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topicnews · September 8, 2024

Will Levis’ quest to become face of Tennessee Titans, NFL star

Will Levis’ quest to become face of Tennessee Titans, NFL star

Fame takes time.

July. Nashville. Muggy as all get out. Will Levis had to pull off a more-elaborate-than-normal QB sneak. 

Roughly 30 teenagers from Youth Villages group homes gathered for a field day, unaware the Tennessee Titans’ starting quarterback was their guest of honor. Levis’ job? Tiptoe past the tepee rope bridge and inflatable water slides and shaved ice machine to surprise the kids gathered at the throw-a-football-into-a-hole arcade game.

So he did. Levis sauntered across the muddy field and casually grabbed a ball. 

But there was a problem: No one recognized him.

Levis’ camp thought this might happen. He was “unbranded.” No jersey. No helmet. No jar of Hellmann’s. Just a black T-shirt and a backward baseball cap. The kids needed a nudge, so one of Levis’ representatives shouted, “Oh my gosh! It’s the Titans’ quarterback!”

Heads whipped. Jaws dropped. A giddy young boy jaunted over and pointed at another camper.

“My friend,” the boy proclaimed to Levis, “he’s wearing your shirt!”

The second boy turned to declare his fandom. Levis and the second boy locked eyes. Levis’ face dropped to a wry grin.

Across the boy’s chest? RYAN TANNEHILL FOOTBALL CAMP.

Welp.

Fame takes time. But Levis’ time is now. 

The Titans doled out a quarter of a billion dollars in contracts this offseason, building around their second-year quarterback. They hired coach Brian Callahan, a quarterbacks guru who promptly installed a scheme designed for Levis’ talents. They signed one of the NFL’s best deep threats in Calvin Ridley and one of the league’s most consistent slot options in Tyler Boyd. They drafted the gargantuan JC Latham to be his blindside protector and signed steady veteran Lloyd Cushenberry III to keep him safe up the middle. 

This organization easily could have chosen to tear down and rebuild after firing Mike Vrabel and losing Derrick Henry. But it didn’t. The face of the franchise responsibilities just shifted to Levis.

Levis accepted a role as the Titans’ living, breathing billboard.

“I think just one thing I’ll never get over as a public figure or as an athlete is just the opportunities you have to go out and get paid to do ridiculous things,” Levis told The Tennessean.

Levis’ run as the new face of the Titans begins Sunday against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field to start the 2024 NFL season (noon CT, FOX). But if you paid any attention this offseason to the Kentucky Derby or the Masters or the NHL playoffs or LIV Golf or the celebrity tournament circuit or attended Nashville-area charity events or spent time in Cabo or Tuscany or simply stepped foot in the condiment aisle of your grocery store, you know The Levis Era has long since begun.

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Fame, Will Levis and mayonnaise

Yeah, yeah. We have to start things off by talking about mayonnaise.

Levis says he doesn’t intentionally court fame. He thinks being the face of a city is a title appointed, not pursued. He said he doesn’t pay attention to celebrity, he’s rarely on social media and has no problem turning down appearances. 

But he’s acutely aware of branding. This is the guy who asked NFL legend Peyton Manning a question about marketing management in front of ESPN cameras while he was still in college. Levis talks about walking the tightrope between doing enough to be known and taking advantage of his platform, but not doing too much as to become overexposed.

He and his team have a behind-the-scenes plan to make the most of his public appearances without stretching him too thin. He’s selective. He’s dutiful. He considers being a brand ambassador “work” and takes that work seriously.

Still. C’mon. Let’s not overintellectualize this. He’s the mayo guy. 

“People, to this day, still think I drink mayonnaise in my coffee every morning,” Levis said, chuckling, in reference to his viral TikTok moment from college. “Like, that’s the most-asked question I get: Do you actually drink mayonnaise in your coffee? So . . . it worked.”

Excuse fans for being a little confused after having seen the commercial.

