Top sports ads of all time

With more and more of the world moving toward 700 satellite channel-surfing and Tivo, you would think the television commercial would be on its last legs. If the 30-second advert is on its way out, well, it's going out with a bang.

Two recent spots unveiled for the NFL season and the NBA season are downright awesome.

In one, a kid is hoisted into the Michael Vick Experience Ride and gets to feel what it's like to be the NFL's most electrifying player. In the other, an army of Lilliputian Special Ops commandos try to bring down a Gulliver-esque Tracy McGrady, only to have T-Mac overpower them for a jam. And like all great sports spots, the product being hyped seems almost irrelevant to the superstar spectacle.

The spots are instant classics and evoke memories of the all-time great sports commercials. Here, ranked 10-1, are my personal favorities, with congratulations to Nike as clear winner of the overall marketing battle for my heart, soul and $.

10. Terry Tate, office linebacker — Reebok

For office-bound sports fans, this illustrates the violent collision of two worlds — the one their bodies are stuck in all day and the one their minds (and computers) wander to in desperate bids at escapism.

Anyone who has ever had even a second of their youth evaporate while sitting in a cubicle can relate to this spot. You just sit there wishing you could blindside people all day.

"There's my supervisor, I've got him lined up, I'll drive him through the water cooler." Don't know how this sells shoes, but it just makes you feel good.

9. Bo Knows — Nike

(Nike)

It's really hard to convey to this new generation of sports fans the brief and all-encompassing reign Bo Jackson had over our imaginations. Once the guy obliterated a baseball 461 feet in his first All-Star at bat and then obliterated Brian Bosworth on Monday Night Football, we truly believed there was nothing he couldn't do.

The "Bo Knows" spots, which featured the phenom in a wide array of sports, even had us saying — in response to a doubting Wayne Gretzky - yeah, but what if he could ice skate? He'd be unstoppable.

8. Charles Barkley and friends, Shady Rest Retirement Home — Charles Schwab

Chuck's comical side is so preferable to his "I am not a role model" side. (Plus, it's depressing to me how totally Nike has infiltrated my brain, so I'm moving up any non-swoosh spots in the rankings.) Part of the genius of this campaign is that it taps into the question of what exactly people who retire before age 40 do with the rest of their lives. Seriously, does Barry Sanders set an alarm?

Ironically, these spots ran right before Schwab was forced to run another campaign that was obliquely themed "Sorry We Lost All Your Money."

7. Dennis Hopper — Nike

I'll admit it, I don't really understand how most marketing works. I mean, does having Dennis Hopper reprising his Blue Velvet lunacy really sell shoes?

Sure, the campaign offended some mental health professionals, but the rest of us were mesmerized by Hopper's portrayal of a defrocked referee sniffing Bruce Smith's shoe and describing Barry Sanders with the same maniacal awe he previously reserved for Colonel Kurtz in Apocalypse Now.

6. Larry Bird v. Magic Johnson — Converse

How can you beat the all-time greatest individual rivalry endorsing a fantastic product? The commercial itself was a little hokey, but that was due in part to the earnest sincerity of Bird and Magic. They were both in their own way very square, the Hick from French Lick and the ebullient kid from East Lansing. My buddy Shek was wearing a pair of Weapons (the shoes featured in the ad) yesterday and — in the wake of the less-than-glorious NBA happenings of the past week — seeing the old-school kicks made me long for the good old days.

The spot's only flaw is that going one-on-one is diametrically opposed to what made these two players so great. But I quibble.

5. Steve Mizerak — Miller Lite

Most prefer the John Madden or Bubba Smith "Tastes great. Less filling" spots, or Bob Uecker's "I must be in the front row." My all-time favorite ad from this campaign though is billiards legend Steve Mizerak's "Even when you're just showing off." I went through a pool phase as a kid and even got Mizerak's autograph at a tournament once. Sure, it took the Miz more takes to get the button on this spot just right than it took Tiger to shock the world in his Nike spot, but the final product was oh-so cool.

4. M.J. and Mars Blackmon — Nike

Long before he became the most annoying celebrity fan in all of sports, Spike Lee was the lovable, irrepressible Mars Blackmon in a series of Nike spots with Michael Jordan that immortalized the line, "It's gotta be the shoes." Blackmon, a character from Lee's first movie "She's Gotta Have It," was the embodiment of that all-mouth, no-game player we've all encountered at some point in a gym or on a playground, the one we asked to "please, baby, baby, please" just shut up.

When Jordan leaves Mars hanging and muttering — "That's cold, Mike." — we're at once sympathetic to the little guy and delighted by his misery.

3. Tiger Woods — Nike

While the "I am Tiger Woods" campaign had a nice, global, I'd-like-to-teach-the-world-to-golf feel to it, it was the insane hand-eye coordination spot that blew us all away.

We all had the same reaction: that's not possible. Then we remembered oh yeah, you can do anything with computer graphics. Then we learned that Tiger had actually done it on the first take. Good God. Or, maybe more accurately, good, God.

2. This Is SportsCenter — ESPN

While the FoxSports' "We know the feeling" campaign is excellent, the This Is SportsCenter series of our competition just may be the greatest of all time. The multitude of deserving choices — Mark McGwire, Grant Hill, the kid anchor they called up too soon — make it impossible to choose just one spot.

And with fresh new entries featuring Andy Roddick and the Umass Minuteman and the Star Wars characters the campaign shows no signs of slowing down. "Cut me, Lou!"

1. Mean Joe Greene and the Kid — Coca-Cola

(Coca Cola Corp. / AP)

Why does this ad — so simple, so bereft of action or fancy visual effects — stand so clearly above the crowd? Maybe it's because I was a kid when I first saw it and could relate to that feeling of awe the kid has for his hero.

The spot perfectly captures the eternal possibility of heartbreak when we meet our heroes. Suppose Mean Joe really is mean? We'll all be devastated right along with the little kid. Oh, God, he's walking away. Wait.

"Hey, Kid, catch."

Gulp. And you've got a huge lump in your throat that could best be dissolved by an ice cold Coke. The perfect ad.