“Hey Kid, catch!”: How Coca-Cola and “Mean” Joe Greene Launched a Legend

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Earn points towards special rewards and more at David's bridal.com. And we continue with our American Stories. It's been multiple decades since a nine-year-old kid shared his Coca-Cola with Pittsburgh Steelers star Mean Joe Green in one of the most famous commercials in American history. Here's Greg Hengler with a story. The man known as Mean Joe Green was one of the most feared defenders in NFL history. In 13 seasons as defensive tackle with the Pittsburgh Steelers, the 6-foot-4, 275-pound Joe Green was a 10-time Pro Bowler and a two-time Defensive Player of the Year.

He became an NFL icon and a first ballot Hall of Famer. And then there's that name. Here's teammates Frank O'Harris and Andy Russell. Is there a better name than Mean Joe Green? I mean, that name just flows. And I ask kids about that and I say, Mean? And they say Joe Green. He asked me one time, he said, Andy, why do they call me Mean?

And I said, because you're mean. Here's Steelers chairman Dan Rooney. We're playing in Philadelphia, and Philadelphia has the ball. And if they can make a first down, the game's over. They made it.

They made the first down. And he went up, took the football, and threw it in the stands. And I said to my father, this guy's special. If he's that intense, that he's going to do something like that, we got a guy that we want.

Some people ask that question, what does Joe really mean? Yeah, that was the perfect name for him. He hated to lose. That was part of his demeanor. He's here to win. He's here to beat that guy across from him. And he's not going to be nice about it. But inside the man who was the centerpiece of the steel curtain defense that led the Pittsburgh Steelers to four Super Bowl championships in six years was something unseen by the public eye.

Here's Joe Green giving us a peek. When I was a senior in high school, my class voted me to be class president. And I declined. I think about that a lot.

And it was basically because I was shy and didn't want to have to talk in front of the class or the student body. But in 1979, Green's rugged public persona and life changed dramatically after being selected for a television commercial by Madison Avenue creative wizard Penny Hawke. We were asked to do an exploratory, that is to take the Coca-Cola brand and see where else it could go in its communications. The guys were sitting there saying, okay, well, who could we get? Well, we could get Lynn Swan, Terry Bradshaw, Franco Harris, Mean Joe Green. And I said, wait, there's a guy called Mean Joe Green.

Is he mean? And they said, yeah. And I said, well, that's perfect. We want the most intimidating human being we can find. And boy, did we get it.

We wrote about 10 different storylines. And the very first one that we came up with was, let's take kind of a pathetic little kid who was just awestruck over some kind of superstar football hero. The kid has nothing to offer except he has the Coca-Cola. He gives the superstar the Coca-Cola. The superstar drinks it. Shazam!

He's a changed person. In the commercial Mean Joe would have a memorable encounter with a trembling nine-year-old named Tommy O'Kan. My mom and my dad were both in television.

As to our future weather, well, we expect the rain. My mom was on air talent. My dad was a director and a producer. I had started doing commercials probably when I was around five or so. So by the time we did the Coke commercial, I had probably done about 30 or 40 commercials up to that point. On the first day when we shot the commercial, there was a lot of downtime because they were doing a lot of work to the set.

And because of that, there wasn't a lot to do. So of course, I had brought a football and went over to Joe and asked if he'd throw a football around. And he said, sure.

He developed a sweet little relationship with Tommy and made Tommy much more comfortable. Okay. Giving the line, Joe.

Okay. Cut. They were trying to get him to drink the whole Coke. And they had him maybe do that a couple of times and just said they were going to, the guy was going to blow up after a while. He went through an awful lot of soda.

He drank 18, 16 ounce bottles, equivalent to two and a quarter gallons. Needless to say, when I start to shoot, first thing out of my mouth was a big burp. Hey kid. All right.

Cut. Talk about absolutely perfect timing. Super Bowl programs. Super Bowl souvenirs. Super Bowl pinets.

The commercial ran on the Super Bowl and then they won. And the rest is history. What could be better? Hey Mr. Green. Mr. Green. Yeah. Want my Coke? It's okay. You can have it.

Okay. Coke and a smile makes me feel good. Makes me feel nice. See you around. That's the way it should be.

I'd like to see the whole world smiling with me. Coca-Cola has life. Have a good day. Thanks, me and Joe. Joe Green was probably the first black male that was cast for a national brand. It was the fact that he was black and the little boy was white.

It was a shock at that time and people experienced it and really resonated to it. I don't know where that jersey went. I don't know if Joe took it back or who got it. I do know that that Christmas I got a package and it was a signed mean Joe Green jersey that I still have to this day. But Tommy was not the only child whose life would be positively influenced by Joe Green. Here's Joe's wife, Agnes. I think it changed our lives a lot. It changed Joe's personality a lot because so many kids were looking up to him. He decided he really wanted to be a role model for the kids. I think mean Joe Green should be called sweet Joe Green because he always smiles and he looks sweet. I mean he's really nice.

He appeared with the Muppets and probably Elmo and was on children's TV shows. Well you know I used to be afraid of my own shadow and then everybody told me that was silly. What are you afraid of? Well lots of things like the whole offensive line of the Rams jumping on you. We'd be walking around and little old ladies that I know didn't know anything about football would come up to Joe and talk to him. Listen you're not mean guy.

He's just a big old teddy bear. Doing the Coca-Cola spot did change the image. I enjoyed it. I liked it. It made me more approachable. To this day I'm still rather amazed.

I mean it's the commercial that will not die. Although he was known to the world as Mean Joe, he is known to his grandkids as Papa Joe. When we went to North Texas and you saw me interacting with the people and you were surprised. A little bit.

Why? I guess just because we know you as grandpa and then all these people are trying to talk to you. The father of three and grandfather of seven credits the coke ad with keeping him in the spotlight since his retirement in 1981. My public life, my football life has been kept alive by the commercial. I think few people might know me as Mean Joe but a lot of them know me as the Coca-Cola guy. And a terrific job on the production, editing and scripting by our own Greg Hengler and what a story Mean Joe Green. 13 season in the NFL, 10 time Pro Bowler, first ballot Hall of Famer and as as we heard in that piece is there a better name than Mean Joe Green? In a mere minute it changed his life as he said the commercial made me more approachable.

Indeed it did. And it changed his personality because as he put it as his wife said he wanted to be a role model to those kids. The best thing that ever happened to Mean Joe possibly was not only being drafted by the Pittsburgh Steelers but having a Coke commercial which well helped him reshape his life.

The story of Mean Joe Green and the Coca-Cola commercial that launched a legend here on Our American Stories. Clean water access helps kids soak up childhood. Girls can be in class instead of walking hours for water. Kids can be climbing trees and skinning knees instead of being sick with waterborne diseases.

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