While Michael Phelps image is built upon his success as an incredible and perhaps superhuman athlete, it appears as though he’s not superman after all.
In the following video, The Today Show’s Matt Lauer properly labels this as a “public relations challenge” and questions what will happen in the court of public opinion:
When I originally began writing this post, early last week, the story had just been released that Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps had been caught on camera smoking pot. Originally, I began to write about the possible reactions of Phelps’ publics (sponsors, the IOC, the USOC, fans, and the proverbial “general public”). Since beginning this draft, however, the story has gone from what appeared to be an isolated incident of irresponsibility that would result in a mere “shame on you” from the world, to a suspension of competition and the loss of his contract with Kellogg’s.
To know what kind of ramifications Phelps is facing is all well and good, but the more important notion is to understand why they are happening. In short, this means understanding the power of public opinion.
At first, Phelps’ sponsors seemed to be nonchalant about this incident. Speedo and Omega released statements indicating their continued support of Phelps. From a purely capitalistic, business perspective, if your stockholders and consumers (which in this case are predominately NOT children/parents) do not seem to care one way other the other about Phelps’ misstep, why should you condemn him? Kellogg’s, on the other hand, has a different sort of public to worry about. Unlike a luxury watch brand or a producer of the most technoligically advanced swimwear on the planet, Kellogg’s brand is something consumed by the everyday American family. Therefore, it should come of no surprise to Phelps that the power of that public’s opinion would lead to him losing a contract.
It will be interesting to see what the additional fallout of this pot-smoking incident may lead to. If the opinion of officials of the USOC changes (on their own volition or due to outside pressure), will Phelps be unable to compete at the Olympic level? If Speedo’s consumers, ranging from young kids taking swimming lessons, to the most elite collegiate and professional athletes, change their opinions, will that contract also be in jeopardy?
I actually wrote my blog on Michael Phelp’s too, so I decided to comment back on some others. I definitely do not think that Speedo will ever drop Phelps. Despite the fact that what he did was wrong, he brings in too much revenue for them to lose. Who would take his place? What he did had nothing to do with his swimming career. It would have been a different story if this had happened during the Olympics…but it didn’t. I am not saying that what he did was acceptable, however it did not change my personal opinion on the idolized swimmer. People in class were saying Phelps is arrogant. I disagree. Nobody can make it in that type of world without a little bit of edge to them. You want to talk about an arrogant athlete…let’s talk about Ron Artest or T.O. Phelps dedicated his entire life thus far to winning 8 Olympic golds. Yea he got a D.U.I and was caught with a bong, but there’s also 104 anonymous MLB players who were caught using steroids in season, but no sweat off their shoulders; we don’t know who they are. If Michael Phelps ever called me up offering swimming lessons, I sure as hell would say yes…especially after seeing him in a speedo
Michael Phelps was seen to many as a hero. Athletes adored him, young kids idolized him, and women basically threw themselves at him, but some believe that being caught smoking marijuana has jeoparized his career. Should his endorsements get taken away from him or should his million dollar contracts with Speedo and Kellogg’s continue? This is what the public has been talking about over the past few weeks. The contract that Kellogg’s and Phelps once had is now over. Kellogg’s cut ties with him and did not like what he was beginning to stand for. I agree with Kellogg’s in this situation. Just because a person won 8 gold medals and people worship him does not mean he can get away with this kind of stuff. Celebrities, especially athletes are held to a higher standard because of the young children that look up to them. For them to see that their hero is smoking pot is wrong. Phelps has to realize he is in the public eye and that people are watching his every move. I am very intrigued to see how Phelps over the next few years until the next Olympics tries to stay out of the spotlight for fear of being caught again.
Great use of a creative title. As you can imagine, with all of the noise out in the blogosphere, a catchy title can attract readers.
I decided to choose one Phelps blog to comment about, and I feel that you did a great job in discussing some of the “nitty gritty” issues surrounding such a widely publicized incident. After our discussion in class last Wednesday I found myself wrestling with a lot of harsh conclusion in relationship to America’s overall public opinion of Michael Phelps and some of companies that currently are sponsoring him as well as Kellogs (who dropped him). I believe that the general public opinion of Michael Phelps is inherently down, but I do not think his overall image will be as deeply impacted as many are anticipating. I think that as many things do, this will blow over– although there will be people who will forever regard Phelps in a negative light, many will begin to see this was a (rough two???) mistake, and many of his achievements will outshine his “youthful” bad decisions. Yet on the other hand, I think that Phelps is a complete idiot, and should be held accountable for his actions and if this means the pulling of endorsements then so be it– he is a public figure that is representative of our country, our pride– and partaking in this behavior was irresponsible and not parallel with the image he should be portraying.
“To know what kind of ramifications Phelps is facing is all well and good, but the more important notion is to understand why they are happening. In short, this means understanding the power of public opinion.” (shoemaker)
Honestly I really don’t care about Michael Phelps smoking out of a bong and you can’t really prove if he inhaled out of that bong. However, that picture released to the public was attractive to those who are familiar with Phelps. The consumers of Kellogg’s’, which are adolescents for the most part are more likely to take offense to Phelps unethical decision. Why is Speedo nonchalant about their decision making? Maybe because their consumers don’t take a similar gratitude of offense that Kellogg’s does. To conclude, Phelps made a bad decision and he should have been aware of the public’s opinion. He has a wide range of fan base, so he must make sure that every decision he makes pleases his audience base