed, but rather being exposed as yet another dirty player of the steroid era.

In the case of Verducci, the plug propelled his book to the top of the NY Times Best Seller list, prompting a book tour that would be more fitting for J.K. Rowling. As for Selena Roberts’ piece/excerpt, her book has been pushed up for an April publication.

No question as a timely sale for Opening Day. While I have no qualms with anyone making money, I do wonder where the line is with being a journalistic outlet and becoming a self-promoting platform. There is no doubt that having a best-selling author and scooping all major news outlets with bringing down baseball’s golden boy latest * will help sell magazines. However, why is a propaganda piece gracing the pages of a magazine that costs subscribers $54 a year?

I doubt that I will ever have an answer to the question. The stories may have peaked my interest, but I would rather wait for the paperback and I am kind of frustrated that two issues were filed with excerpts of three books – last I checked it was a sports magazine, not Readers’ Digest.

On the other side of the coin I think that it is a pure marketing genius by offering a product to your audience while promoting your writers. SI has managed to monetize their customers in every way possible.

When you start reading a book, you often want to get off on the right foot. However when the book opens with

Michael Irvin stabbing someone in the throat, you know you are in for a wild ride.

Growing up, I remember the Dallas Cowboys winning three championships in the 90′s. However, I really don’t remember too much about those teams. Which in itself is kind of hard to believe since the egos and clothing styles were larger than life. There was the Playmaker, Prime Time, Jimmie and Jerry.

Jeff Pearlman captures the essence of America’s Team as well as the times in Boys Will Be Boys. Drugs, sex, booze and more drugs with some football added into the mix.

Aside from the aforementioned characters, the book also breaks into the bit players and characters like Charles Haley who were much more in your face than anything that South Park could drudge up. Funny thing was that it was all true.

If you are a fan of the NFL or would like to know more about the last real-life Cowboys of the Wild West, then this book is for you.  On top of the stabbing there is plenty of full-frontal nudity (Haley), contract disputes, pissing contests, illicit plane parties and the White House.

On a scale of 1-10 I would give this one a 10 for content and 20 for shock value.

Ahh finally back after having no home access to the computer due to a nasty little virus for a week. It was like the cat from that old schoolyard song…you know it came back the very next day.

Well what a week it’s been. I am sure by now everyone is done with their Super Bowl hangovers. Outside of Pittsburgh and Arizona, everyone tuned in for the commercials – and I’m sure some viewers in Arizona were wishing they saw the commercials.

It leads me to wonder who the big winner was. While Budweiser made a number of big splashes with their Clydesdales and humorous Bud Light spots, I would not categorize them as the winner.

I know you’re thinking the creepy eTrade baby may have been numero uno, but again wrong.

The 3-D dancing lizards with my man Ray Lewis? Maybe if Stop & Shop or Shaw’s had the glasses. Damn you “super stores.”

My favorite was perhaps the most realistic of all of the commercials from our friends at Bridgestone.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sRofF_v6kk0]

Not only is the ad realistic comical, but it combines one of our favorite toys of yesteryear going through an experience that we all have, the nagging spouse. Now if only we could find a way to pop off her lips when we’re getting yelled at. I’ll take the eyes any day.

You can check out how Fox Sports ranked the ads, do you agree? Or do you have another one in mind?

Image courtesy of www.gocomics.com

I saw this cartoon earlier today on the homepage at GoComics and couldn’t help but see the sad reality that we now live in. I am not talking about the extinction of the rabbit ears, but rather the state of the youth in the country.

Instead of playing outside and building a relationship with good ole’ dad, the child would rather stick inside watching the Jonas Brothers, Cheetah Girls or American Idol. By blatantly marketing these shows as can’t miss broadcasting the Idol results on evening news, these shows become larger than what they really are ~ Entertainment.

With the media further glamorizing (and here) these pop stars and reality show contestants, it is no wonder that today’s youth shuns playing outside, joining Little League, or going for a hike as it’s simply easier and more profitable to strike it rich with some stupid human trick.

I thought I would never say it, but maybe we are better off without the constant drum of the TV.

We have all had our share of jobs that just didn’t meet our needs or dreams. The question is how many of us found our dream job, only to find out that the dream was more of a nightmare?

