Six years ago, it felt like the Kansas City Chiefs had America on their side. When they faced the New England Patriots in the 2019 AFC championship game, neutral NFL fans hailed them as the exciting up-and-comers that would finally end the Patriots’ dynasty − a run so dominant that it led some fans to dub them ‘The Evil Empire.’
Now, the Patriots are in the league’s proverbial basement. And many of those same neutral fans have instead come to loathe the Chiefs.
In other words, the ‘Evil Empire’ moniker has changed hands.
‘That’s natural,’ Chiefs safety Justin Reid told reporters Monday night, ahead of their Super Bowl matchup with the Philadelphia Eagles. ‘We were the Cinderella story, and now we’re the villain.’
It’s an all-too-common transformation in the world of professional sports, where neutral fans always seem eager to cheer for greatness … until the team in question becomes too good or wins for too long.
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Before the Chiefs’ current reign, which could see them become the first team in NFL history to win three consecutive Super Bowl titles, it was New England that drew eye rolls (and/or expletives) from casual NFL fans after emerging as one of the league’s dominant forces for the better part of two decades. The Golden State Warriors, New York Yankees and, perhaps most recently, the Los Angeles Dodgers are among the juggernaut teams in other sports whose reputations have taken a villainous turn.
The question isn’t so much whether this phenomenon exists in sports fandom, particularly in the United States, but why. And while psychologists have a few theories, they say research doesn’t provide a clear answer.
‘We like underdogs. We like novelty. We like things that are unexpected,’ said Tufts University psychology professor Sam Sommers, who co-authored a 2016 book on fandom titled ‘This is Your Brain on Sports.‘ ‘I think that’s my best sort of hypothesis for why it is: That it gets old quickly. We want to move on to something new and be surprised.’
According to survey data published Tuesday by data and technology company Numerator, 46% of the people who plan to watch Sunday’s game will be cheering for the Eagles, compared to 39% supporting the Chiefs. Yet among the Eagles supporters, more than 1 in 4 said they were only cheering for Philadelphia because they want to see the Chiefs lose.
Some NFL fans would chalk this up to simple ‘Chiefs fatigue.’ Since its first Super Bowl win of this run, in the 2019 season, the team has constantly been in the limelight − and two of its key players, quarterback Patrick Mahomes and tight end Travis Kelce, have blossomed into all-around celebrities even outside the world of sports. (Kelce’s relationship with pop star Taylor Swift has only added to the perceived over-saturation.)
This year, in particular, there’s also been a growing sense of injustice about how the Chiefs are performing − with unfounded cries of an officiating fix after Kansas City benefited from close calls in key situations. (‘A ridiculous theory,’ commissioner Roger Goodell said Monday.)
Psychologists said there could be a few different phenomena at play here, including schadenfreude − the notion of deriving pleasure from the misfortune or failure of another person or, in this case, another team.
‘I live in Boston and there used to be ‘Yankee Hater’ hats that people would wear around,’ Sommers said. ‘Sports may be one of the last bastions where hate is somewhat OK. You’re not allowed to be hateful towards other people in the stands, but you’re sort of allowed to wear on your sleeves that you don’t like (rival teams) − like overt prejudice.’
Mercer University psychology professor Keegan Greenier, who studies schadenfreude, wrote in an email that the feeling is often triggered by one of a handful of circumstances. He said people might experience it if they believe the other party deserved the negative outcome − a speeding car getting pulled over by police, for instance − or if they view them as undeserving of a positive outcome. This would apply to perceived cheaters or those benefitting from nepotism.
Schadenfreude is often rooted in a dislike of the other party, but that is where Greenier said the Chiefs application becomes a bit muddled. For neutral fans, he said, schadenfreude would not explain the inherent distaste of the Chiefs.
‘Perhaps one could argue that the fatigue of seeing the same team win repeatedly could induce disliking to some degree,’ Greenier wrote.
The hate toward sports dynasties like the Chiefs could also be a reflection of an inverse idea: that Americans love underdogs.
‘We find quite comprehensively, consistently, that people who are unaffiliated initially gravitate towards the underdog versus a favorite,’ University of San Diego professor Nadav Goldschmied said.
In studies about the perceptions of underdogs, Goldschmied has informed participants that a team has a 30% chance of winning or 30% of the financial resources of their opponents, and then asked them to watch clips of a game. His research found that about two-thirds of unaffiliated viewers gravitated toward the underdog − and that, in some cases, people see the underdog as displaying more effort or working harder.
‘It’s really counterintuitive why we support the underdog, because we love winning,’ Goldschmied said. ‘And at the core, underdogs are not likely to win.’
Goldschmied said support of underdogs could hinge on the emotional payoff − the notion that, for neutral fans, cheering for an underdog offers a significant emotional reward with little risk. If the favorite wins, neutrals can just shrug and move on.
He also noted that most people perceive themselves as underdogs in life. ‘Even if they’re successful or rich, they’ll find a hardship that they experienced and say this qualifies them as an underdog,’ Goldschmied explained.
All of this raises questions about whether the Eagles, who have won 76% of their games over the past three seasons, should even qualify as an underdog in the first place.
It also does not explain the leap from supporting the underdog to hating the favorite − or why people seem more likely to boo team dynasties while gawking at individual greatness in sports like tennis and golf.
‘I know people who are blown away by the domination of Tiger Woods or Serena Williams or Olympic swimmers and boxers, (Rafael) Nadal and (Roger) Federer. They’ll tune in and watch them win over and over again and they don’t mind,’ Sommers said.
‘I guess maybe in team sports, we just expect a certain amount of parity and spreading of the wealth.’
The Chiefs, of course, are not so much interested in understanding the newfound hate surrounding them ahead of Super Bowl 59 as they are in utilizing it. Mahomes told reporters at Super Bowl Opening Night that he thinks the outside negativity around the team has brought players closer together.
“I don’t even think it’s embracing being the villains. We embrace who we are,’ Mahomes said.
‘If winning football games makes you a villain, we’re going to keep going out there and doing it.”
Contact Tom Schad at tschad@usatoday.com or on social media @tomschad.bsky.social.