Yes, Pepsi is spending millions to promote its brands and have Beyonce deliver a much-anticipated halftime show during the Super Bowl on Sunday. But before talking about any of that, the diva just had to get something out of the way at a press conference today.

As the New Orleans Saints Twitter account noted with a twitpic, Beyonce began the event by belting out the national anthem a cappella, then said: "Any questions?"

Yes, she admitted: She had lip-synched "The Star-Spangled Banner" during President Obama's recent inauguration — though not because she lacked the pipes, as Thursday's event was meant to demonstrate.

"I'm a perfectionist," Beyonce said by way of explanation, according to The Associated Press. She explained that she couldn't practice with "The President's Own" United States Marine Band and, taking weather and other circumstances into account, the Grammy Award winner didn't feel "comfortable taking a risk. I decided to sing along with a pre-recorded track."Continue reading...

As part of its own image evolution, the NFL unveiled its new uniforms today in New York, with a player from each of the 32 franchises modeling his team's look by new league apparel partner, Nike.

According to the Associated Press report, most teams' new cutting edge Nike Elite 51 uniforms (tagline: "Fast is Faster") aimed to combine "tradition with innovation," but one team stood out.Continue reading...

What a difference a year — let alone a day — makes in the National Football League.

Last year, the NFL, owners, management and players were just settling in for what promised to be a long-haul labor dispute which essentially kept professional football out of the regular flow of news for months, during the crucial time after the April draft when fan excitement typically builds over prospects for the coming season. Its relevance and even the NFL brand faded for a while.

This year, however, the NFL's off season is pulling a 180-degree turn worthy of the league's nimblest scatback. Today's announcement by Commissioner Roger Goodell of very stiff penalties for head coach Sean Payton and others associated with the New Orleans Saints for their bounty-hunting exploits broke on the same day that the Denver Broncos traded the closely watched Tim Tebow to that media-wallflower team, the New York Jets.

And oh, yes — the signing of Peyton Manning by those same Broncos? That already is so two days ago.Continue reading...

Thank you, Mr. President. Once Barack Obama assented to deliver his important economic speech to the nation at 7 p.m. ET today — a not-so-politically convenient 4 p.m. on the West Coast — instead of later, the National Football League was pretty much free to pursue its further remake of opening day into a sort of mini-Super Bowl. And right up until game time at about 8:30 this evening, the league, NBC, the Green Bay Packers, the New Orleans Saints, big brand marketers and Belgioso Cheese are making the most of it.

The Today Show kicked things off this morning by hosting part of the proceedings from Green Bay's Lambeau Field, where the Super Bowl Champion Packers, the previous Super Bowl Champion Saints — and the hopes and dreams of dozens of major brand marketers — will launch the season. "Growing up and watching the NFL ... and John Facenda talking about the 'Frozen Tundra' of Lambeau Field ... this is fantastic!" exclaimed Today's Al Roker.Continue reading...

We can give you a one-word reason why President Obama will not accede to House Speaker John Boehner's request this afternoon to move his jobs-plan speech next week to Thursday from Wednesday. Well, actually, it's one acronym: NFL.

As White House staffer Dan Pfeiffer announced on Twitter, Obama scheduled a Joint Session of Congress for the evening of September 7 so that the entire august body could gather, before a nationwide television audience, to hear the president lay out his long-promised new initiative for creating jobs and getting the U.S. economy back on track.

The jobs speech announcement, which followed Obama's call on Congress to pass key transportation measures to protect jobs, raised some eyebrows because the September 7 timing would precisely conflict with a live televised debate of Republican presidential contenders (already rescheduled back in May) at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, to be broadcast on MSNBC.Continue reading...

Tiger Woods' "humbling return to the public eye" has been voted the #1 sports story of the year by members of the Associated Press. The AP's top 10 after the jump.Continue reading...

Marketers always want to capitalize on major sports events, as evidenced in the recent Winter Olympics, when some advertisers who were not official Olympic sponsors tried to use the Olympics to their advantage. If they are not officially sanctioned, these marketers do so at their own risk.

That's why Reebok is being taken to task – and to court – for manufacturing and marketing a "Finish Strong! We Are Saints" t-shirt in association with the 2010 Super Bowl.

A company called Finish Strong is suing the sportswear company for infringing on its trademark. Company founder Dan Green wrote a book titled "Finish Strong" that inspired Saints quarterback Drew Brees to adopt the phrase as his mantra. The New Orleans Saints, of course, pulled off an upset win in the Super Bowl.Continue reading...

It's official. American men are changing – at least the way they clean themselves. The American male demographic is tough to change, but over the past seven years men in the US have been increasingly using body washes instead of bar soap.  

The next big step for the body wash category could hinge on the effectiveness of a campaign featuring New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees, who is endorsing Dove Men & Care Body Wash. After a dramatic win in a widely watched Super Bowl, Brees appears to be the ideal spokesman at the right time.Continue reading...