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"What happened between Richie Incognito and Jonathan Martin?"

From Laces Out, Huffington Post, ESPN.com, and Bleacher Report

Analysis by Thomas Anzalone in SRM 334 (section 1)

Over the past week a member of the Miami Dolphins organization Jonathan Martin quit the team because other team members were bullying him. Richie Incognito was the targeted bully who left a viscous voicemail on Martin’s cell phone. Once upper level management heard this voicemail they suspended Incognito indefinitely. Richie Incognito has a history of getting kicked off teams and starting fights with players. With all this said many of the players on the Dolphins have came forward to say that Incognito is a great teammate and he took Martin under his wing to show him the way. When the media released the voicemail people started to attack Incognito through social media. He later retaliated on twitter to ESPN and Adam Schefter ESPN’s reporter. Incognito has taken his tweets off of his twitter page and neither Incognito nor Martin has yet to speak publicly about the incident. There are also numerous tweets between Martin and Incognito especially the picture posted of him and Incognito on Bourbon Street. When I first heard this story it immediately seemed like Richie Incognito had bullied Jonathan Martin to the point where he had to remove himself from the team. It didn’t even cross my mind to go online and write something about this incident or even go after Incognito’s twitter. 

I believe that social media can be good in certain ways but too many people abuse or misuse it. With social media growing so rapidly people feel the freedom to write what ever they want whenever they want. I think it’s just to easy now days to sit behind your computer or mobile device and say things to someone you wouldn’t say to their face. When the media found this voicemail they immediately started to attack Incognito and now that some of his teammates are having his back they are letting off him slightly. With the ability to communicate through technology so easily, a lot of things can get taken out of context. Since the audio of the voicemail hasn’t been released yet it’s hard to understand Incognitos tone of voice throughout the message. Incognito said some unacceptable things but it’s easy take Martins side after only hearing one side of the story. This story is relevant to our class because of all the media attention this story has drawn and all the talk throughout various types of social media networks. It shows us how members of the media are handling crises like this and how people on social media can react so quickly to one-sided evidence. This story also shows how not to respond to media reporters using social media and that things can easily be taken out of context through social networking.

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Analysis by Wyatt Johnson in SRM 334 (section 1)

My current event was based on the Richie Incognito and Jonathan Martin situation that occurred over the past couple of weeks. Practical jokes and pranks are part of the culture in NFL locker rooms, but it seems that it went over board for the Miami Dolphins. They suspended guard Richie Incognito for conduct detrimental to the team for his alleged treatment of teammate second year player Jonathan Martin. It’s being portrayed that Incognito was bullying Martin but it went to another level once Fox Sports reported that the Dolphins and the NFL Player Association were informed that Incognito sent racial slurred text messages and left threatening voicemails to Jonathan Martin. Incognito allegedly made references to harming Martin’s family, calling him a half n****, and defecating in Martin’s mouth. It appears that Martin was fed up with a prank that occurred in the lunchroom. There were also reports of Incognito pressuring Martin to contribute $15,000 for player trip to Vegas which Martin did not attend. The Dolphins confirmed that they have reached out to the NFL to conduct a thorough review of this situation. It is uncertain if and when Martin will return to the team and Incognito’s future is up in air right now with the Dolphins Franchise.

I find this story puzzling, because both players seemed fairly close just from observing both their twitter accounts that have pics of them together doing numerous activities. I know when I first saw this story I was really shocked that this could even happen in the NFL. I feel like the media is bashing Incognito and I mean they have the right to. There is evidence of Incognito using words that he shouldn’t and his background is very sketchy from college to now. I do think that the media needs to pay more attention Jonathan Martin because obviously he has some self-esteem issues and may need some physiological help. Obviously Jonathan Martin didn’t feel he could trust anyone in the Dolphins organization to talk about the internal issues he was having. This story just shows how much impact the media can have on a particular situation. It’s all over the media markets and now people are starting to discuss the topic of bullying and how it can be stopped. I mean that is the basic overall take of this is the bullying and hazing being a critical factor in sports and society.

