A good college friend and fraternity brother of mine, Adam Silverstein (@onlygators on Twitter) sent me a message to check out David Canter’s tweets criticizing Under Armor and the ad company that created UA’s new advertisement…and then his tweets backtracking from pressure yesterday. Canter’s criticism was blasted using Twitter as his medium of choice, which is why I wondered to myself why I didn’t catch it without being notified. Then I checked Canter’s Twitter page. The DEC Management principal, who I considered a friend, apparently does not want me following his progress. This is the note I received when I clicked the “Follow” button:
You have been blocked from following this account at the request of the user.
Oh well. Anyway, Canter’s tweets from July 19th read:
Someone please fire the ad agency that did the new Devin Hester Under Armour ads. Wow beyond awful
@darrenrovell1 disappointing stuff to say the least– short UA stock– hester isnt a big enough name and the spots were atrocious
@darrenrovell1 is Darren Rovell,a sports business specialist at CNBC. Canter’s statement yesterday:
I apologize if my advertising and comments offended any corporations last night- it wasn’t meant to hurt- only to be constructive criticism.
There is no problem with having opinions. There is a problem with vocalizing those opinions when they reflect poorly on your company and your clients. See one of Canter’s clients from this year’s NFL draft recently signed a deal with Under Armour. In fact, Canter tweeted about it on June 22nd:
CONGRATULATIONS TO DEC MANAGEMENT CLIENT PAUL KRUGER WHO JUST SIGNED A NEW TWO YEAR DEAL TO ENDORSE UNDER ARMOUR
This post is not intended to harm Canter’s reputation (although I am a little disappointed that he decided to block me on Twitter), but instead to make people realize that what they say (especially on Twitter) cannot be erased. And those statements, when you are an agent, go well beyond reflecting poorly on your own image. It can hurt your clients as well. We need to make sure to place damage controls on our clients’ usage of social media sites, and we should remember to think twice about what we say before we go tweeting away.
Remember that Twitter is a very powerful medium to promote players and your own business. In the same respect, saying the wrong thing has its negative consequences. One thing I will point out is that I give Canter credit for immediately apologizing for his remarks. He owned up to his mistake and should be forgiven for it.
2 replies on “Will Agent’s Tweets Anger Under Armour?”
As a clarification, Darren Rovell did not write "disappointing stuff to say the least– short UA stock– hester isnt a big enough name and the spots were atrocious." It was a tweet sent by Canter that was intended to be read by Rovell. There may have been some confusion for those of you not on the Twitter bandwagon.
Wow, seems UA has some growing pains. Not surprised though after my experience with UA quality. “Poor” would sum it it up briefly. I think if UA would just focus on quality….the reputation would take care of itself, (and the stock price).