Levis engineered a viral moment in August by launching Will Levis No. 8, his “parfum de mayonnaise” made by Hellmann’s. Andrew Simon, the creative director behind the campaign, based the idea for the commercial on self-serious cologne ads starring actors like Johnny Depp, Matthew McConaughey and Jake Gyllenhaal. 

Over the course of an eight-hour shoot, Levis unflinchingly inhabited the parodic spirit like he was Leslie Nielsen in “Airplane!” He seductively shushed the camera. He longingly spritzed himself. And with a straight face, scooped mayonnaise with his finger and licked it clean, a move Simon says Levis improvised.

“This was ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ for him,” Simon said. “I said we’re going to do a few setups, nothing crazy. I’ll explain what the ideas are. But he immediately got it. When I said, ‘Will, I want you to channel your inner ‘Zoolander’ and give me a little bit of ‘Blue Steel.’ He was able to nail that.

“He has the ability to understand that part of the business. He has the opportunity to be very successful for a long time because he just gets it.”

The Levis ‘power aura’

May. Louisville. Back-to-back days of horse racing. Levis wore a double-breasted pink jacket with a houndstooth pattern and a pink bow tie to the Kentucky Oaks Friday. The next day, for the Kentucky Derby, he donned a “Peaky Blinders”-inspired getup complete with vest, newsboy cap and pocket watch. 

Derby weekend usually feels like a college reunion for Levis, but this year’s was special.

Levis had met thoroughbred trainer Kenny McPeek the same day he moved into his University of Kentucky dorm room in 2021, when the Levis family took a tour of the Keeneland race course. They clicked.

With Levis in attendance this spring, McPeek became the first trainer since 1952 to have horses win the Oaks and Derby in the same year. McPeek had a “paddock pass” reserved for Levis so the quarterback could celebrate with him in the winner’s circle, but Levis couldn’t make it through the crowds.

“I think Will’s got what I would call a ‘power aura,’ ” McPeek told The Tennessean. “ . . . He’s magnetic. It’s a great thing. You get one opportunity at life. If you bust your tail at something, you can make great things happen.”

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The ‘Levis brand’

February. Las Vegas. Levis is in a foursome with retired defensive back Darius Butler, New England Patriots quarterback Drake Maye and six-time major winner Phil Mickelson as part of a LIV Golf pro-am.

Mickelson is treating the green as his classroom. Maye putts. “If you’ve got that kind of touch with a putter, you’ve got all the throws.”

Butler putts. “Putting, I can tell it’s your thing.”

Levis putts. “See, I didn’t know you had such deft touch like that.” 

Mickelson putts. The ball fades left of the hole. Levis leans away from Mickelson and toward Maye.

“We’re both closer to the pin,” Levis whispers gleefully. “It’s no big deal.” 

“I had a great time with Will on the course, and I enjoyed learning more about him,” Mickelson told The Tennessean through a representative. “He has a presence about him, and it’s easy to understand why he’s a strong leader. He’s easy to like, and I’ll be pulling for his success.”

Six months later, Levis smiled, hearing Lefty’s words.

“I’d like to think I just handled myself the right way around him, asked the right questions,” Levis said. “Maybe got a little too frustrated after some bad shots so he could tell that I was a little competitive. I probably played my worst round of golf of the offseason that day. So for him to still have some faith in me says a lot.”

That, in essence, is the “Levis brand.” Whether he’s on a family vacation appreciating the European countryside in Tuscany or being mobbed by cellphone cameras walking down Lower Broadway, Levis is who he is. “As long as I’m not an idiot,” he says, “then nothing bad’s going to come.”

So you get situations like February in Las Vegas when Levis finished sixth in a celebrity poker tournament and screamed in shock after beating 1-in-22,000 odds by correctly predicting the flop in a game of Texas Hold ‘em.

You get situations like May in Nashville, when Levis was misinformed about which sports were on the Tennessee Special Olympics schedule before giving a speech to 800 athletes. “Who here plays pickleball?” Levis asked. No hands went up. “OK . . . ” he stammered. Like a play that was breaking down in the pocket around him, Levis had to adjust on the fly and segue back into his speech.

