In recent years, Super Bowls seem to have been mostly about Tom Brady. He quarterbacked the New England Patriots to six Super Bowl titles, but according to the latest Economist/YouGov poll interested Americans aren’t at all sure he is likely to lead his new team, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, to victory on Sunday.
Instead, America is looking for the Kansas City Chiefs and their quarterback, Patrick Mahomes, to take their second Super Bowl in a row. More important, they want Kansas City to win.
In the Midwest, those interested in watching the Super Bowl overwhelmingly want the Kansas City Chiefs to win another victory (52%) — and 62% think it’s likely to happen. Only in the South, the home of the Buccaneers, does Tampa Bay come close to Kansas City as the viewers’ favorite. Southerners who are interested in watching the Super Bowl are split between Kansas City (39%) and Tampa Bay (35%). Many Southerners (44%) believe the Chiefs are likely to emerge victorious.
The public – and those who plan to watch – are happy about the COVID precautions in place for the big game. Three in five (60%) overall and 73% of those who will be watching say the league took appropriate actions to limit the spread of COVID-19. Just one in four overall (24%) and 15% of likely viewers say the league did not take the risk seriously enough. Even fewer say it overreacted.
At the Tampa Bay stadium, attendance is limited to 22,000 fans, though the stadium can hold at least 65,000. Only one in three Americans (35%), as well as 45% of those interested in the game, are satisfied with that solution. Americans are more likely to favor fewer (22%) or even no fans (24%) than they are to believe more than 22,000 fans (19%) should be permitted to watch in person.
Related: What will Americans be eating and drinking during Super Bowl LV?
See the toplines and crosstabs from this week’s Economist/YouGov Poll
Methodology: The Economist survey was conducted by YouGov using a nationally representative sample of 1,500 US Adult Citizens interviewed online between January 31 - February 2, 2021. This sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, and education based on the American Community Survey, conducted by the US Bureau of the Census, as well as 2016 Presidential vote, registration status, geographic region, and news interest. Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel to be representative of all US citizens. The margin of error is approximately 2.9% for the overall sample.
Image: Getty
