Will you be watching the Super Bowl matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles? Kathy So, a 74-year-old sports fan from Battle Creek, will not. "I think this will be the first one I've totally tuned out," she said. "The Lions are not there. The teams who are there, I couldn't care less if they win or lose. ... I'll be doing laundry." And she is not alone in her sentiment. Across town and throughout the state, football fans who picked the Detroit Lions to go all the way ― only to see their team lose in the NFL playoff divisional round to the Washington Commanders ― this year's Super Bowl is a super bust. "Stupid Commanders," So said. "They played better. That makes it harder. I can't blame anyone else." Here's why other fans are forgoing the game which, for the record, starts about 6:30 p.m and airs on Fox.
'I'm not a conspiracy theorist ...'
For Char Yates, a football fan who attended last year's Super Bowl in Las Vegas — she left at halftime to go shopping — and has had season tickets to the Lions since 2000, the decision to skip this year's Super Bowl broadcast comes down boredom. "I really don’t want to see two teams that I’ve seen before playing in the Super Bowl," Yates said. (The Chiefs and the Eagles faced off against each other in 2023.) "And I’m quite tired of Kansas City." (The Chiefs
won the Super Bowl in 2024, 2023 and 2020.) "I’ve been through all the ups and downs of the Lions," she said. "This year was such a disappointment. Then to have the two teams who ended up being these repeat teams ... " She believes the Chiefs may have had help in their journey to the Super Bowl. "I'm not a conspiracy theorist,'' the 61-year-old Detroiter said. But Taylor Swift is dating Travis Kelce, the Chief's star tight end. Swift attends games. Young girls, especially, adore Swift and her interest in the Chiefs fuels their interest in the Chiefs, which is great for the National Football League. Which is why Yates said she believes the Chiefs ”get favorable calls and whatnot to keep them in the game." The NFL wants to "keep these young kids engaged and build up this whole next generation" of fans. Her goal for the day: "I just want it to be as peaceful as possible because with all the craziness in the world ... "
A presidential first
"He's just a terrible person. He's very self serving and just not a good man. I don't like him," she said, referring to policies she says are hostile to women and people of color. "... And the way he’s just wanton about his words, 'Oh let’s buy Greenland.' What? 'Let’s make Canada the 51st state.' No! ... He’s just not good for our country.” She said she will catch the commercials on YouTube. That way she doesn't have to deal with the president popping up on her screen. But even if Trump wasn't planning to be in attendance, she still wouldn't be watching. She can't abide by the NFL's decision to
remove the phrase "End Racism" from the end zone at the Super Bowl. The phrase has appeared in a Super Bowl end zone since 2021. This year's messages will be "Choose Love" and "It Takes All of Us." Once a Chicago Bears fan, Glenn Reedus became a Lions die-hard when he moved to the Detroit area in the late 1970s. Back in Chicago now, 72-year-old Reedus maintains his love for the Lions. In fact, a Lions appearance is the only reason he'd watch the Super Bowl. The business of the game, he said, "takes away from the football." And that takes away from the fun of it. So on Sunday, Reedus, will "stay out of restaurants with televisions and stuff like that. People are fanatics these days, they take the fan part way too seriously. I love sports, but at the same time, this is just a game." He'll see game highlights on Monday.
'I hope both teams lose'
Kerriann Koss has always liked the Lions, but the last couple seasons she has become a super fan. "I’m watching the games without my boyfriend even joining me," the 31-year-old Berkley resident said. "I’m in the basement yelling, being the football fan I never was." A candlemaker, Koss decided to turn her love for the Lions into a scented candle called Smells Like a Detroit Win, which she said smells like anticipation and excitement and birchwood. She sold the candle on her website,
mugsandotherjugs.com . And in shops. When the Lions' Super Bowl run ended, she adjsted the candles' packaging so that one side of the candle bears a "Smells Like a Detroit Win" label and the other side bears a label that says "I Hope Both Teams Lose." She said she will still watch the Super Bowl, but she will be surrounded by the scent of "I Hope Both Teams Lose." Which seems a fine sentiment for this bust of a bowl game.
