Sunday, May 31, 2009

The LifeLock Mercury?



With WNBA fans going nuts trying to figure out the major announcement coming from both NBA Commissioner David Stern and WNBA President Donna Orender on Monday at 9 am regarding the Phoenix Mercury, longtime WNBA fan pilight has discovered a major clue.

First, note that the Phoenix site is on "lock down". Look at the locking device which you can see at the website:



It sort of looks like a little person with a head and legs, doesn't it. Now, look at the following unnamed corporate logo:



BINGO. We have a match. (*)


So which corporation does the person-lock logo belong to? It belongs to a company callled LifeLock. LifeLock has a sort of bumpy history, but they're in their fourth year of existence. They are based in Tempe, Arizona.

Bleacher Report has already posted the LifeLock connection.

My conclusion: LifeLock is going to be involved with the Phoenix Mercury in a "game changing" way, one so big that it's beyond the ordinary story of a corporate entity acquiring a company. My most recent guess is that the Phoenix Mercury will either:

a) be the first WNBA team to have its name changed to that of the sponsor, to be officially known as the LifeLock Phoenix Mercury or some variation thereof, or
b) be the first WNBA team to wear the sponsor's logo on its journey, or
c) possibly both.

My guess is "c". This is something that is done in Europe all the time - all of the teams there are sponsored by corporations, and wearing corporate logos on the jersey is simply a given. The name of the team usually reflects the corporate name.

Undoubtedly, David Stern is there to give his official and public blessing to this project, as a way of telling potential sponsors, "I, David Stern, approve of this direction." ("And, if you want to sponsor an NBA team, please bring a truckful of money with you. Gracias.")

If this happens, the Pleasant Dreams blog will give its blessing as well. If Lifelock is going to help out the Mercury, I'm going to help out Lifelock. I'll call the team the "Lifelock Mercury" or somesuch. Corporate sponsors who want to sponsor the Pleasant Dreams blog know where to write.



(*) Either that, or the graphic designer for the Mercury's lockdown page is horribly lazy and is just grabbing logos and recycling them. In which case she might be looking for a new job soon. According to other sources, the Suns/Mercury web design team is very competent, so I only give a 1 % chance of this being the explanation.

3 comments:

pilight said...

The logo has been removed, so something must be up.

pt said...

Yup. Just posted about it. One percent chance that the graphic designer used the wrong logo, ninety-nine percent chance that you were exactly right that there is a LifeLock/Mercury connection that will be explained on Monday.

Anonymous said...

Yep - I expect Lifelock to be on the jersey.