Olympic gold medal-winning swimmer Ryan Lochte’s apparent tall story about getting robbed in Rio has ruined his chances of picking up any new sponsors, sports business experts told The Post on Thursday.
“Right now, sponsors will be trying to figure the real story and from there they’ll take action, but it’s difficult to navigate right now,” said sports branding expert Jarrod Moses, of United Entertainment Group.
Henry Shafer, who runs Q Scores, an awareness and likability index for marketers, said Lochte’s scores are already sinking.
The 32-year-old swimmer, with 12 Olympic medals, including a gold medal in the 4×200-meter relay in Rio, had “shown signs of being a polarizing personality” even before the Rio Games started, Shafer said.
Lochte’s likely tall tale about being robbed by thieves posing as Rio cops has nearly overshadowed the Games themselves.
As is typical in the first days after an athlete gets into trouble, marketing partners have little to say.
Lochte has a long list of sponsors, including Ralph Lauren, Gatorade, Nissan, Mutual of Omaha, Speedo and Procter & Gamble, and they are likely to wait for more facts to be known before making a decision on whether to continue their relationship with the swimmer, experts said.
On Thursday morning, NBC “Today” show anchor Matt Lauer said he spoke to Lochte the day before and that the athlete had told him: “We wouldn’t make this story up.”
Only Ralph Lauren, a USOC partner, gave a statement, telling The Post it is “reviewing the situation.”
That followed a press conference held by Brazilian authorities who accused Lochte and one of the three other swimmers of making up the story.
Lochte, worth about $3 million, is signed to Hollywood talent shop CAA and his agent was not available to comment.
Media measurement firm iSpot reports Lochte appeared in TV ads 117 times during the Games so far.
“As time moves on, a lot will depend on what he says and how quickly,” Shafer said. “The longer the delay, the more negative perception and it’s harder to overcome.”
In a January poll, Q Scores found Lochte was known by around 26 percent of the US population, and of those people, 10 percent said he was one of their favorite personalities.
At the same time, rival Michael Phelps had a 67 percent awareness and a 12 percent Q Score.
“We’ll see what happens with Lochte, it’s going to create a lot of controversy,” added Shafer, who is set to conduct a new poll on the athletes after the Games end.
A separate marketing survey by Canvs, which tracks language on Twitter, shows Lochte displaying many more negative emotional reactions — such as “crazy,” “dislike,” “idiot,” “weird” and “hate,” it said.
The number of tweets using the word “love” dropped from 30 percent to 20 percent.