NFL Ad Named Top Super Bowl Commercial By ‘USA Today’
USA Today has released its annual Ad Meter, ranking the best of the year’s Super Bowl commercials. And this year’s winner is an advertisement produced by the NFL itself.
“The 100-Year Game,” the ad by the National Football League featuring dozens of NFL players from multiple generations playing a tackle-filled football game while dressed up at a fancy dinner, was named the year’s top Super Bowl commercial, per USA Today. Finishing in the rankings was Amazon’s Alexa spot, called “Not Everything Makes the Cut,” which humorously shared some of the functionalities that Alexa doesn’t have.
Last year, Amazon won the competition, while the NFL’s own ad finished second. The Ad Meter is determined, the newspaper said, by “voting by tens of thousands of registered participants.”
Finishing third in the 2019 competition was “We All Win,” a Microsoft commercial showcasing the company’s adaptive technologies for gaming. In fourth place was the Hyundai commercial “The Elevator,” which featured Jason Bateman as an elevator attendant guiding customers through all of the worst places to be, ending up on “Car Shopping.” And in fifth was “The Coach Who Wouldn’t Be Here,” Verizon’s ad in which Los Angeles Chargers coach Anthony Lynn tearfully thanks the first responders who saved his life after a car accident in 2005.
The Verizon ad, while undoubtedly moving, was criticized by some, in that Verizon last year was caught throttling data for first responders as they fought wildfires in California, per USA Today.
There were 44 retired and active NFL players in that commercial. #AdMeter https://t.co/Xhfq0AwyK9
— USA TODAY (@USATODAY) February 4, 2019
As for other prominent commercials that debuted Sunday, the Washington Post‘s ad “Democracy Dies in Darkness,” which was narrated by Tom Hanks, came in 13th, while the Stella Artois spot “Change Up The Usual,” which saw Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) and Jeff “The Dude” Lebowski (Jeff Bridges) eschew their usual drink orders (Cosmopolitan and White Russian) for the Belgian beer, came in 14th. And the Bud Light spot, which turned into a Game of Thrones commercial and featured the shockingly violent death of the Bud Knight, finished 16th.
None of the movie trailers that debuted during the game ranked especially high on the Ad Meter, with the highest ranking one, the Captain Marvel spot, coming in 31st.
Coming in last in the survey, in 58th place, was #EatLikeAndy, the spot for Burger King featuring the late artist Andy Warhol unwrapping and eating a Whopper. The ad came across as pointless, and it’s possible that some younger viewers didn’t know who Warhol was. Second to last was Karlie Kloss’ spot for the web design tool Wix.
