The Ringer NFL Show - There’s Something About Josh

Episode Date: January 8, 2025

Josh Allen is one of the most talented quarterbacks in the NFL. But the love that Buffalo has for him is something … different. