Lionel Messi and Kobe Bryant Collaboration Overshadowed NASCAR Royalty Jeff Gordon’s Decade Old Pepsi Ad

Back in 2013, Jeff Gordon’s Pepsi advertisement took the internet by storm. However, while it appeared to climb the charts of the top 20 ads of all time, another advert soon dethroned it. The ad featured two mega athletes, one from the NBA and the other from soccer.

YouTube, back in 2015, awarded the top 20 ads according to the public from the past decade. Soon the voting began and Jeff Gordon’s iconic Pepsi commercial, in which he pranked a car sales associate, made it into the top ’20s. However, that commercial never got into the top 5. Some of the other iconic adverts took that honor.

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The Turkish Airlines advert bagged the number one spot. It was from the same year as the Gordon advert. Turkish Airlines got themselves two celebrated athletes. One of them was Kobe Bryant, and the other was Lionel Messi. They staged the ad as a selfie battle between the two sporting icons. The advert, during the time of the awards, had secured views exceeding 140 million on YouTube. In comparison, the Gordon advert had only amassed 44 million plus views in total.

What were Lionel Messi and Kobe Bryant’s adverts about?

The Kobe Bryant and Lionel Messi advertisement was a collaboration between them and Turkish Airlines. The ad was intended to promote their vast number of routes and destinations across the planet.

Instead of just one ad, there were actually a series of adverts with the iconic duo. One of them was on a plane, where a kid arrives with a ball and finds Messi seated on the plane. Just as he is about to get the former Barcelona star’s autograph, Kobe Bryant, seated behind, calls the kid. The kid was obviously excited to see the LA Lakers and NBA legend, and he instantly gravitates toward him. Soon a battle ensues between the two athletes, with the focus being on who can entice the kid enough to give him their autograph. However, eventually, it was Turkish Airlines who trumps them both by offering the kid ice cream instead.

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In another advert, we see Messi sending Bryant a text, showing off a selfie. Soon, both of them try to beat each other by flying to destinations across the planet to get a selfie at that location first. Throughout the whole shenanigans, at one point, Bryant even snaps a shot with a lion licking his face. Finally, Messi takes another one of his selfies, which Bryant hilariously photobombs. Bryant then looks at him with a poker face, and then lets out a smile, before both run in opposing directions to find more places to take a picture.

It was the selfie advert that ended up winning the Webby Awards in collaboration with YouTube for the best advert of the decade.