Mitcham Gets Sponsor. Can We Give It A Rest Now?

Let the celebration commence; Australian diver Matthew Mitcham now has a sponsor. Australian telecommunications and media company Telstra has signed Mitcham for an undisclosed amount to represent the company throughout Australia.

For months many have tried to figure out why corporate sponsors weren't flocking to his side and offering him the same lucrative contracts Michael Phelps was getting. I am thrilled for him, simply because I'm sick and tired of listening to all of the whining and idiotic comparisons.

How can anyone compare Mitcham to Phelps? Phelps has won 16 Olympic medals (14 gold, 2 bronze), 48 career medals (40 gold, 6 silver, 2 bronze), was named World Swimmer of the Year 5 times, US Swimmer of the Year 7 times, and most recently won Sports Illustrated magazine's Sportsmen of the Year award. He has broken the world record in various events 26 times, and that's not counting what he did as part of a relay team. In other words he's proven time and time again his abilities as an athlete. Granted Phelps has stumbled on a number of occasions in his personal life but as an athlete he's proven himself more than once. 

A more accurate comparison might be Canada's Alexandre Despatie. In my opinion he is a more consistent diver than Mitcham but as a current competitor about the same age he's a better comparison. At 23, Despatie has been around just a few years more giving him increased name recognition. Like Mitcham, he's good looking, very personable, a good diver and very popular in his home country. Care to guess how many corporate sponsors he has? Just one; McDonald's Canada.

In these tough economic times getting any sponsors is tough, especially for someone in Mitcham's position. We know him for no other reason than his public announcment that he is gay. Over his career he hasn't performed consistently from competition to competition and to me that is the mark of a champion and someone worthy of sponsorships. If he was straight, the only thing you might have remembered about him was he stopped the Chinese from taking all the diving medals at the Beijing Olympics. 

I congratulate him for the Telstra deal but I'm not surprised it took this long.  In the future I expect to see more deals come his way as long as he is more consistent in his diving.  Having produced the highest scoring dive ever I know there is greatness in him and with hard work and a lot of training that greatness will be seen, along with more sponsorships. 

Comments

[Joe Moag]

BINGO on your argument! BINGO SQUARED!

Ya nailed it!

[SERIAL SEAN]

:)

[B.]

Finally somebody writing an article about this that makes sense. Lots of gold medal winners do not get offered sponsorship deals. He won a gold medal, great, so did lots of other people. I don't see the gay community standing up and screaming for the gold medal winner in archery to get an endorsement deal (whoever that was). Hell, I haven't seen Nastia Liukin splashed all over various product endorsements for winning a gold medal either, and I would safely bet that women's gymnastics got far higher ratings than diving did. But she's not gay, so we clearly don't care whether she is getting the endorsements she "deserves" for winning a gold medal, three silvers, and a bronze.