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ADIDAS' WORLD CUP SHUTOUT

U.S. fans of soccer's big event will see only Adidas ads on television. Nike's response: A MySpace-style site for soccer nuts

In new Adidas TV, U.S. soccer star Pablo Mastroeni and Mexican soccer standout Jaime Lozano have three hours to recruit amateur players from the streets and beaches of Los Angeles. Their goal is to form one team of U.S. players and one team of Mexican born players to square off in a sandlot soccer game. The ad, one in a series, is meant to capture the high-octane international rivalries that will erupt starting on June 9, the kick-off of FIFA World Cup Soccer. But all that competitive tension is nothing compared with how the company behind the ads, Adidas Group, feels about soccer when it comes to its nemesis, Nike Inc.

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Business Week

Nike hopes contacts will be big business

The next time a friend asks you to check out his Nikes, you might have to look into his eyes.

That's because the shoe and apparel giant's new contact lenses, called MaxSight, hit optometrist offices nationwide on Monday. The lenses are meant to replace sunglasses. They are designed to filter out ultraviolet light and are said to make the ball and its surroundings appear crisper through the company's patented technology.

"It's for anybody who takes their sports seriously who wants to crank their game up to the next level," said Dr. Hal Breedlove, an optometrist at Coastal Vision in Virginia Beach, Va., who ordered 500 pairs of the lenses, the maximum Nike would allow. "For a vast majority of individuals who wear this lens, it will give them the edge over someone of equal skill not wearing them.

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http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/columns/story?id=2134694