The 2025 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic

Welcome to the 2025 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic! Super Bowl LIX is history and the Eagles are decisive Super Bowl champions! And it’s time to reveal our judging panel’s (me) top honors for this year’s Super Bowl ads.

Everyone has their opinions of the best and worst, funniest and failures, award winners and money wasters, noteworthy and not worthy. But our Super Bowl Ad Awards may stray wildly from the standard accolades for Super Bowl ads. Our goal is to recognize the Super Bowl ads that stuck and the ones that sucked. That means highlighting the ads that resonated with the person who watched the game first, the commercials second and had a beer or two (from the viewpoint of an advertising guy who worked Super Bowl promotions in bars for 15 years). So, without further non-poetry…

Best Ad That Screams "We Have No New Ideas" Award

Co-opting a catchphrase from a 25-year old movie for your Super Bowl ad concept? Check!

Using a cheap, attention-getting stunt to generate "buzz" before the Super Bowl? Affirmative!

Congratulations Coors Light for hitting the "We're Creatively Bankrupt" daily double! Like actual Coors Light, their "Got A Case of the Mondays" spot featuring sloths having a bad day was empty and flavorless. A line from the funny movie Office Space, Coors Light adapted "Case of the Mondays" into an unfunny concept for their Super Bowl spot. But Coors Light doubled down on their bad idea with pre-game ads with an intentional misspelling to generate cheap buzz. (Pro tip: If you have to explain your concept and stunt before the ad runs, you're doing it wrong.) Honestly, a silver bullet should have been used to kill this idea before it ever came to life.

The "Please, Just Go Away!" Ad Award

Uber Eats gave us a celebrity-studded spot on the history of football … or something. But piled atop a full season of Matthew McConaughey playing a middle-aged Wooderson for Uber Eats, this ad was not alright, alright, alright! Too many celebrity cameos, too many contrived scenarios for all those celebrities and too many concepts jammed into one spot. But, ultimately, this spot earned its award for the use of not one but two of the most overexposed pitchmen of our time; McConaughey and Peyton Manning. That McConaughey also appeared in not one, but two, SalesForce ads (and I'm still not sure what the hell SalesForce does) didn't help. Please advertisers, there are pitchmen who can do the same thing McConaughey and Manning are doing for your brand who would work for less. And they'd be far less annoying and overexposed.

Honorable Mention: Jesus, He Gets Us

As a concept, the He Gets Us message is tired and hasn't evolved. And while it's still trying to be a show-stopper, the message really falls flat on Super Bowl Sunday. The spot asked us to ponder, "What is Greatness?" Even with Johnny Cash singing Depeche Mode's Personal Jesus, this spot was not "greatness."

Best "Close But No Cigar" Super Bowl Ad Award

The Ram Trucks spot featuring Glen Powell as Goldilocks could have been a classic among Super Bowl ads. A celebrity in an absurd situation can always play when it sells the product. Instead, Dodge overplayed their hand and overproduced the ad. Instead of cutting through the noise, there was too much screaming, too many booms and it was ultimately more noise. In the end, it was a :60 spot that would have had more impact as a :30. 

Best Ad That Put Everyone To Sleep Award

Jeep has a long history of room-quieting Super Bowl ads featuring big-name celebrities waxing poetically about freedom and America. Those ads can work in the right time and place. This year, however, Jeep chose to have Harrison Ford present a monotonous, ponderous, two minute monologue on freedom, acceptance and America in the 4th quarter of a blowout game. Though many viewers likely were still paying attention at that point, I'd bet that spot didn't hold their attention for the full two minutes. Even the novelty of Harrison Ford as spokesperson had worn off by the cute payoff at the end. And, for all the mention of freedom and America, did anyone bother to notice the irony that Jeep is owned by Netherlands-based Stellantis?

The Office Dog Honors Memorial Award

Named in memory of my beloved Office Dog (he was the goodest of boys!), this award honors the best use of animals (preferably monkeys) in a Super Bowl ad. But, it seems monkeys are passé in Super Bowl ads these days and dogs were a rare commodity too. Other than sloths and NerdWallet's talking manatee, animals were scant in this year's ads. So, this award goes to the plucky young Budweiser Clydesdale that was too young to join the team but bravely pushes a dropped keg to a bar. However, while it likely made everyone say "Awwwww," it will have zero impact on Budweiser's flat sales. 

The Super Bowl Ad WTF? Award

Streaming service Tubi gave us a weird concept about a kid born with a skin cowboy hat. or was he born with a cowboy hat-shaped head? Whatever it was, the kid (and later the adult) liked Westerns and therefore Tubi was the streaming service for him. Or something. I think the spot ran twice and it was still too weird for the concept to make sense. 

Best Ad That Didn't Make Fetch Happen Award

Easy Mean Girls reference aside, Fetch is an app, or something. And they pulled a cheap stunt with a million dollar giveaway in $10,000 just for downloading and opening the app. I still don't know what the app does and I didn't scan the QR code that was on the screen for the duration of the app. Throw in that this ad ran at the 2-minute warning break in the 4th quarter of a blowout game and this was a big waste of time and money. And for the people that did see it, it was quickly forgotten among a sea of better – and earlier – Super Bowl ads. (Note the ad linked above is a "making of" video, since it appears the spot itself isn't online.)

The Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic Water Cooler Winner

This year, I found the Super Bowl ads awash in mediocrity. But from that morass of mediocrity, two stood above the rest. In fact, these were the two that I actually did want to go back and watch again. 

The Doritos ad did everything a Super Bowl ad should do. It was fun, engaging, cut through the noise and had a nice payoff. My only issue was it ran in the 1st quarter, which it might get lost among the other attempts at Super Bowl ad blockbusters. 

The other ad I thought was great was the Stella Artois Two David's ad. Here, David Beckham discovers he has a long-lost brother, also named David. Having Matt Damon as the other David, along with some witty dialogue made this spot, fun, memorable, and effective Even though it came late in the 4th quarter, this ad was good enough that the people who actually saw it took note and will be talking about it tomorrow. 

So, there ya’ go… my Super Bowl Ad Awards for 2025. Some good, some bad, some creative, some cliché. Feel free to leave your thoughts, picks, pans, favorites, and failures in the comments. And, until then, when does the 2025 football seas

The 2024 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic

 Welcome to the 2024 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic! Super Bowl LVIII is history and the Chiefs are again Super Bowl champions! And it’s time to reveal our judging panel’s (me) top honors for this year’s Super Bowl ads.

Everyone has their opinions of the best and worst, funniest and failures, award winners and money wasters, noteworthy and not worthy. But our Super Bowl Ad Awards may stray wildly from the standard accolades for Super Bowl ads. Our goal is to recognize the Super Bowl ads that stuck and the ones that sucked. Our goal is to recognize the ads that resonated with the person who watched the game first, the commercials second and had a beer or two (from the viewpoint of an advertising guy who worked Super Bowl promotions in bars for 15 years). So, without further non-poetry…

The Super Bowl A For Execution But… Award

Pfizer ran a fun little ad that celebrated science and innovation through history and featured Albert Einstein, Isaac Newton, Galileo and others. OK, fine. It's a nice little pat-yourself-on-the-back corporate feel-good ad that was likely made to counter Pfizer's ad encouraging people to get a Covid vaccination (which obviously lit up the anti-vax crowd). But right at the end of the spot, the company switches gears and shows us a little girl leaving the hospital as "LetsOutdoCancer.com" appears on the screen. It was as if they couldn't decide on what message they wanted to emphasize and, instead, tried to jam in both ideas. Ultimately, it made the first part of the ad appear superfluous and silly when superimposed with the serious message of beating cancer as the (overly broad) call to action.

https://youtu.be/fwvjimuwVyY?si=pndsrF_zPMlQiFfn

The Office Dog Honors Memorial Award

This is a tough one, as this year marks the first Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic without the judging help of my beloved Office Dog. He was the goodest of boys! In Opie's memory, this award honors the best use of animals (preferably monkeys) in Super Bowl ads. However, monkeys seem to be passé in Super Bowl ads these days. But this year, animals overall were a rare commodity (save for animated creatures and the Planet of the Apes movie promo). Reese's gave us a fun spot that checked all the classic Super Bowl TV spot boxes (even though it got old and predictable fast), and it featured a doggie twirling a Hula Hoop around its "waist." Ultimately, the Office Dog Award winner was Budweiser, who featured a yellow Labrador saving the day and leading the Budweiser Clydesdales through a blinding snowstorm to make a heroic delivery. It was short (only :30 seconds), it was in the fourth quarter and it will have zero impact on Budweiser's sales, but it did have a cute doggie. 

https://youtu.be/8C4DNSV3IRE?si=6BxFt9Y4OLwJjJMd

The Super Bowl Ad WTF? Award

A super Pac supporting anti-vaxxer wacko Robert Kennedy Jr's run for the presidency was a blatant ripoff of an ad run by his Uncle, John F. Kennedy in 1960. In fact, it appeared the spot simply interspersed RFK Jr into the original ad. The ad was campy in the 60's, but it was crap in the 2020s. That he's going for name association and the ad was essentially a cartoon that did nothing but repeat "Kennedy for President" will do nothing long-term for his chances. And yes, it was seen by millions of people, but so was every other ad. Hence, just like RFK Jr's campaign, this really bad spot will be soon forgotten. 

