John Oliver ended his show on this topic, including describing the change as taking Phanatic from "a Sesame Place 10 to a Times Square 6". I can't find the whole clip, but below is the last part where the show makes a pitch to land Phanatic if he becomes a free agent (narrated by Bob Costas):

My marketing idea is having the Phanatic and Gritty have some kind of rivalry, appearing together a few times a year to renew the rivalry. I would pay to see a Phantic/Gritty free throw shooting contest. The mix of their personalities would be gold, I think.

apparently need HBO subscription for the whole clip

To me both sides are stupid. If you were lucky enough to have rights now after all these years - due to bad negotiations by Phillies years ago, and know how iconic this character is for Phils, then do one of two things - ask for a new licensing arrangement that is healthy but not ridiculous. Or ask for a one time buy-out to assign all rights in perpetuity to the club. Get a nice payout and move on.

The Phillies have to weight two things. Do they have so much brand equity in the Phillie Phanatic that is't too damaging to start over? Because they could tell the entity with the rights - keep em. You can't use "Phillies' that's likely their copyright and connected to MLB, but the Phanatic could live on, but who will care? They'd likely end up with very little or nothing as it would be a dead character quickly.

It might take a while to build up a new character but in time, if they found a talented person to inhabit the character they could come up with another wholesome character that would appeal to kids and families or be more baseball-centric or whatever.

Now, what is fair and reasonable? The licensor has to be able to realistically indicate what the Phonetic is worth to the Phillies in terms of $$, revenue etc.. and then in terms of notoriety and good feels. Don't be greedy. A few mil probably, 30mil probably not.100mil or more definitely not. (unless the club has crazy licensing revenue from Phanatic toys and sales etc)

The new look is lame, I don't like updates to classics - and it's definitely not different enough.

But there are so many creative people, good actors and clowns that it wouldn't be that hard to make a new character. Create a back story - make it a comic even. Built it up so that by time the character showed up the word had been out there and building. That's one path for the Phils.

Otherwise, just do a 1 time buy-out and be done. If they won't be reasonable, in their ask - then let them know you have another character in the wings and willing to start over.

Rockinghorse wrote:John Oliver ended his show on this topic, including describing the change as taking Phanatic from "a Sesame Place 10 to a Times Square 6". I can't find the whole clip, but below is the last part where the show makes a pitch to land Phanatic if he becomes a free agent (narrated by Bob Costas):

#respecttheconicalhonker

The Fauxnatic blows

They need to fix the eyebrows