So, my staff at my business were clammering “When are we gonna go to a hockey game?” The Anaheim Ducks had won the Cup last June, and when I inquired about tickets last October, there were no group sales going on because the season had been pretty much been bought out by season ticket-holders, old and new and left scant amounts behind in the corner nose-bleeds seats. Hmmph. Maybe I should try getting the L.A. Kings at the Staples Center. Some of my guys wanted to go there this time around. OK…and then I tabled the notion and forgot to follow up on it until yesterday, when a King sales rep cold-calls me on my cell phone. He tells me about a 3 game deal for $60, complete with player figurine giveaways. “Sounds like fun”, I said…“But what I really need is to get someone from group sales because I want to get about 75 of us to a game.” So, he directs me to over to someone over in group sales, while I deftly navigate my way over to the LA Kings website.
…And I watched what you are watching right now.
With Bob Miller and Jim Fox commentating, I witnessed 3 grown men reduced to the mentality of kids 1/3 of their age, playing with their own caricatures of themselves. “GOOOOOOOOooooooooo KIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNNNGS!” being screamed by the town drunk in the background, I watch in maniacal horror as the men simulate how to play hockey on a little plastic rink, cutting in with some of the players brighter moments when they were ACTUALLY playing hockey, complete with Batman-like “ZOOM!", “WHAMM!”, and "WOW!” plastered on the screen (Nice elbow there, Brown). “GO KINGS GOOOOOOOoooooo!” And to finish it off, the over-zealous smiles of three men who must have been brainwashed by the Church of Scientology to go through with this whole travesty of insulated boneheaded marketing.
But I laughed (because it was them, and not me).
Then I cried (for those poor schmucks who probably didn’t read the fine print of their contracts).
Then I said, “WTF!?!” Who in their right mind would do this? Someone pea-brain in marketing must have liquored up the entire chain of command when he ran this piece of genius by them.
I did set aside 86 tickets for the last game…Kings v. Ducks on 4/5/08. This little vignette did not make me want the tickets any more or any less…I was already on a mission to get them.
But what if you were looking for some hockey tickets and you came across this? What say you?