Why Are Eagles Fans So Crazy? A Penn State Doctor Explains
"The fanship in each community definitely thinks that their community has the most intense fans," says Conshohocken's Liselle Milazzo. "But fans of teams like the Eagles and the Bills tend to take things to more of an extreme."
Fandom expert Liselle Milazzo from Penn State’s Abington campus shares her insights into Eagles fans ahead of the Super Bowl. (photos via Penn State Abington and Getty Images)
Dr. Milazzo, I first have to ask how on earth someone chooses fandom as their area of expertise.
[Laughs] Well, I grew up surrounded by the Buffalo Bills fan community, because my dad is a proud Buffalo Bills fan. And then I developed a fanship for Harry Potter in my teens, participating heavily in that fan community. I went abroad, visiting sites I saw in pictures in the books. And I realized there is a whole world out there of people who are fans of all sorts of things. I originally studied the fan communities surrounding Harry Potter, the Beatles, Dr. Who, while I was living in the UK. Then Beyonce and Taylor Swift. And I started studying the fan community surround the Eagles when I moved here in 2023. The Eagles have such a vibrant fan community, and once Penn State formally approves my study, I look forward to actively recruiting research participants.
What are commonalities among all these different fan communities, from Swifties to Eagles fans?
There are three primary commonalities.
First, there’s a desire for internal involvement. People make small to major changes in lifestyle. So, for Eagles fans, this might mean restructuring your Sundays come football season so that you have time to watch the games. Maybe you are suddenly inviting friends over who you wouldn’t normally invite to your home, but you will during the season because they are Eagles fans. And more major, maybe changing your financials so you can afford tickets to games.
Then there’s a desire for external involvement. You want to acquire things related to the Eagles. That could be jerseys. It could be membership in some Eagles fan community. There’s a link between what we physically own and touch and our love of the Eagles. I was just looking at an article in the New York Times about a gentleman in Philly who has something like 300 different Eagles jerseys and an attic dedicated to memorabilia. This is actually quite common in fan communities. Fans will have objects of interest on display. People care a lot for these objects, they curate them. These objects can remind them that they are part of that community.
And finally, there’s a desire for social interaction. A lot of people get a lot of pleasure sharing the same fan interest. You might have these social interactions around the water cooler or in a Facebook group or a group chat. Or maybe face-to-face meetings, going to bars with other Eagles fans.
One other interesting thing about all of these fan communities is that people don’t always have the same level of interest throughout their lives. Some people will vary in degree. You have diehard Eagles fans who have, for years and years, been paying attention. Then you might have fans who watched a few games this season but are now really enthusiastic and excited because of how well the team has done. Maybe they are suddenly listening to sports talk on 94.1 when they never would have done that before.
I think you’re actually pointing to yet another commonality between fan communities when you bring up the diehard versus casual fan. Isn’t there some snobbiness, some resentment, some criticism coming from diehard fans of anything when there are all of a sudden newbies joining the pack? When it comes to sports, fairweather fans.
It really depends on the community, but specifically for the Eagles, what I’ve seen is a type of gatekeeping. There are people who feel like they’ve borne all the losses, so the stakes seem higher for them. So they can see themselves as the “true fans,” but there is also pushback to that narrative. This is our city, this is our team. Everyone can participate in it. And I think particularly when you have a big celebratory event like the Super Bowl, we see more welcoming narratives celebrating our shared identity, a shared pleasurable experience.
We like to think that Eagles fans are somehow special. The craziest. The most loyal. Is that really the case, or do people in most cities with NFL football teams think the same of their team’s fans.
The fanship in each community definitely thinks that their community has the most intense fans. But fans of teams like the Eagles and the Bills tend to take things to more of an extreme. If you’re in Buffalo for a game, fans like to jump up and down on tables at the local bars until they break.
It is just a game. Or maybe it’s not. It is and it isn’t. Rooting for a team creates a connection between the fan and the team. There’s a bond. Some academics would use the word “parasocial” to describe this fan-team relationship. I’m not sure I would call it that. But there is this relationship between the individual and the thing they are rooting for. It feels like an extension of identity when they win, a validation of our emotional and financial investment. And there’s a feeling of a personal loss, so much disappointment when they lose. It’s not just a football game, of course. If that’s all it was, you could go to any park and watch kids playing football and come away with the same feeling. But that’s not what happens.
I get invited to Eagles games a fair amount, but, honestly, I’d just rather watch with diehard fans at a neighborhood bar and all scream at the TV together. What’s with these people who are refinancing their houses so they can go to the Super Bowl?
Some people have a different desire of intensity for that external involvement we spoke about earlier. Some people see being at the Super Bowl itself as an act of communitas. It’s a shared, spontaneous feeling of closeness among other people going through the same experience. The sense of closeness is replicable at homes and bars, but when you’re at an event as big as the Super Bowl, it’s magnified by a thousand. There’s a special feeling. You are all there.
And if your team wins, it’s a moment you will never forget.
Yes, you will all have this intangible memory of this shared cultural experience. For some, this will have status attached to it. They can tell other fans, “I was at the Super Bowl!” And that can come with some social cache within the fan community. It can also serve as a badge of honor that you were such a devoted fan that you were willing to go to whatever lengths to get to the Super Bowl. It’s how you are expressing your identity. You are someone who is fiercely loyal, who puts your money where your mouth is. With the Super Bowl, it’s the ultimate fan pilgrimage, a once in a lifetime experience for some.
And those of us who don’t make it to the Super Bowl, we just run out into the streets in this crazed, spontaneous celebration, if we win.
Yes, again, communitas. We need to have that special feeling of closeness. Out of history, there comes this theory of places of memory. Most of the time, that’s applied to monuments and museums and historical sites. But in my research, I’m starting to see that there are also newly created places of memory tied to fanship. Having a spontaneous celebration on Broad Street creates a new place of memory. Whenever you go back to Broad Street, you will be able to immediately pull up that night. The entire city will remember.
OK, Dr. Milazzo. You grew up in a Buffalo Bills house. And you’ve only been in Philly for a couple of years. Who are you rooting for?
Oh, my house is the Eagles all the way. My husband’s family, they are all Kansas City Chiefs fans. But in our house, it’s the Eagles.
And your predicted outcome?
Eagles by 14. I’m feeling really good about this. I can’t wait to go down to Broad Street Sunday night.