Honorable Mention: For the second year in a row, The Jesus, He Gets Us ads. It may be Sunday, but Super Bowl Sunday is not the day to schlep spirituality to the masses.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvXJJRjGVT4

The Please Just Go Away Award

The Temu ad in the first quarter was bad. The tagline, "Shop like a billionaire" was also stupid. And, the spot, which was a weird animated spot that featured a singer crooning nothing but "ooh ooh Temu" for :30 seconds at a time was just painful. What is Temu? In the ad, it came off as an app to buy cheap crap. What is it in reality? It's an e-commerce site that sells cheap crap from China. So that was bad enough. But then the spot ran again in the second quarter. And again in the third quarter. And, just for good measure, once more during overtime (at a discount price). I never wanted to see the ad or the advertiser again after the first view of the spot. By the fourth viewing, I was wondering how much I'd need to drink to forget I ever saw the ad in the first place. Yes, a lot of people will be talking about it because it was so bad. But won't translate to sales. Blessedly for all of us, the ad isn't online, so we won't have to see it again here!

Best Superfluous Use Of A Celebrity Award

This is always a tight race as there were once again far too many celebrities packed into too many ads. Aubrey Plaza appeared in her standard sullen and sardonic persona for Mtn Dew Blast. Kate McKinnon showed up to shill Hellman's Mayonnaise. Tom Brady was in several spots. T-Mobile brought back Zach Braff and Donald Faison singing and dancing to the Flashdance theme and included Jason Momoa and Jennifer Beals. Uber Eats reunited Jennifer Aniston and David Schwimmer. But no advertiser topped M&M's this year, who gave us a weird ad that celebrated runners-up and featured Dan Marino, Bruce Smith, Terrell Owens (none of whom ever won a Super Bowl) and, in a wacky twist, Scarlett Johansson (who has never won an Oscar). It was a lame concept and, on a day like today, nowhere near good enough to break through the noise. 

https://youtu.be/9UBWFIArQxs?si=-N9q-F8m8JpoLMf9

Best "We're GettingThe Band Back Together" Award

Budweiser and Bud Light used to own Super Bowl advertising. Some of the stuff the two brands did in the 90s and early aughts are some of the most memorable ads ever made. But, these days, Budweiser simply utilizes the same, formulaic heartstring-tugging ad with the Clydesdales and dogs every year. And Bud Light saw its fortunes plunge in 2023 after inflaming conservative America by having the audacity to have a transgender influencer endorse the brand. So, in 2024, Bud Light went back to the well and tried to produce a rollicking, memorable Super Bowl spot like they used to. This one featured the emergence of a wish-granting beer genie and wacky consequences ensued. But it was too quick, had too many cuts, tried too hard, and ultimately, was too ambitious. It won't hurt Bud Light, but it won't fix their plunging sales either. 

https://youtu.be/Cl--5P79iRs?si=uOXre9HnmEmO-GyC

The Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic Water Cooler Winner

This year, there were some truly good Super Bowl ads. That's notable because it's not always the case. Amidst all the explosions, yelling and clichés, a few spots rose to the top. The CeraVe spot featuring Michael Cera as the alleged inventor of CeraVe was amusing. Dunkin' Donuts killed in bringing back Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez while including Matt Damon, Tom Brady and others (Damon modifying his famous Goodwill Hunting line to "How do ya like them donuts" was inspired). BMW's ad featuring Christopher Walken was great as well. But I thought State Farm's " Like A Good Neighbaa" with Arnold Schwarzenegger was the best and funniest ad of the night. Nicely paced (a rarity among many ads this year) with a punchline and tagline that, though repeated, didn't get old, the spot just worked and stood out among the current trend of trying-too-hard-to-be-memorable Super Bowl ads. That it ran early in the game and then again during overtime will also help the memorability factor on Monday morning. 

https://youtu.be/p8ZYgb8Osek?si=RkO9PUuQhRvdT_Q-

So, there ya’ go… my Super Bowl Ad Awards for 2024. Some good, some bad, some creative, some cliché. Feel free to leave your thoughts, picks, pans, favorits, and failures in the comments. And, until then, when does the 2024 football season start?

The 2022 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic

Welcome to the 2022 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic! Super Bowl LVI is history and the Rams are Super Bowl champions! And it's time to reveal our judging panel's (me and Office Dog) top honors for this year's Super Bowl ads.

Note that, while everyone has their opinions of the best and worst, funniest and failures, award winners and money wasters, noteworthy and not worthy, our Super Bowl Ad Awards may stray wildly from the standard accolades for Super Bowl ads. Our goal is to recognize the Super Bowl ads that stuck, the ones that sucked, and the ads resonated with the person who watched the game first, the commercials second, and had a beer or two while actually enjoying the entire show (from the viewpoint of an advertising guy who worked Super Bowl promotions in bars for 15 years). So, without further non-poetry…

Best "We Phoned It In"Award

Budweiser's tagline has long been "The King of Beers." And I'm old enough to remember when Budweiser was also the King of Super Bowl Advertising. Yes kids, there was a time when Budweiser Super Bowl ads were funny, buzzworthy, and memorable. 

