Overtime

This week started in Overtime and is staying there right through Grey Cup.

Monday I had a 2-1/2 hour final New Business presentation for an amazing AOR opportunity. Monday afternoon I had football practice for my Lawrence Park Panthers as we prepared for our first appearance in the City Championship since 1982. Monday night I had my Toronto Jets football banquet where I was honoured to hand out awards to my Spring and Fall Bantam teams. Including the Fall “Jet” award to my son. The Jet goes to the player who contributes the most on and off the field in practices, games, on the bus, etc. I would rather have my kid win that award over MVP any day. Although our two MVP’s are two of the best kids I have ever met, and their parents are mightily resisting my requests to adopt them!

Tuesday I was honoured to present What Your Sponsors Really Think of You at AFP. That was the official title. My unofficial title was Why Your Sponsors Hate You. It went well, I was thrilled by the audience feedback. I love the AFP Congress. If you have never been, block the dates for 2017! Tuesday after my Panther football practice I was scared and thrilled to be the opening keynote for an an event staged by the Honourable John Tory. The Mayor’s Music Sponsorship Roundtable was designed to provide Toronto’s grassroots music industry insight into sponsorship best practices, an opportunity to establish new and innovative partnerships with Canada’s biggest corporate brands, and help bolster popular support for the City’s music strategy. I was given five minutes, and not one second more, to get the crowd warmed up for the panel. You can see, and review, my speech here! If you want to see the cool video my team developed that went along with my speech, go here. If you want to see them together, please squint!

Wednesday morning I was presenting an awesome deck developed by my Consulting and Creative teams, at AFP. This one was called What Canadians Want Companies to Sponsor. But my unofficial title was Selling Heartvalves Not Eyeballs. I have to admit I wasn’t my best for this presentation. I probably didn’t rehearse enough (I usually do every deck many times) and halfway through I lost my JuJu. But only one person left during my 90-minutes so maybe I did okay.

I then raced into Metro Toronto Convention Centre bathroom. Changed my clothes faster than a volunteer firefighter from Arnprior. Hopped in a waiting Uber and arrived at Birchmount Stadium in time for the 1:00pm kick off between my Lawrence Park Panthers and the Etobicoke Collegiate Rams. At stake? The City of Toronto high school football championship. Unfortunately we lost. Badly. But as I said to my players, there are a lot of people who have played high school football in Toronto who never went nearly as far.

Now onto some much bigger football championships.

Our team is busy busy completing the Nissan Rally of the TITANs, which we kicked off two weeks ago as a cross-country challenge featuring Nissan’s new TITAN truck, as they make their way to Toronto for a big Grey Cup.

Tomorrow kicks off a ton of Grey Cup Festival events including our Nissan TITAN Street Festival and an amazing event at Ripley’s, as I have heard from many people scrambling for last minute tickets. Saturday is the Vanier Cup in Hamilton. I am heading down with some high school coaches to see if Calgary can keep up with the powerful Laval Rouge et Or. Then Sunday comes the big game!

Deep down I am an Ottawa Rough Riders fan. J.C. Watts, Condredge Holloway, Tommy Clements for me baby! So I will be cheering for the ageless Henry Burris and the RedBlacks. If you are down at BMO Field, drop by the Nissan TITAN Tailgate party we are throwing.

It was an Overtime week for me for sure. I am typing this with one hand because my other is occupied caressing my silver medal!