After the Hoax, Marketing Manti Te'o
CAROL COSTELLO: Manti Te'o has already begun a very public campaign to repair his image and his future in the NFL, like a huge amount of money is ride on whether he can contain the damage from that hoax over his imaginary girlfriend. Te'o maintains he's a victim of a cruel prank, not a willing participant, but he does admit he continued with the story of his dying girlfriend even after learning she was merely a creation of the Internet. Listen to what he told Katie Couric.</s>KATIE COURIC, ABC HOST: You stuck to the script and you knew that something was amiss, Manti.</s>MANTI TE'O, NOTRE DAME LINEBACKER: Correct.</s>COURIC: Why?</s>TE'O: Well, anybody who put himself in my situation -- Katie, put yourself in my situation. This girl I committed myself to died on September 12th. Now I get a phone call on December 6 saying that she's alive and then I'm going to be put on national TV two days later and ask me about the same question. You know, what would you do?</s>COSTELLO: What would you do? Bob Dorfman is a sports marketing analyst and executive vice president with Baker Street Advertising. Good morning, Bob.</s>BOB DORFMAN, BAKER STREET ADVERTISING: Good morning.</s>COSTELLO: You know, there's no doubt that the media in large part packaged Manti Te'o into this likeable emotional figure so that people would watch football games, is that fair?</s>DORFMAN: That's fair. I mean I think it really is part of his personality, but, yes, you know, every successful athlete is a brand so in a sense they're packaged a little bit.</s>COSTELLO: Exactly. And it seems you don't get attention unless you have this touching story or you came up from hard knocks to become this huge success, otherwise forget it. Nobody's going to pay attention to you.</s>DORFMAN: That's true. Again, you know, the backstory becomes very important. You know, there's hundreds of guys in the NFL. If you have a strong backstory, that certainly helps your marketability.</s>COSTELLO: So who like promotes the backstory. Does the athlete go to the media? Does the media go to the athlete? I mean how does that happen?</s>DORFMAN: It's a combination of both. If you're a successful athlete, you're getting interviewed after the games. The more you get interviewed, the more you get into your personal life. You have an agent who's also working with you and trying to tell your story. So it's a little bit of both sides.</s>COSTELLO: So here's this kid. He's what, 21 years old at the most maybe and he has this great backstory and the media's latched onto it. They believe every word he said. And then he finds out it's a lie and he's going to go on national television and you heard him. He says what would you do? So as a marketing expert, what should he have done and do you understand why he chose to do what he did? Well, the big question right now is what's the truth? I mean this story hasn't played out yet. I watched him last night on Katie Couric and he certainly seemed sincere. It's hard to imagine that he's clever enough, you know, to come up with, you know, a story that he manufactured that was involved -- that he was involved in from the beginning. He seems to be, you know, a bit pathetic, a bit of a dupe here. I think, you know, it's important that the whole truth come out. He's got to own up to whatever he did. He seems to be doing that. He admitted to a few little lies. But I don't think those are, you know, terribly damaging. He was embarrassed. You know, if I think that that's the story that he was duped, he was embarrassed by this whole thing. He was afraid to tell his parents the truth. He was afraid to tell the public the truth. He ran with the lie a little bit, I think he's OK. If things get worse than this and there's very much the possibility that they will, then we have serious problems with his marketability and his whole image.</s>COSTELLO: OK. So does the NFL -- he's going to try out for the NFL, have interviews with all these teams. What will he say and so what will he say and do you think he has some type of person like you helping him to figure out --</s>DORFMAN: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. I mean he has a high-powered agent. He has some of the best people, you know, in the world working damage control for him. So, you know, I assume they're doing the best they can in this situation. The NFL, frankly, only cares how well he plays on the field. And as long as he's, you know, tackling and making big hits and helps the team win, all that other stuff kind of falls away.</s>COSTELLO: I think you're absolutely right about that, Bob Dorfman. Thank you for joining us this morning. Thank you. We'll be back.