"9/11 golf course promotion backfires"

From ESPN.com

Analysis by Trent Cundiff in SRM 435 (section 1)

I reviewed an article done by ESPN.com and Darren Rovell based on the Tumbledown Trails Golf Course’s 9/11 Golf Promotion fail. This golf course located near Madison, Wisconsin tried a very risky marketing promotion that ended up miserably. They offered a special for 18 holes of golf just for $9.11 on September 11, 2013. They believed that they would be honoring the people that were lost on that day but it turned into a major problem once their ad hit social media. The public was disgusted with the golf course trying to take advantage of a tragic day by spinning it off into a marketing promotion. Instead of the management for Tumbledown Trails realizing that a big mistake had been made by them intentionally or unintentionally, they posted on their Facebook that they have done it before and it is only meant for honoring the day. They even went on to say that they were “hurt” by the comments left from the public. This caused more backlashes from the public, including death threats left on the golf course’s voicemail. After the second wave of terrible responses, the management decided to donate the day’s earning to the 9/11 Memorial.

When studying this story the major thought that kept coming to my head was, “How many people did this go through to get approved?” I know a golf course management team is not close to numbers compared to an NBA marketing team but I believe red flags should have been thrown up from the start. They made one of the biggest tragedies in our American history into almost like a car dealership trying to have “An Independence Sale”. The actual idea going from the planning stage to the action stage makes me very confused to how it went through those channels without someone stopping it. Even more confusing to me was how when the promotion became negative, the golf course handled their crisis management very poorly. If you are going to take that big of a risk about doing a promotion based off 9/11, the golf course should have at least had a plan if things went “bad”. Instead of mending the public’s feelings, they became defensive that people had a negative outlook on the promotion. The first thing management should have done is tried to figure how to make this right to the public because their reputation is on the line. They may have been one of the more popular golf courses in their area and now they made national news for having one of “worst advertisements in human history”. I understand management believed they were doing a good thing and they could possibly get more attraction to the course. They saw it as a win-win from doing the promotion. However you have to scale the risk-reward ratio more than they did to see it might not be a win-win. 

The relevance of this story to sports marketing students is that sometimes you and your team or peers might think an idea is good for a marketing promotion but you have look at the glass half-full. If this group would have just weighed out the backlashes it could create, maybe they would have not decided on this promotion. I also believe research should have been done before you try this idea. When I researched 9/11 promotions, other companies had tried similar promotions in other industries and negative thoughts were produced from their promotions. Either way, lessons should be learned from a major mistake done by Tumbledown Trials, which is that don’t do promotions on national tragedies or possible “sour situations”.

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Analysis by Ryan Kilmon in SRM 435 (section 1)

Tumbledown Trails Golf Course royally messed up with this advertising campaign. They ran n advertisement promoting discounted golf on 9/11 that went sour fast. I personally feel that they represented a day of tragedy unfairly and with little remorse. Sure, intentions may have not been negative intentionally, but the way they went about this was totally ignorant. The terrorist attacks on the US will forever be a tragedy to this country and this golf course simply neglected that by promoting and taking action with this marketing plan. From the get go they should have marketed differently.

Proceeds for the day should have been donated upfront before any threats started that the golf course soon received once the advertisement hit social media. Instead, I viewed this act by Tumbledown Trails as brutally selfish. I feel that they used the remembrance of 9/11 as a way to try to make money for the course rather than actually marketing and promoting a day to remember the victims that fell in the attacks. They could have promoted discounted golf in a way that would still draw a crowd, but instead they chose to use an actual price of $9.11 which I feel was unnecessary and crossed the line.

This marketing plan was clearly not thought all the way through before it was launched. National attention was made out of this occurrence and the name and image of the course also became tarnished, especially when the course tried to get defensive to the criticism being thrown at them. Marketing and promoting on a day with such emphasis to this country has advantages and disadvantages. Clearly the way this advertisement was pitched was wrong and should have never been followed through with.

This article relates very strongly to this course. I feel that this is an excellent learning tool to learn what not to do when promoting or marketing for an organization. All stakeholders must be considered within a marketing plan and I feel that Tumbledown Trails Golf Course neglected to take this into consideration. People all over the country reacted to this and I certainly hope this establishment will do a more intensive brainstorming before they launch any more marketing advertisements.