You have the moments like June in Mexico, when Levis brought five teammates to a sunny resort in Cabo for some extra practice between the end of OTAs and the start of training camp, and you have the moments in July when Levis picked up journaling so he’d have more awareness about what was going on in his head.

You have April at the Masters, where Levis and his father fulfilled a lifelong dream by walking the course following Tiger Woods, relishing the anonymity that comes with Augusta National’s no-cellphone policy. And you have April at Bridgestone Arena, when Levis kissed a catfish right on the mouth before a Nashville Predators playoff game. 

Callahan coached Peyton Manning — the Papa Johns pitchman, Nationwide insurance jingler, Mastercard “cut that meat” guy — at the end of his career in Denver, well after Manning had become America’s most overexposed quarterback brand. He also coached the Not-So-Real Slim Shady himself, Joe Burrow, at the beginning of Burrow’s career in Cincinnati and watched as “Joe Shiesty’s” brand ballooned.  

Now he’s seeing Levis go through all the same paces.

“The pressure is real,” Callahan said of being a public figure as an NFL quarterback. “The microscope is real. You’ve got to find your way through those things. It can be challenging.”

LOOKING BACK AGAIN: Tennessee Titans QB Will Levis — and his cannon arm — have arrived. Get ready, NFL.

LEVIS’ JOURNEY: To understand how Will Levis’ draft slide could jettison him to Titans stardom, start in high school

Will Levis’ responsibility

Levis says he thinks about his expiration date every day. Whether it’s in three years at the end of his rookie contract, or in 15 years with a gold jacket on the way, his playing days will eventually end.

Asked to describe his opportunity in one word, Levis chooses “unimaginable.” But that’s not exactly true now, is it? Levis is, in his heart, an imaginer. 

McPeek thinks back to the day he and Levis met. Levis told him he came to Kentucky to be the Wildcats’ starting quarterback. 

“Well, good luck with that, young man,” McPeek responded, unaware of how easily Levis would achieve that goal. 

A couple of weeks later, McPeek and Levis had another conversation. This time, Levis told McPeek he planned to spend two years at Kentucky, then turn pro. 

“Well, good luck with that, young man,” McPeek repeated, again oblivious to the power of Levis’ ambition.

Eventually their conversations shifted. The two started jostling about what would happen first: McPeek’s Kentucky Derby win or Levis’ Super Bowl victory. 

McPeek won, but the competition isn’t over.

“I do think that if you believe you can do it, you’ll get it done,” McPeek said. “You have to believe first. I believe Will believes he can do anything . . . You know what, he’ll win a Super Bowl. Because he’s decided he’s going to. And I have no doubt that he will do it.”

Levis isn’t ready to call himself the face of the Titans yet. But he knows what it’ll take for him to get there.

“I don’t think I’ve earned it,” Levis says. “I haven’t gotten close to it . . . I do recognize the pressure, and I know that there is pressure surrounding me and this team and the city. But that’s good. I embrace it. I know that I’m not given this job because it’s easy, but because it’s hard.”

So let’s go back to that muggy evening in July. Levis had long since resolved the Tannehill mix-up. He’d scarfed down his red and blue snow cone and endured the ruthless torments that are the surgical insults of witty teenagers. One wouldn’t stop ribbing him about how the Titans aren’t as good as the Kansas City Chiefs. Another told him he thinks the NFL isn’t that cool to begin with. One couldn’t stop grilling Levis about his weightlifting regimen.

Levis just kept smiling. He gifted the kids shoes and shared dinner with them, shoulder to shoulder, on picnic benches. By the end of the night, the kids who just an hour before didn’t know Will Levis any more than they knew their local city comptroller were forming lines to get their turns going down the waterslides with him. 

Kid after kid, minute after minute, Levis just kept sliding, splashing, living. For those kids, on that night, Levis was unquestionably the face of the Tennessee Titans.

So that’s 30 fans he’s won over. 

It’s a start.

Nick Suss is the Titans beat writer for The Tennessean. Contact Nick at [email protected]. Follow Nick on X, the platform formerly called Twitter, @nicksuss.

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