Looks like Brock Ollie will have to generate buzz without a Super Bowl appearance

The intersection of sports and marijuana reform always intrigues me, and Super Bowl week often takes this story to new heights. And this Adweek piece, headlined "Why This Broccoli Is Fed Up With Cannabis Censorship: Weedmaps, whose Super Bowl ad was rejected, uses 'Brock Ollie' to call out lingering stigmas," spotlights the first amusing headline-making development this week. Here are the basics: 

On a typical day for a character named Brock Ollie, he eats breakfast, hails a ride, goes to work and chats with his colleagues. So why does everyone keep bombarding him with clumsy references to getting high?

Because Brock Ollie, with his lanky body and flowery head, is the broccoli emoji come to life, but he’s not just the physical embodiment of a cruciferous superfood.  He’s a visual stand-in for cannabis, often used as shorthand between friends or code between sellers and buyers.

But in 2022, when 37 states have now legalized marijuana for medical use or recreational sales, this kind of subterfuge shouldn’t be necessary anymore, according to Weedmaps. The brand created the walking, talking veggie as the star of his own short film to make a point about censorship in cannabis marketing. And executives chose the timing strategically, dropping the 90-second spot today just ahead of Super Bowl 56, a commercial extravaganza it tried — and failed — to buy time in.

“It’s a message we feel is relevant for a national stage,” Chris Beals, CEO of Weedmaps, told Adweek. “It’s just regrettable and sad to not get the ad on network TV.” The rejection strikes Beals as hypocritical, he said, as high-profile spots for regulated categories like alcohol and sports betting are readily accepted during The Big Game, airing Feb. 13 on NBC, and other televised sports events.

An NBC spokesman said the network does not accept ads “for cannabis or cannabis-related businesses” on any of its platforms....

“The answer was a hard no — they wouldn’t even entertain the conversation,” Juanjo Feijoo, Weedmaps COO and CMO, told Adweek. “We see ourselves as trying to be trailblazers in the industry and making new inroads where others haven’t gone before in cannabis advertising. So it was disappointing.”

I have embedded the video here, as I clearly do not have the same standards as NBC: