How will you remember Lance Armstrong? As one of the most celebrated athletes in the world? As a cancer survivor who has inspired and helped millions of people around the world? Or as a fallen sports idol and fraud?
Say what you will about the doping case being built against him, but Armstrong’s Aug. 23 announcement that he would neither fight the charges nor arbitrate with the U.S. Anti Doping Agency (USADA) may just be the first time in his storied personal and professional life that he has ever given up on something.
He can beat cancer and win seven Tour de France titles, but he doesn’t have the will to contest these charges and fight to clear his name? At a net worth of $125 million, he certainly has the scratch to lawyer up and arbitrate or take it to court. But he doesn’t think he can win this case – either because it’s unwinnable, as he alleges, or because he is guilty, as the USADA alleges.
So, Armstrong is, instead, seeking to win the PR battle. If he can hang on to his reputation and convince fans to give him the benefit of the doubt, he will continue to have value as a product pitchman and cancer spokesman. By staying out of arbitration, he can continue to say that he has never tested positive, and, thus, the allegations will always be only allegations. In addition, Armstrong has been depositing a lot of credits in the goodwill account for many years through his Livestrong activities. This goodwill is a major asset during this crisis.
Ultimately, what do people want to believe? There is an emotional and rational component to this controversy. His innocence is a better story and outcome for sports fans and cancer sufferers than his guilt.
The USADA filed charges against him on June 12. On Aug. 23, Armstrong answered those charges by announcing he would stop fighting them. He was banned from the sport for life. His statement on the Livestrong website said “I have been dealing with claims that I cheated and had an unfair advantage in winning my seven Tours since 1999. The toll this has taken on my family and my work for our foundation and on me leads me to where I am today -- finished with this nonsense.”
Had he persevered and fought the charges, a hearing may have been held in December with witnesses for and against.
This is a defining crisis for the Lance Armstrong brand and by not choosing his legal right to clear his name, he will forever be under a dark cloud of suspicion. But what can be learned from Armstrong’s public relations activities to counter this crisis and spare enough goodwill to maintain the credibility of his Livestrong efforts and his legacy to cancer if not to cycling?
First, bad news is bad news. You can choose to hide from it and let a bad situation define you or your brand. Or, you can step up and attempt to fill the vacuum with your own message. Armstrong chose the latter by announcing he wouldn’t fight the charges, unequivocally stating his innocence, casting doubt on the fairness of the process and reminding fans that he would rather spend his time supporting his foundation and the cause of cancer patients.
He also lined up a slew of communications and endorsements to reach fans with these messages. His Livestrong blog shared a message Aug. 23 from the Foundation’s founding chair Jeffery C. Garvey: “Faced with a biased process whose outcome seems predetermined, Lance chose to put his family and his foundation first and we support his decision. Lance’s legacy in the cancer community is unparalleled. Lance could have left cancer behind him and never looked back. Instead, before ever winning the Tour de France, he established a foundation that today has served 2.5 million cancer survivors with its free patient navigation services.”
The Lance Armstrong Foundation would clearly like to ensure his legacy is one of helping the cancer patient community.
Also lining up to throw their support behind Armstrong in this post were John R. Seffrin, PhD, chief executive officer of the American Cancer Society and Matthew L. Myers, President, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids.
But Armstrong and his supporters are just getting started.
Attorney and former San Diego Chargers spokesman Mark Fabiani is representing Armstrong and getting the message out through the media now that the USADA has released its report. The details contained in the report might be exactly what Armstrong was hoping to keep out of the public eye by avoiding arbitration as the USADA-released report concludes that the U.S. Postal Service Team was engaged in a doping conspiracy that “was professionally designed to groom and pressure athletes to use dangerous drugs, to evade detection, to ensure its secrecy and ultimately gain an unfair competitive advantage through superior doping practices.”
On the same day that the USADA report came out, Oct. 10, Armstrong Tweeted “What am I doing tonight? Hanging with my family, unaffected, and thinking about this. http://bit.ly/Po6mXT #onward”.
The Tweet links to a press release issued by his foundation on that same day announcing its 15-year anniversary celebrations in Austin from Oct. 18-21. The highlight is the Fri., Oct. 19 fundraising gala that includes Norah Jones, Stephen Marley, Sean Penn, Ben Stiller, Robin Williams and, of course, Armstrong himself. With throngs of supporters at rallies, sporting events and the gala later this week, it might be difficult for people to see Armstrong as a bad guy.
By hammering on the work for cancer and success his foundation has achieved, the public might ask whether Armstrong hasn’t done more good for people in serious trouble than he has done harm to a sport and its competitors and fans?
Clearly that is the drumbeat to which Armstrong and his closest supporters are marching.
In a survey of more than 800 people that was conducted before the USADA’s findings were publicized, it would appear that the public was reluctant to turn on Armstrong. Sixty-seven percent said they still saw him in a positive light including 29 percent who said they were disappointed but respected what he has accomplished and 24 percent who believed Armstrong that he had never doped. Fourteen percent said he is still a champion while 8 percent said he is a cheater.
It will be interesting to see what the weekend’s celebrations produce to counter the negative coverage since Oct. 10, but with serious allegations about Armstrong that go beyond doping to bullying team members, paying $1 million to an Italian physician also accused of helping athletes dope and gifting $100,000 to the International Cycling Union and a drug-testing laboratory, fighting this crisis may be the one challenge his will alone won’t be enough to surmount.
Image credit: John Kershner / 123RF Stock Photo
5 comments:
He said versus they (26 people including 11 former teammates) said. The other clear evidence aside, this aspect alone is damning, only insofar as there is far less motivation for all these people to collectively perjure themselves versus Armstrong, with so much at stake. From here, the PR jury will be in: brands will disassociate, some quietly, some not so; we'll be hearing of the lawsuits to reclaim winnings and bonus payments; and the next truly great achiever will have just that much more cynicism and skepticism to surmount. But human greatness will still prevail.
I started to write a comment and then realized it was becoming so long that it should be a blog post of my own. Short version: The P.R. war is lost. He and his cause are inseparable, for good or ill. I'll post the longer version to my blog later today.
Share the link to your post here, please!
With his seven titles now stripped, abandoned by his sponsors and being distanced by the same organization he's been trying to save, Lance has gone silent a la Tiger Woods.
So what's next? This article suggests that because the court of public opinion is all the really matters for Livestrong, he should come out and say, "sorry I did it," so the media can move on.
http://www.ragan.com/Main/Articles/45722.aspx
He has lost everything and by not apologizing and confronting the elephant in the room, he just does more damage. He perpetrated a massive fraud on the public. He owes the public an apology.
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