At this point, Sydney Sweeney and ad campaign drama are becoming quite the power couple. This time, it involves sports betting, strategically placed equipment, and some seriously unimpressed Olympic athletes.
The controversy centers on Sweeney’s new campaign for sports prediction market Novig, appropriately—or perhaps ambitiously—titled Novig is Just Sports. In the commercial, the Euphoria actor appears mostly nude, using basketballs, footballs, boxing gloves, and other sporting equipment to cover herself while promoting the platform.
Watch the campaign stirring up the sports world below:
I’m no athlete, but I’m pretty sure that’s not how any of this equipment works.
For Sweeney, who joined Novig as a strategic partner and equity holder, it was all “a very simple and playful idea,” as she described the campaign to Complex.
But the women who actually compete in these sports aren’t exactly playing along.
American gymnast Gracie Kramer had little time for what the campaign was trying to sell:
“This ad is honestly infuriating. I’ve spent my entire life competing in a sport where female athletes have been oversexualized, reduced to our bodies, and forced to fight to be taken seriously for what we can actually do.”
Unlike Sweeney’s latest sporting venture, Kramer’s experience comes from years of actual competition. The UCLA walk-on became a 2018 NCAA National Champion and three-time All-American on floor exercise, later earning a perfect 10.0 in 2020.
Clearly, she knows sporting equipment is more than just a cheeky wardrobe choice.
For Kramer, the bigger problem is what happens when that imagery becomes the face of women’s sports:
“So to see women’s sports once again being marketed through the male gaze feels like a massive step backward.”
Sweeney’s relationship with the male gaze is hardly a new conversation. Her recent marketing has leaned into her sex appeal, from the viral Dr. Squatch bathwater soap campaign to American Eagle’s “Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans” campaign, which sparked debate over race and beauty standards with its “jeans” and “genes” wordplay.
For Kramer, the message this kind of marketing sends to women in sports is the real problem:
“We should not have to take our clothes off to convince men that women belong in sports, or that we’re only worth watching if we’re showing enough skin.”
Kramer countered with an Instagram Reel showcasing footage from her own training and competition.
Her response quickly moved from words to action on Instagram:
Other female athletes followed, turning Kramer’s response into a broader movement centered on women's strength and skill in sports.
Australian swimming legend Ariarne Titmus, a four-time Olympic gold medalist, had one pretty damning question for the campaign:
“How do we live in a world where monetizing a woman’s body and sexualising women’s sport is still a thing?”
Sprinters, cyclists, rugby players, and other athletes also shared footage of themselves training and competing, effectively reclaiming Sweeney’s “just sports” premise.
British sprinter Amy Hunt took things one step further by addressing Sweeney directly:
Naturally, the internet wasted no time joining the athletes in the comments section:
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u/Kittycity926/Reddit
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Sweeney eventually appeared to respond herself, though not with a written statement. Instead, she shared photos of athletes who had posed nude or with limited clothing, including Serena Williams, Ronda Rousey, Sue Bird, Megan Rapinoe, and several male athletes.
The apparent message: If athletes can pose nude, why is her campaign any different?
One Instagram user drew a sharp distinction between athletes celebrating their own bodies and an actor using sports imagery to sell a gambling product.
@badgalpheebs argued Sweeney’s response overlooked that crucial context:
“The fact you think the ESPN Body Issue is comparable to this campaign shows how badly you have missed the point.”
Sweeney’s response reportedly cost her more than 200,000 Instagram followers. While she repeatedly plays controversy with an ignorance-is-bliss shrug, there comes a point when not recognizing how these campaigns land becomes part of the conversation. Novig may call it "just sports," but the women who dedicate their lives to sports see something else entirely.
And in the end, accountability is always the smarter (and cheaper) bet.
@elektrotimmy/X