But, it seems Budweiser has abdicated both its royal titles. While losing market share to an array of trendy seltzers, ciders, and trendy microbrew swill, and running among the gamut of screaming, over-the-top Super Bowl ads, Budweiser chose to just burnish its brand with a schmaltzy spot featuring a dog worrying about the health of its Clydesdale buddy. The 60-second ad posted below was a great spot that would have quieted the room and made viewers say "awwwww." But, unfortunately, Budweiser ran a too-short, 30-second version during the 2:00 warring commercial break that didn't have time to actually connect with the audience (especially at that point in the game). Why they ran the :30 instead of the :60 (which is embedded below), I don't know. But I do know Budweiser's advertising agency can make those ads in their sleep, it won't sell much beer and, pretty much like the Budweiser beer brand, it will quickly be forgotten.

The A For Execution But... Award

The first ad of the game came from Toyota and told the story of the McKeever brothers, one of whom lost his sight but still won Paralympic Games gold medals with the help and support of his brother. It was really an inspiring spot, that suffered from running at the start of the game and the use of the edgy, senseless please-use-this-in-a-hashtag tagline, "Start Your Impossible." How that applies to selling Toyotas, I don't know. But it was a well-done spot. 

The Office Dog Honors Award

This award honors the best use of animals (preferably monkeys) in Super Bowl ads. However, monkeys seem to be passé in Super Bowl ads these days. In fact, animals of any kind were barely featured in this year's crop of Super Bowl ads. The ad for Flamin' Hot Doritos and Cheetos gave us various wildlife eating junk food and beatboxing (though feeding any animal Flamin' Hot Doritos or Cheetos should be considered animal cruelty). That pretty much left the Kia ad for its EV6 electric car. Sentient, animated dogs were in vogue this year, and the Kia ad featured an electric "Robo Dog," who wants a human owner, chasing an electric car. All in all, it was a fun spot that at least had some form of animal in it (even if it was an animated Robo Dog).

The WTF? Award

The ads that Matthew McConaughey did for Lincoln several years ago were strange. The ads that McConaughey did for Wild Turkey were equally weird. So, true to form, SalesForce's Super Bowl ad starred Matthew McConaughey spouting lots of self-righteous tropes about what "we need to do" here on earth instead of exploring alternate realities or other planets (take that Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos!). Oh did I mention that McConaughey did all this while floating around in a hot air balloon while wearing a spacesuit? SalesForce is essentially a software company and the payoff to the spot was the company (through McConaughey) declaring themselves "#TeamEarth." Short of taking pokes at Zuckerberg and Bezos, I have no clue what SalesForce was trying to accomplish with this spot. 

Honorable Mention

Rakuten is a shopping app, or something. But I honestly spent the entirety of this ad thinking it was an online betting ad. I've watched it four times and I'm still not sure what Rakuten is. 

The Please Just Go Away Award

Pro tip when writing Super Bowl ads; being annoying will only get you so far. Needless to say, Carvana's ad featuring a wildly annoying lady annoyingly describing everything that made her car purchase through Carvana wonderful got real old, real fast. If buying a car through Caravan is this annoying, I think I'd rather get strong-armed in finance by a traditional car dealer while undergoing a root canal.

Best Ad That Looked Like a 90s Era Computer Screensaver

Coinbase, a cryptocurrency exchange app, ran an ad that was nothing but a QR code bouncing around the screen. Those who ran to their screen and scanned the code were taken to the Coinbase webpage and, if they downloaded the app, they could be rewarded with a token amount of cryptocurrency and a chance to win even more in Bitcoin. There was a brief screen at the end highlighting Coinbase, but overall, it was a cheap gimmick to draw more potential investors who don't fully understand how crypto works.

Best Superfluous Use Of A Celebrity

See Salesforce above.

The Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic Water Cooler Winner

While the Uber Eats "Don't Eats" spot was fun and memorable, it took too long to pay off. That said, Gwyneth Paltrow was totally believable as being dumb enough to eat a candle.

That left the BMW electric vehicle spot featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Salma Hayek as the Greek gods Zeus and Hera, who've retired to Palm Springs (along with their pet pegasus Peggy). As Zeus grows frustrated with the mortal world's electric needs, Hera introduces him to the BMW iX EV "Ultimate Electric Driving Machine." It puts the spark back in Zeus's life and the two happily enjoy the ride as Eddie Grant's "Electric Avenue" plays. It was a funny concept, a well-written ad, and it captured your attention and kept you guessing. It had one of the more amusing fine print disclaimers at the bottom of the screen, too. For my money, it was one of the better, and more memorable Super Bowl ads I've seen in quite a while. 

So, there ya' go... my Super Bowl Ad Awards for 2022. Some good, some bad, some creative, some cliché. Feel free to leave your thoughts, picks, pans, favorites and failures in the comments. And, until then, when does the 2022 football season start?

