You’re old standby.

When I was looking up some details for the Qualcomm piece, I came across an old favorite: the Sprint Trench Coat Guy. Taking over the job of Sprint’s personification after Candice Bergen had done such an amazing job must have been tough, but the fact that you still remember him (and probably still like him, too) is proof, in my mind, that he pulled it off pretty darn good.

Unfortunately, the Trench Coat Guy was just one of the many casualties of the irrational decision making that came after Sprint acquired Nextel. (You’ll remember I was never a big fan of the merger.) Think about the last Sprint commercial you remember. My unofficial polling of friends says Sprint’s many, many attempts to brand itself since the merger have been failures. (If my anecdotal evidence doesn’t convince you, perhaps the more empirical fact of Sprint’s continued hemmoraging of postpaid subscribers proves the point better.)

Would bringing back Trench Coat Guy cure all of what ails Sprint? I’m afraid not. But, as the Washington Post points out, he provided “a fresh face to an otherwise faceless, multibillion-dollar telecommunications behemoth (and helped make it successful enough to buy another faceless telecommunications behemoth)” (that’d be Nextel, in case you were wondering).

While we’re taking this meaningless stroll down mobile phone memory lane, how about a look at some of the other faces I remember (and one I wish I didn’t)…

Jamie Lee Curtis for VoiceStream

Maybe the one you might not remember, since VoiceStream was pretty small back in the day, a cobbling of various GSM carriers that eventually attracted the attention of Deutsche Telekom. Jamie provided a friendly face for a relatively new company, and was the first to make Get More From Life a recognizable phrase. Alas, the Germans seemed to not understand why America loves Jamie, and so…

Catherine Zeta-Jones for T-Mobile

When they bought VoiceStream and changed its name to T-Mobile, they also hired Catherine to be its new spokesperson. She eventually became the face for Telekom around the world, and made some fierce commercials before T-Mobile decided it no longer needed a spokesperson in 2006.

Last, and least…

There’s whatever his name is for Verizon Wireless. He might have made “Can you hear me now?” a national catchphrase, and maybe that’s all that matters, but I honestly can’t imagine a less loveable wireless icon. Perhaps the Washington Post put it best: “Alas, without [Sprint Trench Coat Guy], we’re stuck with [the] imitative and inferior rival: that horn-rimmed Verizon Geek, who walks around asking “Can you hear me now? Good!” We know what Trench Coat Guy would say about that: Not good. Not so good at all.“

It’s true. I think it’s about time the Sprint Trench Coat Guy make a triumphant return. Says the Post:

Trench Coat Guy and Verizon Geek were selling the same kind of product, but never emitted the same signal. Verizon Geek is more concerned with his own reception and transmission, and happens to be one of those guys who are never not on their phones. That’s the funny thing about Trench Coat Guy: In all those years — all those living rooms, airports and sidewalks — he never seemed to use a cell phone, or interrupt somebody so he could take a call. That’s the sign of a true gentleman, and they are harder and harder to find.

You’re telling me.