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I went to Old Navy last Saturday to get some cheap t-shirts. (Every wardrobe needs cheap t-shirts.) During my excursion I ran across this display of sports teams tees.

I live in Kansas City. The Old Navy in question is in Kansas City. I ask you, what is missing from this assortment?

The missing team is The Kansas City Royals. I asked a salesperson where the Royals shirts were. She rolled her eyes and said, “I know, we have the most random collection of teams.”

How does this happen? It’s an obvious miss on Old Navy’s part when it comes to understanding their market. While my beloved Royals have had a terrible record since the mid-80s, people in Kansas City still have a passion for this home-town team. And if you’re going to create city-specific apparel, it’d seem wise to at least cover the major sports franchises in a respective city.

…And then to pour salt in the wound: doubling up on the the St. Louis Rams, really? Really!?

Step into my office, Old Navy, you’re fired.

Do you recognize this logo? You’ve probably seen it before. Almost everyone in the world has. It’s the logo for Major League Baseball. It’s striking, simple and full of symbolism. And no one is quite sure where it came from…

David Fincher directs the life-long journey of pro football players LaDainian Tomlinson and Troy Polamalu as their destinies collide in an NFL football game. (Marketing is all about telling concise stories, and it doesn’t get a whole lot better than this.)

More YouTube drama-goodness today:

In August last summer, a fan of Electronic Arts‘ Tiger Woods PGA Tour ’08 posted a video showing a glitch in the game that allows Tiger Woods to literally walk on water and perform a golf shot. He referred to it as the Jesus glitch.

Well, someone at EA saw it (after 100,000+ views) and responded with the following vid a few days ago:

These kinds of marketing opportunities wouldn’t exist without mainstream sites based on user generated content, like YouTube. It’s nice to see a company mastering the medium and using it to communicate directly with their fans on a level otherwise not possible. This is as opposed to, say, freaking out and unleashing the attack dog lawyers, because you don’t understand your product, your audience and their culture.

Nicely played, EA. (Tiger, too.)

Phelps in Midstroke (Speedo USA/Michael Muller)

Michael Phelps is the billion dollar man of the moment. He’s the one the kids currently want on their Wheaties. So, let’s say, hypothetically, you’ve got his agent on the line and he owes you the biggest favor in the world…

So,what do you use Micahel Phelps to sell? Anything is game. (He’s already hawking Visa Inc., Speedo, Omega, AT&T Wireless, PowerBar, Kellogg’s, Rosetta Stone, and PureSport.)

I’d put his face on a box of fishticks. Maybe a box of Phelpsticks.