The 2020 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic

Welcome to the 2020 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic! Super Bowl LIV is history, the Chiefs are  Super Bowl champions, the Great State of Kansas is celebrating, and it's time to reveal our judging panel's (me and Office Dog) favorites from this year's crop of Super Bowl ads.

Note that, while everyone has their opinions of the best and worst, funniest and failures, award winners and money wasters, noteworthy and not worthy, our honors may stray wildly from the standard accolades for Super Bowl ads. Our goal is to recognize the Super Bowl ads that stuck, the ones that sucked, and the ads resonated with the person who watched the game first, the commercials second, and had a beer or two while actually enjoying the entire show (from the viewpoint of an advertising guy who worked Super Bowl promotions in bars for 15 years). So, without further non-poetry…

The A For Execution But... Award

Tide did a four spot arc that left you guessing both what brand was actually advertising and where it was gonna go next. However, while it was well done, amusing, and made plenty of good impressions, the brand did the multi-spot-arc thing in the Super Bowl two or three years ago. Hence, this version was somewhat predictable and the payoff spot in the fourth quarter (when attention spans are fading) left me a flat.

The Office Dog Honors Award

This award honors the best use of animals (preferably monkeys) in Super Bowl ads. However, monkeys seem to be passé in Super Bowl advertising these days. In fact, it seemed like fictional creatures far outnumbered the use of real animals in Super Bowl ads this year. Given that, WeatherTech's ad highlighting the CEO's dog and the school of veterinary medicine that helped rid him of his cancer really stood out. What stood out even more was that the spot ended with a link for viewers to donate to the veterinary school without any mention of a Weathertech product. So, while it may not have directly marketed any specific product, Weathertech actually exuded gratitude and more than recouped its investment in warm fuzzies and positive brand impressions.

The WTF Award

New apps and new tech have a long history of dropping the farm for a Super Bowl ad (in 2020, $5.6 million for a :30 ad), but then not quite being able to tell the story of that technology in the time allotted. This year, that technology (Is it an app? A streaming service? Both?) was something called Quibi, which is short for "quick bites." I seem to recall something about "episodes in 10 minutes or less," but it wasn't made clear what, exactly, you'd be watching for 10 minutes or less. Overall, the spot was conceptually tired and took too long to pay off. And thus, for $5.6 million, millions of people may now know the name Quibi, but they still don't know WTF it is…

Honorable Mention

Procter & Gamble apparently couldn't decide which of their brands they wanted to feature. Instead of choosing, they left it up to the public to choose via an interactive website. While that was… odd… they also wound up with 10 or 12 brands all jammed into one :60 second spot. Add in too many celebrity cameos, including comedic actor Rob Riggle as a paper towel roll-ejaculating superhero, and you wound up with a spot that was too busy, too cute, and trying way too hard to be over-the top, even within the confines of Super Bowl ad excess.

The Migod-Did-This-Get-Old-Fast Award

Hyundai tried for some comedic buzz with their ad featuring Boston-bred comedic actors affecting annoyingly bad "Bahston" accents to promote the automaker's Smart Park feature. Unfortunately, the fake Boston accents stopped being funny about :05 seconds into the spot and a smart parking feature isn't exactly life-changing technology. The oh-boy-what-a-surprise cameo from Boston Red Sox slugger David Ortiz at the end also provided no redemption.

The Please, For The Love Of God, Go Away Award

Featuring the Adult Swim cartoon characters from Rick and Morty, this ad was notable for Rick screaming "We're trapped in a Pringles commercial," as he's surrounded by several robotic Mortys, "flavor stacking" chips. I fully admit I'm not a member of the demographic that spot was aiming for but, for what seemed like an eternity, we were all trapped in a painfully annoying Pringles commercial.

Honorable Mention

For no reason other than cheap buzz, Planters "killed" Mr. Peanut in advance of the Super Bowl, then predictably resurrected him on game day in the form of Baby Yoda Peanut. It was a cheap, lazy stunt that, when you add in the Baby Yoda Peanut merch they immediately began flogging, just came off as crass.

The Best Waste Of Money On A Dying Brand Award

Budweiser continued their recent trend of running uplifting, feel-good ads celebrating typical, hard-working, everyday Americans who deserve a classic American beer like Budweiser. Trouble is, Budweiser is no longer American-owned, craft beer consumption is growing all across the nation, and market share for traditional light lager beer brands like Budweiser is nosediving. That the ad didn't even feature the company's signature Clydesdales, and Budweiser basically threw a whole lot of money to make America feel good about a beer they're not gonna buy.

Best Pointless Use Of A Pointless Celebrity Award

The Sabra Hummus spot was the runaway winner for most pointless use of a celebrity honors. Why? Because it featured not just one celebrity but instead crammed 19 "celebrities" into one :30 second spot. Throw in that some of those "celebrities" weren't exactly A-list names (or even B-list for that matter), and that the ad tried to force feed some quasi-indecipherable hashtag, and the Sabra Hummus ad was ho-hum and fairly superfluous.

Honorable Mention

Coke got a lot of pre-game buzz for their Coke Energy spot that featured Martin Scorsese and Jonah Hill. But, for my money, it took too long to pay off, there was no real or imagined connection between Scorsese and Hill, and the whole concept (if there actually was one) just seem contrived. That I spent the first two-thirds of it thinking it was another Quibi spot also didn't help.

The Water Cooler Winner

I'll admit it, I went into this one biased, having seen the Jeep Groundhog Day spot before the game. In fact, based on my social media activity, I think it might have been hard for anyone to have not seen it before the game. As it happened, the spot ran in the fourth quarter, which only added to the anticipation (and the number of people looking for it). That it was funny and featured Bill Murray reprising his role in a beloved movie was great. But it also went beyond the movie and did something that sometimes gets lost in Super Bowl ads; it actually showed the features and benefits of the Jeep Gladiator. That's right, a Super Bowl ad that actually tried to sell a products on some of its merits. Revolutionary! And while there were some other amusing and well done ads this year (Cheetos, Quicken Loan-Rocket Mortgage/Doritos Cool Ranch/T-Mobile/Avocados From Mexico), the Jeep Groundhog Day ad stood out the most, and that's the one that will be the most talked about around the water cooler tomorrow!

So, there ya' go... my take on the Super Bowl ads for 2020. Some good, some bad, some creative, some cliché. Feel free to leave your thoughts, picks, pans, favorites and failures in the comments. And, until then, when does the 2020 football season start?

The 2018 Super Bowl Advertising Awards For The Non-Poetic

Welcome to the 2018 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic! Super Bowl LII is done, the Eagles are Super Bowl champions, the City of Brotherly Love is alive with, umm, celebration, and it's time to reveal our judging panel's (me and Office Dog) favorites from this year's crop of Super Bowl ads.

Note that, while everyone has their opinions of the best and worst, funniest and failures, award winners and money wasters, noteworthy and not worthy, our honors may stray wildly from the standard Super Bowl advertising accolades. Our goal is to recognize the Super Bowl ads that stuck, the ads that sucked, and the ads resonated with the person who watched the game first, the commercials second, and had a beer or two while actually enjoying the entire show (from the viewpoint of an advertising guy who worked Super Bowl promotions in bars for 15 years). So, without further non-poetry…

The A For Execution But... Award

The NFL spots featuring Eli Manning and Odell Beckham, Jr. were pretty dull and forgettable, until we finally got the spot where the New York Giants quarterback and receiver reenacted the Time of My Life scene from the movie Dirty Dancing as part of their touchdown celebration. That spot was pretty entertaining and the two players nailed the re-creation of the scene. However, coming on the heels of a season marked by dull games, concussions and serious injuries, a confusing rule book, inconsistent discipline, and lower TV ratings, and ad celebrating touchdown celebrations did little to help the image of the NFL. While it may have helped people forget all the league's bad press over the last several years for a minute, it was ultimately a big ball of silly that will be quickly forgotten the next time the NFL fumbles on a disciplinary ruling, rule interpretation, or player health issue.

Honorable Mention

Budweiser spent $5 million to remind America that, not only do they make a dying brand of beer, but they also have a heart and use their canning lines to can water, which is delivered to disaster zones. Now, make all the "Budweiser is pretty much water anyway" jokes you want, but the bigger laugh comes from Budweiser spending who-knows-how-much to produce this nice ad that ultimately plays up their skill at putting water in cans.

The Office Dog Honors Award

This award honors the best use of animals (preferably monkeys) in Super Bowl ads. However, monkeys seem to be passé in Super Bowl advertising these days and, apparently, so are dogs or animals in general. In fact, thanks to ads for, and tie-ins with, the new Jurassic World movie, it appeared dinosaurs were the new monkeys. So, of all the dinosaur ads, Office Dog and I liked the  Jeep ad featuring Jeff Goldblum the best. The spot had just enough of the trademark Jeff Goldblum weirdness that we all haven't gotten sick of yet, while also showing (and this is crazy) actual features of the Jeep Wrangler (you know, things that might actually help sell a Jeep Wrangler).

The WTF Award

Dodge Ram Trucks gave us what they hoped would be an epic spot, featuring Vikings driving around in a Dodge Ram truck, hauling their Viking ship with a Dodge Ram truck and sailing their Dodge Ram truck across a stormy sea, all to the accompaniment of Queen's We Will Rock You. The spot ends as the two Vikings in the cab turn the truck away from the big city after looking at their Sirius XM satellite radio and seeing the words "Tonight's Matchup." Of course, the super at the end of the spot directed you to go online to "Watch The Full Story" which absolutely no one in America has done. I've watched the spot four times and I still don't know what they were going for other than a lame tie-in to "EPIC ADVENTURES." I think they were trying to be funny and show Minnesota Vikings fans going to the big game, but you had to look too long and too hard to find that, which made this spot empty, not edgy. Throw in another Ram trucks spot that used a voiceover of a Martin Luther King sermon and I'm simply not sure what the hell Ram Trucks was actually going for here.