Image courtesy of Careerhub.typepad.com

As you ponder that, I’ll break into my story. While at college, I fell into the world of sports. Not as an athlete, but rather an intern with the NJ Devils. After a semester working there, I landed a gig as a media relations intern with the NY Knicks. After these two experience, I figured that sports was for me. It was fun, exciting and made people interested in what I did, however after graduation, I couldn’t land a job and went to work for my stepdad’s construction company trying to figure out what to do.

Then in mid-July, I got a call from the Baltimore Ravens, asking me if I would be interested in an internship for training camp. It was slated to last six weeks, but they selected two people to stay on.  To make a long story short, I wound up with the Ravens for two years and had a lot of fun and met a ton of cool folks.

I know you are probably asking yourself what part of this is the bad nightmarish part. You’ll see

After missing the playoffs, my fellow intern Hilary was told that her last day was the following Monday. Without hearing anything, and having some bugs dropped in my ear that I would be around for a while, I thought that I was safe. I was wrong – and the following week, I said my goodbye’s to the folks that I had spent two long years with.

From there I hung around Charm City a few weeks with no job and when money was short, I returned to Jersey and the family business. While looking for jobs, I wound up landing one with Jaguar and Range Rover. This job lasted all of six hours as I got a call from a minor league baseball team in Long Island that wanted me to be the media relations manager. So without much thought, I quit and was on my way to making less than I had as an intern.

The base salary was $25K and I could make more in commission checks from sales. I was told that sales comes naturally to PR people, as we are inclined to be full of sh%t. I figured it wouldn’t be that bad, and I could do it, however the red flags should have went up soon  after when I was told that they would not pay to relocate me, not even putting me up in a hotel room.

At first the job was great, working in a new sport and running my own department. I had a great intern named Presto and we got along well, then there were the official scorers Red and Joe that truly entertained me.

Red was an old tymer who generally had disdain for the owner of the team and always told people to f-off, when he wasn’t napping. Then there was Joe a male Yenta who smelled from caddying and always had a bad attitude. They did teach me how to be an official scorer, it came in handy during a 25-1 game with all kinds of kooky plays including a Buckner.

During the first year, I realized how hands on the life of a minor league employee was in the independent leagues – cleaning up the park, pulling tarp in the rain, working outside events and attending parades and other promo events. Not only did I show up daily before eight, but routinely worked until after midnight for weeks straight. Since there was no travel money, I also was writing away game recaps from the friendly confines of my desk. Work weeks often hovered around 70-80 hours a week.

The PR work also became a drag as the local media outlet did not send out a quality reporter and most times it was a burden for them to be there. So all of the releases and game notes that I crafted turned out to be recycling. I also produced magazines and a media guide, that I am not sure if 10 all season were purchased. So it began to wear on me and I also got tapped to do PR for the league as well which took away much of the free time that I had. The crowning moment was getting us on CNBC.

Note: In the two years I lived on the Island, I was 10 min. from the beach and saw it twice.

Image courtesy of NYT

As long as my coffee pot was full and I had some energy drinks I was fine. It was in my first offseason that I realized that the job might not be for me as I entered the sales season. There was the need to constantly fill out call sheets and a pressure to sell-sell-sell. Going into meetings with small business owners, I would feel guilty of bilking them out of hard earned cash – and also thier entire marketing budget – for advertising.

Believe it or not, I lost money that offseason as accounts decided against renewing and I only brought in two new contracts. So I had to learn to live on a shoestring budget and make Ramen the meal of choice. The season did not turn out much better.

The team was going through a management shift and I became the favorite target for anger and spite. The exiting manager promised the sky and I fell for it thinking I was going to be getting a raise. On his way out, I was assured that I would be taken care of. Funny how that term means different things to different people.

During my review, I brought up salary and the new GM informed me that I made enough money. After hearing that I laughed, since when is $25,000 a lot of money for someone living in Suffolk County New York? Informed him that he would need to find another PR person.

Unemployment or working at Burger King would have paid more than I was making. In turn, I wound up job hunting and landing a job in Massachusetts to be closer to my girlfriend. Leaving behind the job was not as hard as leaving the people I was friends with and wondering how they could stay working there. After I left I was also made to be the villain as many people opened their eyes and realized how bad it was and left as well.

I began thinking of this experience dwelling on the economy and noticing how many people are doing things that don’t make them happy. I also wondered how many of them were in the so called dream job? Hopefully they don’t wind up in a situation like mine.

Let me know what you think, I’d be happy to share similar stories as well…