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Are the Detroit Lions America's team now? NFL world seems to think so
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- Are the Detroit Lions America's team now? NFL world seems to think so
The term "America's team" gets thrown around a lot in sports — mostly digs aimed at the Dallas Cowboys — but the 2023-24 Detroit Lions are making their claim at the title this season.
The Lions , a franchise perennially at the bottom of the NFL for most of its existence , have become a fan favorite as they work to shed some of their negative history .
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The Lions, under the new regime of Dan Campbell and Brad Holmes , rebuilt the team in three years, resulting in a 12-5 regular season record, and the first division title and playoff win in three decades.
Data backs up this claim, too. The Lions are one of eight teams remaining in the divisional round of the NFL playoffs, and a majority of the country has hopped on the bandwagon to root for a historic first for the franchise — reach the Super Bowl and win the whole thing .
The Lions have the most support from NFL fans across the country for any team left in the playoffs, this according to BetOnline.ag , a gambling company that uses trends software and social media data to create sports-based graphics.
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Based on data tracking over 200,000 tweets since the divisional round matchups were set, Bet Online determined a majority of fans in 27 states are backing the Lions for the rest of the playoffs. The Lions are the only team that had more than 10 states rooting for them, with the San Francisco 49ers in second place at seven. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Lions divisional opponent, had support from two states, Florida and Oklahoma, showing Baker Mayfield still has support from Sooners fans from his time in college.
The data was compiled by tracking fan hashtags used on tweets from all 50 states. The Lions' hashtag, #OnePride, was the one that showed up the most across the country, spanning from New England states such as Maine and New Hampshire all the way down to the Southwest in New Mexico and Arizona .
On top of the social media numbers, the TV numbers love the Lions, too. The Lions-Rams rubber match in the first round of the NFL playoffs drew in 38.5 million viewers , making it the most-watched television program since last year's Super Bowl.
Overcoming historic obstacles with a young roster and a coach who has embraced the city's persona has been one of the main reasons the Lions have become one of the favorites of casual fans or fans of teams out of the playoffs around the football world.
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"As they proceed through the NFL playoffs, the Lions should be America's team," Alex Kirshner wrote for Slate Magazine. "The reason is not that Campbell is a good talker or even that Detroit has been through a lot. The reason to root for the Lions to beat everyone is that the people who love the Lions are going totally ape(expletive) as their team mounts a charge that forever seemed impossible. It's just fun to watch people have fun. As an added bonus, the Lions have found success in ways that seem designed in a lab to be a tonic for their fans' past pain."
The Lions bandwagon started filling in the buildup to the 2022 season after the team went 3-13-1 in Campbell's first season in charge. NFL fans far and wide got an inside glimpse at the Lions' rebuild during the 2022 training camp, and the whole country got an uncut taste of Campbell's stern — and also teary-eyed — speeches to a young team trying to figure out how to win at the highest level.
People were rooting for the plucky upstart team with a coach who was not afraid of the team's history and preached a consistent message for emerging out of the darkness, but the real fandom picked up during the 2022 season. After a 1-6 start that led to questions about Campbell's future, the Lions rallied to win eight of the final 10 games that season to finish 9-8, just missing the playoffs.
During the resurgence as the team's message from the preseason came to fruition, the Lions became one of the most "lovable" teams in all of sports. The Lions became loved for playing like a team without any of the franchise's weight on their shoulders and winning games by throwing passes to their now All-Pro right tackle, Penei Sewell .
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"This team seems blissfully unaware of any of that," the Wall Street Journal wrote in December 2022, following the Sewell catch . "It has one of the NFL's best offenses led by an unlikely reclamation project in quarterback Jared Goff . It's led by coach Dan Campbell, who became a bombastic sensation before he ever coached a game. And it's playing an entertaining brand of football that reflects Campbell's brashness."
That energy carried over in national media as the Lions were preseason favorites to do the unthinkable and win the division for the first time. Fans were skeptical, given the long list of past excitement and subsequent letdowns, but Campbell saw the vision for his team in an interview with Tim Alberta, who grew up as a die-hard Lions fan, for the Atlantic during the 2023 preseason.
""That's been 'America's Team,'" Campbell told me, emphasizing the nickname with air quotes (referencing the Cowboys)," Alberta wrote on the eve of the Lions' 2023 season . "I could tell we were thinking the same thing: Imagine how endearing these Detroit Lions would be to the masses, football junkies and casual viewers alike, if they parlayed their losing past into a winning future. Campbell motioned toward the field behind us. "Why can't we be America's team?""
Campbell's quote from the preseason has started to come to fruition as they met their season goals of winning the NFC North and taking down the Rams for the first playoff victory in ages. And now, they have a majority of fans backing them as they try for their next goals of reaching the NFC Championship, then the Super Bowl, and maybe even winning the whole thing.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Are Detroit Lions now America's team? NFL world seems to think so