The Best Olympics Ad that Wasn't An Olympics Ad

Early in the game, Toyota rolled its "Good Odds" ad, which celebrated the achievements of ParaOlympic skier Lauren Woolstencroft. Following Woolstencroft from being born with no feet to ParaOlympic gold medal winner, all while showing the decreasing odds of someone winning a Paralympic gold medal as the ad reached its climax, this spot was comparable to the NBC Winter Olympic ad featuring skier Mikaela Schiffrin that had run only minutes before. Throw in an overwrought tagline (Start Your Impossible) and a Toyota logo, this ad pulled on the viewer's heart strings. But, it did absolutely nothing to sell Toyotas.

Best Schizophrenic Super Bowl Advertiser Award

On top of their weirdly incomprehensible epic Vikings spot, Dodge Ram Trucks tried to tie together freedom, serving your fellow man and big pickups to the words of Dr. Martin Luther King. Granted, use of MLK's sermon was licensed by his family, but pairing the epic vikings spot with a trying-too-hard-to-make-people-stop-and-think spot like this one was a waste of a lot of money on two spots that had absolutely nothing to do with each other and ultimately didn't even hammer home the same tagline. Given their performance the last few years, I think the creative process for Chrysler Dodge goes something like, 'We've got two great, but distinctly different, creative concepts! Let's do them both for the Super Bowl and split test later!" And that's not the best way to sell product.

The Please, For The Love Of God, Go Away Award

Doritos and Mountain Dew have been trying to create buzzy, edgy Super Bowls ads for years and this year was no exception. Starting with an ad featuring actor Peter Dinklage lip-synching Busta Rhymes to sell us on the fiery flavor of Doritos Blaze chips, and followed by Morgan Freeman doing the same thing to Missy Elliott to sell cold Mountain Dew (#fireandice get it?), these spots were more pointless pap from these brands that won't help sell soda or snack chips. While not as egregiously bad as PuppyBabyMonkey, it's time for both of these brands to find a new approach.

Best Pointless Use Of A Pointless Celebrity Award

For my money, there's no better way to discourage consumption of your candy than bringing in Danny DeVito (he was so good in, ummm, Twins. Yea, that's it) as the human face of that candy. But that's exactly what M&M's did! Throw in Danny DeVito/human M&M asking people on the street, "Do you want to eat me?" (everyone said no) and this spot did nothing to create demand for M&M's. I'm also guessing all of America cheered when human M&M Danny DeVito was predictably run over by a bus in that wacky-for-the-sake-of-being-wacky conclusion to the spot.

Honorable Mention

Avocados From Mexico also deserves some mention here for not only pointlessly throwing Chris Elliott (cue the millennial irony) in their ad, but for also rolling out the wacky mass scream concept that was done to death in Super Bowl advertising at least 20 years ago.

The Water Cooler Winner

There was no debate on this one and it was pretty obvious in the middle of the third quarter who our Water Cooler Award Winner would be. Amid a sea of mediocrity, most of whom were trying just too hard, Tide's ads (starring David Harbour from Stranger Things) are what everyone is going to be talking about around the office water cooler on Monday. By going meta and spoofing just about every popular genre of Super Bowl ad and brand category ever, while not overdoing it, Tide made some of the wittiest Super Bowl ads we've seen in quite awhile. Plus, as the Tide ads ran early, the spots had you watching just about every other ad afterwards in hopes that it too might turn out to be a Tide ad. And they did it with :60s, :30s, :15s and even segment sponsor mentions. Nicely done!

So, there ya' go...my take on the Super Bowl ads for 2018. Some good, some bad, some creative, some cliché. Feel free to leave your thoughts, picks, pans, favorites and failures in the comments. And, until then, when does the 2018 football season start?

The 2017 Super Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic

Welcome to the 2017 Super Bowl Ad Awards For The Non-Poetic! Super Bowl LI is done, the Patriots are again Super Bowl champions, Tom Brady has added a new layer of bland to his legend and it's now time to reveal our judging panel's (me and Office Dog) favorites from this year's crop of Super Bowl ads.

Note that, while everyone has their opinions of the best and worst, funniest and failures, award winners and money wasters, noteworthy and not worthy, our honors may stray wildly from the standard Super Bowl advertising award fare. Our goal is to recognize the Super Bowl ads that stuck, the ads that sucked, and the ads resonated with the guy or gal who watched the game first, the commercials second, and had a beer or two while actually enjoying the entire show (from the viewpoint of an advertising guy who worked Super Bowl promotions in bars for 15 years). So, without further non-poetry…

The A For Execution But... Award

Snickers produced a first for Super Bowl ads; an actual live spot for Super Bowl LI and migod was it underwhelming. Starring Adam Driver and making reference to the game's halftime score (so that, you know, we'd know it was live), the Snickers spot essentially depicted a commercial shoot gone bad. Closing with the self-referential tagline "You ruin live Super Bowl commercials when you're hungry" the spot simply failed to connect and, for those that actually knew the spot was being done live, it failed miserably in living up to the hype.

