Opinion

Wing soaring high but social media still hoping for the Hayne plane to fly

patrick baumeIn this guest post iSentia’s Patrick Baume analyses where the social chatter about Jarryd Hayne has been coming from in his first few weeks in the NFL.

There is an Australian with an uplifting name performing brilliantly as a starter in the first few games of the NFL season, surely you’ve heard of him? That man is Brad Wing, punter for the New York Giants who has already reached the pinnacle of his art this season, dropping a punt on the one-yard line and generally getting rave reviews from his first three outings.

But he might as well be invisible compared to the man who did well in the pre-season but fumbled his first touch in the season proper and had to wait for his third game before exciting the crowd with a 38 yard punt return. In September, Hayne has seen over 163,000 mentions on social, with a quarter of those in just the first five days, while Brad Wing has barely scraped 3,000 mentions.

jarryd hayne tweet

But we’ve heard the Australian punter story before with Darren Bennett and Sav Rocca, and no punter will ever be a marketing phenomenon. Clearly Australians want to find out whether a huge star of rugby league can make it in the trenches of America’s main football code as a running back.

After perhaps producing the only bright spot in a dismal San Francisco 49ers performance overnight, is one good punt return enough to reignite the massive buzz there was around Jarryd Hayne when he was selected for the 49ers final roster, and can he possibly maintain his current profile in Australia if he’s only getting a couple of touches a game?

Australians are still clearly interested, despite his slow start. One pointer to the continuing Australian interest was the news from the NFL online store that his was the fifth highest selling jersey across the NFL, ahead of many of the huge stars of the game, but 70% of those sales were from Australia.

Mentions for Jarryd Hayne on social media in September 2015

Mentions for Jarryd Hayne on social media in September 2015

While there’s been nothing like the social media hype around this weekend’s effort than there was around his first appearance – nearly 35,000 mentions vs. just 4,000 across the days surrounding each match – there’s been a big jump from a week ago, and a far higher proportion was from the US, with many comments calling on the 49ers to give Hayne a more prominent role.

But before anyone gets too excited, a lot of those American comments were inspired by the poor play of just about every other 49ers player, and the majority of comments have still been from Australia.

Origin of mentions of Jarryd Hayne on social media in September 2015

Origin of mentions of Jarryd Hayne on social media in September 2015

At this stage it still seems Jarryd Hayne might be a small part player in what could be one of the NFL’s worst teams, and surely Australian interest will gradually drop off as the season goes on, despite the 49ers games now being available on free to air TV.

However, if the 49ers keep putting up performances like that, desperation may give Hayne the opportunity so many Australians think he deserves to become a serious contributor. If that doesn’t happen, the marketing and TV investments in the Hayne plane may start to look like the sort of punt Brad Wing would never offer up.

Meanwhile Wing, who looks to have a bright future ahead of him in the NFL, will keep punting away unnoticed by anyone but the Giants faithful, or perhaps a brave sponsor looking for a ‘quiet achiever’ angle at a budget price.

  • Patrick Baume is group communications manager at iSentia
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