Chevrolet to replace Cruise as SF Giants' jersey sponsor
The Cruise curse may finally be over. The SF Giants are moving on from their controversial first jersey patch sponsor, in favor of Chevrolet, according to a report by Phil Hecken of the Sports Business Journal.
The Giants announced their partnership with Cruise with much fanfare and a video from Gabe Kapler, wearing a very odd shirt, that promised to "drive our city towards a safer, more environmentally sustainable future."
Kapler called San Francisco "a city that defies convention," perhaps talking about the city's willingness to use nominal starting pitchers out of the bullpen and aggressively pinch-hit for the cleanup hitter as early as the 4th inning to gain the platoon advantage. The jersey patch was "more than thread and stitching. It's a symbol of our city."
But Cruise became an unintended symbol of San Francisco. It symbolized traffic, like when the autonomous vehicles shut down in North Beach creating long traffic jams. It symbolized the outsized political power of the tech industry, and the folly of using a crowded city as a beta testing site for robot taxis, like when a Cruise vehicle dragged a pedestrian. It symbolized the city's struggles with public transportation, like when the driverless cars wrecked Muni lines.
It also doomed the Giants' season. As we covered back in August, the Giants' adoption of the Cruise patches immediately led to a huge slump, with the team's offense stalling out like a robotaxi coming near a traffic cone. They went 18-34 the rest of the way, a late-season collapse that cost Kapler his job. So much for the sustainable future.
So the team has shifted gears. They announced in December that the doomed partnership would continue. And it will, but with Cruise's parent company, General Motors. Specifically, with Chevrolet.
Yes, the Heartbeat of America is now the Sleeve Patch of San Francisco. The Giants kept it in the General Motors family, though the patches can't sit well with minority owner and Toyota enthusiast, Buster Posey.
Clearly General Motors and the Giants worked out a deal because of their outstanding contract. It's less embarrassing for both sides to have a different patch, and perhaps the move will remove all the bad robotaxi karma.
But be wary. While General Motors has phased out its production, there's nothing stopping them from bringing back rheir once-popular mid-sized sedan: The Chevy Cruze.
