Alan Pergament: Why Josh Allen and the Bills have a 'gigantic, surging national following'
Josh Allen is arguably the most beloved and likable athlete in WNY history as he attempts to erase the demons and get the Bills back to the Super Bowl for the first time in more than 30 years.
The surging popularity of the Buffalo Bills across the country is largely because of their adorable, humble and classy quarterback.
Those aren’t my words. Those are the words my wife and I have heard from people we recently met in Florida who weren’t from Western New York.
Josh Allen is leading the Bills with grace and passion. Joshua Bessex, Buffalo News
They came in supermarkets, restaurants, the gym, the pool or on the golf course from people who saw my wife wearing a vintage Bills sweatshirt and a new Bills plaid hat.
Josh Allen is arguably the most beloved and likable athlete in Western New York history as he attempts to erase the demons and get the Bills back to the Super Bowl for the first time in more than 30 years. But you really need to get away from the Buffalo area to appreciate just how that likability has transformed the Bills from a national laughingstock that didn’t make the playoffs for 17 straight seasons into a team whose fans include broadcasters who are not supposed to have a rooting interest.
The current Bills are a different breed from the Bills of the ‘90s who lost four straight Super Bowls led by future Hall of Famers Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas, Bruce Smith, Andre Reed and James Lofton. That group of players became more beloved after they retired than during their four Super Bowl losses.
The love for this close-knit 2024-25 Bills team is immediate, different and nationwide. That became clear after CBS play-by-play announcer Jim Nantz declared via text there was “a compelling case to be made” that the Bills were the new “America’s Team” after their Dec. 15 victory over previously once-beaten Detroit.
“I believe there is a gigantic and surging national following for Buffalo,” Nantz texted me Tuesday. “If they win the Super Bowl, it would be one of the most popular team championships this country has seen in years, in any sport. It takes a title to send this into the stratosphere.”
Allen’s popularity is as much about the way he conducts himself in postgame interviews as it is his Superman performances on the field. I hear about it often away from Western New York, thanks in part to the hat I wear with “716” on the top that stands for the Western New York area code.
The favorite encounter my wife and I had was with a Lions fan at a grocery store in Naples, Fla. Shortly after the Bills defeated Detroit, 48-42, the Lions fan told us he also was rooting for the Bills because of how classy Allen was after the win.
“And he is such a good story,” the man added. “He didn’t get any college scholarship offers and look at him now.”
Allen finally received an offer to play at the University of Wyoming after playing one season at a junior college.
My wife also met a man at the gym wearing a University of Massachusetts shirt who stopped her to say how much he likes Allen despite being a New England Patriots fan.
“He’s a good man,” he told my wife. “So humble.”
My wife met another 70-something Patriots fan at a supermarket who admires Allen for the way he carries himself.
I met a Patriots fan playing golf who saw my “716” and recognized it. He immediately said he rooted for the Bills because of Allen and the sorry state of his favorite team.
“What a quarterback,” he said. “So much fun to watch.”
Then there was the time my wife and her sister were walking to a farmers market and ran into a group of 20-something women. (The encounter came after my wife received a free bag of pita chips at a market stand for wearing a Bills hat. The owner was from Clarence).
“Josh Allen,” two of the young adult women said. “He’s so cute and adorable.”
Of course, he is off the market. He is engaged to actress-singer Hallie Steinfeld, and they have handled their relationship as classy as any celebrity couple seeking privacy could.
Allen has even led some media members who are supposed to be objective to openly root for the Bills. ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky, who makes regular appearances on MSG’s “One Bills Live” with Chris Brown and Steve Tasker, revealed his rooting interest on Dec. 9 on one of the ESPN programs after the Bills lost to the Los Angeles Rams, 44-42.
“So, everybody knows I will be rooting for Buffalo to go to the Super Bowl,” said Orlovsky. “I want to see that team, that organization, that fan base, that quarterback get there.”
Just last Sunday after the Bills beat the Baltimore Ravens, 27-25, CBS studio analyst Nate Burleson said on the postgame show: “Congratulations to Bills Mafia. They are one fan group that I’d like to see win a Super Bowl. Because they deserve it.”
Of course, there are other reasons besides Allen that the Bills are getting so much national love. There might even be an element of sympathy because of the Bills’ four Super Bowl losses.
The list of reasons undoubtedly includes Chiefs Fatigue as brilliant quarterback Patrick Mahomes and tight end Travis Kelce seek their third straight Super Bowl victory.
The Chiefs have become the New York Yankees of the NFL, a team that many love or love to hate. Besides their success on the field, the number of national TV commercials they appear in also has led to overexposure. And I am not even going to bring up all the attention Kelce receives because his girlfriend is Taylor Swift and he does a popular podcast with his brother Jason.
There also is the perception – fueled again by a couple of egregious calls that went the Chiefs way in their playoff victory over the Houston Texans Saturday – that the game officials are on their side.
After the Bills win on Sunday, a guy from South Carolina that my youngest son met on a work trip in Utah messaged him congratulations and added he would be rooting for the Bills in Kansas City.
“We all had enough of Mahomes flopping his way to wins!!” he wrote.
That might be partly true. But based on my encounters with NFL fans outside of Buffalo, I think “the gigantic and surging national following” the Bills have achieved according to Nantz is more because of Allen and all his likable teammates than any Chiefs Fatigue.