Yeah, I see how it's good PR for Uber. I'm just not sure that it does anything to tackle the actual issue of NFL players driving drunk, endangering themselves and others.
How much impact does this actual issue have? What is the over/under on how many marginal drunk driving accidents the partnership with Uber will prevent per year? 10?
The primary effect will be to set up these 1500 or so celebrities as examples for how to behave when drunk. If using Uber after a bender is good enough for John Q Sportshero, then it's good enough for you. And that may make a real difference for the other 300 million of us.
I'd bet this project came out of their PR firms rather than the biz dev department.