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Crazy Catch by Ball Girl

Wednesday, June 25, 2008

There is currently a video circulating the internet of a Ball Girl making a crazy catch. In the slow-mo instant replay you see this girl make a 6 foot vertical leap up the wall to catch an otherwise instant double. Or is that just a little league rule? I don’t follow baseball. Here is the clip:

The video seems plausible and it has everyone debating whether it actually happened or not. If it was staged it was an excellent staging, like the moon landing. In all reality the girl did not make this stunt and the video is in fact fake. The production is a viral ad created for Gatorade by element 79 a viral video and marketing agency.  I’m not sure how it ties to Gatorade. I’m sure the folks at element 79 do. 

I’ve always wondered how these agencies ensure that a viral ad sticks. There has to be some formula and the select group of agencies that understand it are raking in cash from big brand companies.  The one piece I missed is how this video ties to Gatorade. Once people discover it, Gatorade will get a lot of “word-of-mouth” press coverage. But does that help their already recognizable brand?  What does this video sell? 

Traditionally viral videos were placed on sites that had non-obvious links to the benefiting site or brand.  For instance… I remember a site with a girl participating in a wet t-shirt contest, the headline read something like “I see your sister made it to spring break” and it had a “send to a friend” form on the side. The footer had a key word stuffed link to the site that was really benefiting. The basic premise was that you had a viral “host” page feeding PR, relevance and traffic to the “parasitic” beneficiary site.  The beneficiary site was of course, the company paying for the ad. 

Did YouTube and the other slew of online video sharing sites kill the benefits of viral marketing? Or is their other trickery involved? Maybe it’s more subtle… like Tyler Durden at work splicing images into the video. Watch it and then tell me if you’re thirsty.

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Comments

I think this ad will be aired on TV and you will see that the word “Gatorade” is on the scoreboard.  Maybe they were just testing it’s effectiveness?

Julie  on  06/25  at  10:51 PM

Wonderful, spoil the fun.  I can’t believe how much exposure this video got.

James  on  06/25  at  10:55 PM

Obviously I can’t verify whether this video is authentic, but I would like to point out that, to my eyes at least, it does NOT look like she made a “6 foot vertical leap”, which would be pretty nearly impossible. Rather, it looks like she jumped up and pushed herself first off one side of the corner and then the other. Though that’s certainly difficult, with enough moment and strong legs I don’t believe it’s impossible, especially for someone (yes, even a girl) in really good shape. But hey, it might still be a fake video, in which case I’m suspending my disbelief in order to feel inspired by the world’s coolest fictional ball girl.

 on  06/26  at  09:49 AM

At the very end of the clip showing the girl sitting back in her chair, there is a bottle of Gatorade on the ground next to her, a very coy advertisement. How the clip was staged, I have no idea, but it was cleaver.

 on  06/26  at  08:24 PM

Good catch! I didn’t see that until you pointed it out. Great placement on their end too, very subtle.

 on  06/27  at  11:14 AM

No, I didn’t see any penis frames when I went back and watched it again.  I’m guessing they dressed up jackie chan in a baseball uniform for the jump.

Jason  on  06/29  at  03:38 AM

"There is currently a video circulating the internet of a Ball Girl making a crazy catch. In the slow-mo instant replay you see this girl make a 6 foot vertical leap up the wall to catch an otherwise instant double. Or is that just a little league rule? I don’t follow baseball.”

She doesn’t make a 6’ vertical leap.  She pushes off two walls.  It’s a foul ball and even if it wasn’t it would have been a home run.  A ground rule double is when the ball hits the field and bounces over the fence.

 on  07/03  at  08:26 PM

It’s real simple.  No ball girl would be allowed to interfere in a play like that.  She sure as heck wouldn’t be running the ball down with the intent of catching it.  That’s what the outfielder is paid for.  Neat commercial, nothing else.

 on  07/08  at  10:24 AM
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