Top 5 Commercials in the NBA Playoffs That Will Murder Me, Personally

By Dave Levitan  |  May 15, 2024 | 8:02am
Photo by CJ GUNTHER/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock
Sports NBA Playoffs
Top 5 Commercials in the NBA Playoffs That Will Murder Me, Personally

We’re deep into the second round of the NBA Playoffs, which means every fan has now seen the same extremely limited set of commercials running on ESPN, TNT, and ABC approximately 45,000 times. Many of these are designed in a lab to commit atrocities against viewers. These are the worst of them.

5. Wingstop Jenga

I have a lot of questions about this ad. This family seems to have just brought home a feast of various chicken options, at which point they began a game of Jenga? And then the teenagers use the temptation of the chicken to… cause Dad to lose at Jenga? Mom, meanwhile, is sitting off to the side like she’s in a timeout, neither playing the game nor eating the food? Why not just eat and then go back to the game? How is this an either/or sort of situation? The Rae Sremmurd song that, yes, has inspired some interesting impressions, just adds to the confusion.

4. Don’t Let Apple Go

I know Apple’s in some trouble for another awful commercial, but this one is also bad. I can’t put my finger on why, exactly, beyond that I would prefer not to hear it rolling around my brain as I try to fall asleep every night now.

3. Shai and Chet mangle a song for AT&T

I guess this isn’t new, but ads where extremely rich people tout products that in theory save people small amounts of money are extremely grating. Do Oklahoma City Thunder stars Chet Holmgren (2023-2024 salary: $10.4 million) and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (2023-2024 salary: $33.4 million) really need to hear from AT&T about “the best plan for me”? Does Nikola Jokic (2023-2024 salary: $47.6 million) really need to use Hotels.com to provide for his “go home to Serbia fund”? Get outta my face.

2. Google Pixel wants your photos to lie to people

There are a few of these ads demonstrating the admittedly impressive photo editing options available on Google’s phones. They are, in a way, deeply odd: did you take a cool picture of yourself doing a little jump in a nice city square? Great, now with a couple of clicks you can make all of the details of that effort utter lies. Did you have a nice moment throwing your toddler up in the air on a beach? Now you can make it seem like you’re both the world’s strongest and worst dad, throwing the kid an extra 15 feet in the air. They are selling the ability to fool people, which, in the context of the endless dystopian AI-related news out there, feels a bit off.

1. Burger King’s horrible “songs”

Burger King’s pointedly off-key singer wants you to believe that eating food is a “hunger hack.” These songs are war crimes.

 
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