Microsoft Is Pretty Much Running Seattle Sports

It's not just the WNBA team that's a walking advertisement for Microsoft. The Sounders, Seahawks, and even Pete Carroll's draft strategy are all being brought to you by Bill Gates' brainchild.

Today the Storm released their new jerseys, which you might notice don't even say "Storm" on them. They're not the first WNBA team to fork over that valuable uniform real estate, for about $1 million annually. But it simply cements Seattle sports' place in Microsoft's pocket.

From the moment their kits were first released, the Sounders have been referred to — by both home and away fans, both jokingly and dismissively — as the "Seattle XBox 360s." Not hard to see why.

But those are second tier sports. The NFL would never stoop to such a shameless cash grab! Um, you might want to check the Seahawks' practice jerseys, with a Bing patch larger than the team's logo on the helmet.

The most insidious of these sponsorships has been Pete Carroll's little scavenger hunt. Leading up to the draft, he's been posting songs on his Twitter, which are supposed to be clues to tell observant fans who he's planning to select tomorrow night. But with each song, comes a link to the music video hosted on Bing.

Obviously Apple needs to get in on this racket, perhaps backing a popular yet outsider sport, like MMA or Quidditch, which will gradually become everything it's in opposition to.