Tim Tebow and the problem with Major League Baseball marketing

Tim Tebow is back on a baseball field, and with one Instagram post, he became the most popular star in the sport. That’s a marketing nightmare that the league must fix.

Major League Baseball runs a fine Instagram page by all accounts. Whichever young intern the league employs does a nice job curating fresh photos and videos on a daily basis. There are, however, two posts from the past week that should raise plenty of eyebrows. Tim Tebow, NFL flameout turned wannabe outfielder, reported to Spring Training with the New York Mets on Monday, and the league’s official account posted two photos welcoming him to camp.

Combined, those two mundane images of Tebow generated over 166,000 likes and over 1,300 comments. One of the posts was reposted from Tebow’s own account, where he piled up 122,000 of his own likes. A post the same day of Manny Machado and Adam Jones, two certifiable superstars, generated a modest 53,000 likes. A photo of Bryce Harper a week ago snagged 54,000 likes. Obviously these are meaningless hearts on a photo-sharing app, but it paints a picture of the problem baseball faces in marketing its superstars.

Tebow, by all accounts, is a very nice human being. He has done a great deal of charitable work in his life, and is a role model that should be held up for the youth to emulate. What he is not, however, is a proven big leaguer. At 29 years old and over a decade removed from playing baseball in high school, he is not even a prospect. And still, he is the biggest “star” the league has to offer. Tebow made himself into one of the most recognizable athletes on the planet without ever really mastering a single sport with a careful, and curated image, rooted in his personality, faith, and a few iconic moments on the field.

For the past few weeks, baseball has fixated on shaving a few minutes off its game. Commissioner Rob Manfred wants sweeping changes to the sport, but was only able to take away the four unnecessary lobs to the plate for an intentional walk. Now, more than ever, sports are an entertainment industry, but no one in the corner offices of Major League Baseball seems to realize that. Marketing, not rule changes, need to be the focus to reverse the steady decline in youth interest in the sport.

Selling professional athletes is not hard. They’re generally affable and willing to give time, especially to further a personal brand. This comes across well on camera. Natural selection has generally linked athletic prowess to desirable physical appearance. It’s really no coincidence that the best athletes are beautiful people capable of selling a product to the rest of us.

Still, baseball struggles to put this all together. Bryce Harper is the most marketable player in the league. Yet, he is rarely seen in television commercials. His personality would be widely accepted in a different league like the NBA, but in baseball, he is viewed as a punk who needs to be put in his place by veterans.

LeBron James was handed the keys to the NBA marketing machine at the age of 19, plastered all over the media. Harper was drilled in the ribs by Cole Hamels to make sure he knew his role. In Toronto, Marcus Stroman is a bubbly ball of energy. At 5-foot-6, he has an interesting backstory as one of the shortest players in the league. Stroman has his own clothing line, and has appeared in rap videos. This year, the pitcher entered camp with a toned-down personality over concerns that he talked too much last year and rubbed people the wrong way. Excuse me?

Athletes must be allowed to stretch their wings and allow their creative juices to flow. Being an entertainer is a part of their job. Of course, not every superstar player knows how to be a “star” off the field. That’s where the league must step in to help. Mike Trout is this generation’s Mickey Mantle, but he hardly scratches the surface of his crossover appeal. Stand in Midtown Manhattan with a picture of Mike Trout and a picture of Tim Tebow, and the former quarterback is the one who will be more easily named by the masses.

Baseball has become a league of 30 small fiefdoms. There is no discernible national presence or “face of baseball.” The rise of the local sports network is partly to blame for the splintering of the MLB fanbase. When you can watch your team, and your team only, 162 times a year, it becomes harder to care about what the rest of the league is doing. It becomes the league’s responsibility to step in and make us care about the sport as a whole.

There’s no easy marketing fix for a league that is so very stuck in the past, but here’s a start. Stop showing us videos and highlights from the 1930s. Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, and Joe DiMaggio were great, but very few people remain alive who saw them play. There’s a time and a place to honor historic figures in the sport, but it cannot be the backbone of marketing. While we’re at it, let’s kill all think pieces on bat flips, too.

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There’s a game and a sport being played right now by better athletes than ever before. They are faster, stronger, and more powerful. They jump higher and throw harder. Many of them have grown up in the age of social media, and would be willing to do more if given the chance.

Bring in a modern marketing agency, filled with those ever-coveted Millennials and their fresh ideas. Consult with the NBA, the best in the business when it comes to marketing its stars, on a new approach. Get the players involved and let them have more control of the product away from the field.

It’s all well and good to allow Tebow to have a spot on the Instagram account, but the fact that he is a bigger draw than established stars is so, so problematic for the league.