• Adweek, Tuesday, September 5, 2006 12:15 PM

You can TiVo "Desperate Housewives" or the "Sopranos," but watching a warmed-over football game is like eating leftovers. That's the thinking of big guns like GM, Ford, Coors, Pizza Hut, Burger King, Papa John and Adidas. All are in hot pursuit of that slipperiest of consumers--young males who watch live football with ritual fanaticism and don't turn away from the tube, for fear of missing the play that turns the game around. As the season kicks off this week, inventory is 80 percent to 85 percent gone on NBC, CBS and Fox; ESPN's "Monday Night Football" is virtually sold out. GM, which spent $140 million last year and was the top NFL spender, will up the ante this year, using football as the primary launch platform for both the revamped Chevrolet Silverado and the GMC Sierra pickup trucks.

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