Kobe and LeBron Nike Puppet Ad

Puppets of NBA stars LeBron James and Kobe Bryant appear in a new Nike commercial.

The web has been buzzing for the past day or so with talk about the new Nike ad that features puppets of basketball stars LeBron James and Kobe Bryant. It’s always neat to see a commercial like this resonate with people who don’t usually watch puppetry. The spot is reportedly the first in a series of ads Nike is planning to roll out during the NBA playoffs.

The Kobe and LeBron puppets in the ad were created at Legacy Effects. The team of puppeteers who worked on this included Greg Ballora and Greg Manion (Lebron), Rob Saunders and Dave Barclay (Kobe) with Christine Papalexis, Alison Mork, Blake Bolger, and Patrick Gerrity assisting. The Kobe puppet’s voice was supplied by David Allen Grier; Lebron’s was done by SNL’s Kenan Thompson.

13/5/09 Update: I’ve added information about the puppetry team who worked on the Nike spots (special thanks to Greg Ballora for providing the details!).