No marketing blitz for the Patriots

The New England Patriots like to attribute their winning season to playing as a team. But when it comes to marketing deals, the Super Bowl champions may be victims of their own success.

Despite winning their third Super Bowl championship in four years, the vast majority of Patriots players will not see their faces on Wheaties boxes or fast-food commercials or become stars in large national sponsorship deals, several sports agents and marketing specialists said yesterday. On this team of unknowns, they said, only a handful of Patriots, including quarterback Tom Brady, have the star power to anchor national endorsements.

Brady has deals with Gap Inc., Nike Inc., and Sirius Satellite Radio Inc., according to published reports. Brady's agents at Yee & Dubin in Los Angeles could not be reached for comment yesterday.

''Aside from Tom Brady, I'm not sure that outside Boston many people know who Deion Branch or Tedy Bruschi or Mike Vrabel are," said Mike Tatoian, chief executive of the St. Louis sports marketing company Victory Sports Group, referring to the Patriots' MVP wide receiver and two linebackers. ''The Patriots were able to do it without the fanfare and bravado. That's a compliment, but it doesn't bring them the marketing and endorsements that it brings other players."

The Patriots' players are such unknowns that even members of the losing team could wind up with bigger endorsement deals. Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Terrell Owens, who made national news this month when he said he would play despite a leg injury, is likely to get more national sponsorships than all three of the Patriots' top wide receivers combined, said Scott Becher, president of Sports & Sponsorships, a Miami Beach sports marketing agency.

''It may not seem fair, but sometimes being brash and outspoken on the losing Super Bowl team can still make you a marketing winner, as long as your play on the field backs it up," he said. ''That sometimes can be a better recipe than being the Super Bowl champion and being anonymous."

Though the Patriots players may lack national deals, many are likely to receive regional sponsorship offers from corporations eager to sell products to New Englanders. The players also get paid between $3,000 and $10,000 per hour to make appearances at the autograph sessions and other events in the weeks following the Super Bowl. The player's exact appearance fee depends on his stature.

But there is one strategy that might bring the Patriots national marketing deals: sponsoring the entire team, said Tatoian, the St. Louis sports marketing executive. ''On the box of Wheaties, I'd put the whole team," he said. ''It really was a team effort."

In some cases, the Patriots' all-for-one talk may discourage individual players from taking deals to raise their profiles: After last year's Super Bowl championship, wide receiver David Givens turned down contracts to speak regularly on television and the radio because he worried it would draw too much attention to himself, said his agent, Brad Blank, who is based in Boston.

Givens has small deals with Reebok International Ltd. and a glove company, but no large national sponsorships, Blank said. He said it is too early to judge Givens' prospects for sponsorships this year.

After Sunday's Super Bowl, marketing specialists disagree on which players, besides quarterback Brady, possess the stature to do national marketing deals. Branch, the MVP wide receiver, could be get some national offers, but the opportunity may be greater in regional marketing, Tatoian said. Though he rooted for New England in the Super Bowl, Tatoian said he did not even notice Branch until his fourth or fifth catch.

But Branch's agent, Jason Chayut, said he already has heard from several companies, both national and local, though he declined to name them. He said the MVP award makes Branch stand out from the rest of the group.

''With the MVP, it really changes the landscape for his potential to earn," Chayut said. ''I think he'll exploit that to the fullest."

The Patriots' win also may have anointed some new national stars. In addition to Branch, several of the marketing specialists said Bruschi, the linebacker who posted a key interception during the Super Bowl, is on the rise. He appeared in a ''Got Milk" ad in USA Today yesterday.

Most of all, the Patriots' third recent Super Bowl win opened a marketing opportunity for one man in particular: head coach Bill Belichick. Becher, the Miami Beach sports marketer, said companies want to associate their brands with the winning coach.

''Belichick is a guy who truly has the most to gain by capitalizing on marketing opportunities," he said.

Sasha Talcott can be reached at stalcott@globe.com.