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Super Bowl Lowest-Rated AdsIt's Super Bowl weekend, which means every site even tangentially connected to sports, television or marketing will be doing their "Top 1,000 Super Bowl Ads." It's fun, but there are only so many times you can watch Joe Greene throw a jersey to some kid who snuck by security to give him a soda.

I'm more interested in the losers, the ads that cost millions of dollars and countless collective hours of planning and shooting only to see 150 million people go, "Huh?"

USA Today publishes an Ad Meter, an annual survey that ranks every Super Bowl commercial in terms of popularity and viewer resonance. I went through a decade's worth of the lowest-rated ads each year to bring you the Bad News Bears of Super Bowl commercials. Really, SalesGenie?

10. Napster Tries, and Fails, to Reinvent Itself (2005)

Ad meter score: 4.37 (out of 10)
If you're 25 or older, you probably remember the feeling of unadulterated joy when Napster debuted in 2000: that realization that any piece of music was available instantly -- for free. Cut to 2005, and the erstwhile king of technology spends millions of dollars on a piece of cardboard with a few JPEGs and a sun graphic. An apt metaphor.




9. Old Men Kayak, Pee for Flomax (2007)

Ad meter score: 4.22
When this came out, message boards were, um, flooded with tales of fathers awkwardly explaining "male urinary symptoms" and "decrease in semen" to their frightened and confused children. Sorry, dad. I'm more bemused by the ad's use of the verb "go," last heard by my 3-year old nephew, to mean urinate. And they also splash water on each other, a common hazing ritual apparently among Flomax users.




8. No Happy Ending for Godaddy.com (2010)

Ad meter score: 4.20
On paper, this one's a winner. Attractive girl getting massage from another attractive girl. And like Carrot Top doing a prop joke to a middle school assembly, this should be the perfect audience. But maybe the ad voters were expecting the bedroom scene from "Black Swan" or something and felt let down. Or maybe they felt bad for spokesperson Danica Patrick and really wanted to see her get that massage. Did you "see more now" online after this ad was run? Don't admit that.




7. Sheryl Crow Sings for Revlon, Causes Eye Roll and Hissy Fit For Stylist (2009)

Ad meter score: 4.09
Sheryl Crow. A frustrated hair stylist. Revlon. Football game. How did this not work?



6. For Levitra, Mike Ditka Compares Baseball to Not Having an Erection (2004)

Ad meter score: 4.08
We're guessing a lot of people weren't comfortable with Mike Ditka, one of the toughest NFL coaches during the '80s and '90s, shill for an erectile dysfunction drug. It's like watching your dad cry for the first time. You know he does, but still....




(Tie) 4. Salesgenie.com Makes Fun of Asians, Pandas (2007)

Ad meter score: 4.05
So there are actually three ads equal to or worse than this? Perhaps the team behind this commercial thought Ching Ching and Ling Ling, two adorably inaccurate stereotypical pandas filling in for Asian humans, would do for racists what Joe Camel did to potential teenage smokers. At least they didn't go with their first idea and scrapped the Sue Klux Klan ad. Thankfully, good taste and better judgment prevailed. The ad was quickly pulled and the company's CEO would later apologize, saying, "We never thought anyone would be offended." Not thinking seems to be a trait of this company.



4. Gillette Compares Razors to Weird Nuclear Fusion Experiment (2006)

Ad meter score: 4.05
It's gotta be a drag spending months coming up with a concept, testing myriad ideas with focus groups, casting the numerous roles, filming the ad with the pseudo-gravitas of a Michael Bay film, working up the graphics in post-production to look like some bizarre CERN experiment and when the history books come out, you tied with racist pandas. I wonder if the blade works as well on the wrists.




(Tie) 2. Skechers Gets Joe Montana's Disembodied Voice (2010)

Ad meter score: 3.77
We don't want to speculate on the financial reasons that arguably the greatest quarterback ever had to take this gig. Let's focus on the fact that Skechers, for reasons known only to a now-unemployed marketing exec, decided not to show his face during the ad. And it's not like there aren't funny Joe Montana ads out there.



2. Vizio Procrastinates, Has 10 Minutes to Design Ad (2009)

Ad meter score: 3.77
I feel like I should write in bland, neutral tones to properly accessorize the banality of this ad. The vanilla ice cream of Super Bowl ads is a glorified PowerPoint presentation with a voiceover. Taking the hint, the company decided to go the exact opposite direction the following year, piling their ad with a dizzying array of pop culture and Internet references and continuing to befuddle the public into not knowing what exactly they do.



1. Blockbuster Sells DirecTV, Abandons Internet (2000)

Ad meter score: 3.33
I'd like to cover our tracks and say that this ad is so bad, we can't, in good conscience, show it to you. But the reality is that this has been officially scrubbed from the Internet. Really. If you find it, I'll give you a dollar. Instead, let's revisit the most misunderstood and unfairly maligned ad of the decade: Garmin's "GPS Navigator vs. Paper Map Monster." It's camp, voters. Come on.