The Office Dog Honors Award

This award honors the best use of animals (preferably monkeys) in Super Bowl ads. Monkeys seem to be passé in Super Bowl advertising these days, so Office Dog, being a yellow Lab, liked the only ad that featured a dog. That was the Bud Light ad which brought us the ghost of Spuds McKenzie, the brand's controversial 1980's-era mascot. With a lame rekindling of the three ghosts from A Christmas Carol, this ad actually sucked and I'm only mentioning it here so Office Dog will leave me alone and let me finish this. Instead I'd rather highlight the Yellowtail spot, which actually wasn't a Super Bowl spot and featured the closest thing we got to an entertaining live animal this year; an animatronic kangaroo…

Best Schizophrenic Super Bowl Advertiser Award

T-Mobile gave us Justin Bieber being just as annoying as a pitchman as he is a "performer." The ad also featured an appearance by Rob Gronkowski (which was its only redeeming element) as well as a superfluous appearance by former NFLer Terrell Owens to push the concept of "unlimited moves." From there, the brand pivoted to two cloyingly frothy, oooohletsbedirty ads parodying phone sex and 50 Shades of Grey and threw in a new spot with Martha Stewart and Snoop Dogg for good measure.  At roughly $5 million per :30 seconds of air time, T-Mobile pissed away a lot of money on multiple concepts that could have been better spent hammering home their message in a more united, cohesive series of spots.

The WTF Award

Memorable for all the wrong reasons, TurboTax's ad featuring a stitched-up Humpty Dumpty in a hospital bed, oozing yolk from his wounds as he spars with his bumbling King's Men was just too weird. It was simply a long way to go to imply that, with TurboTax, you can do your taxes anywhere, even a wall! Throw in a surly, stitched up egg in a hospital bed acting as your spokesperson and you get an ad that was forgotten in less time than it took to actually air.

The Please, For The Love Of God, Go Away Award

This year, T-Mobile gets the Go Away nod for not one, but two tawdry, lame and brazen attempts to create a Super Bowl buzzed spot. The ads, which gave us tawdry phone sex, 50 Shades of Grey and lame attempts at viral tagline ("#NSFWireless" and "#Punished" edgy, huh?) were weak and, given the other T-Mobile spots, will be quickly forgotten. That they just weren't all that good, spent too much time taking shots at the competition and simply didn't make enough connection to the brand until the last :10 seconds, ultimately made them more annoying than effective.

Best Pointless Use Of A Pointless Celebrity Award

Oh look, T-Mobile scores another honor for its Unlimited Moves spot featuring Justin Bieber, Rob Gronkowski and, for some reason, Terrell Owens. Framing the Biebs as a "Celebration Expert" commenting on various celebrations, the spot could have made the exact same impact without Bieber and Terrell Owens. Had they just built the ad around Gronkowski it would have been far more amusing and memorable. Further, they could have used only Bieber and Gronkowski, and foregone Owens, who was an ass while an active player and who's been out of the NFL and the public eye for six years. That would have saved T-Mobile plenty of money and made the same impact.

The Water Cooler Winner

There were plenty of candidates for the top spot in a year that offered, in my opinion, a fairly lukewarm crop of ads. Though it initially looked like another lame FoxSports in-game promotion ad, Tide's spot featuring Terry Bradshaw, a viral stain, Rob Gronkowski (again!) and an unexpected but wonderfully droll appearance by Jeffrey Tambor was pretty amusing if a bit too long. That the brand reinforced it late in the 4th quarter, with an equally well-done follow-up :15 spot, scored some extra points for brand reinforcement. I liked the Squarespace ad with John Malkovich, though the :60 that ran online was far more effective than the :30 that actually aired during the game. Bai Brands' spot with Christopher Walken speaking the lyrics to Justin Timberlake's "Bye Bye Bye" while Timberlake watches from the other side of the couch was good for a laugh early in the game. 84 Lumber and AirBnB went political and grabbed attention with spots that, while gripping, were also a bit heavy handed.

But the spot that I think will be talked about the most around the watercolor on Monday was the It's A 10 Hair Care spot featuring a soft political jab, humor and just enough weirdness to make it memorable beyond the equally memorable game.

So, there ya' go...my take on the Super Bowl ads for 2017. Some good, some bad, some creative, some cliché. Feel free to leave your thoughts, picks, pans, favorites and failures in the comments. And, until then, when does the 2017 football season start?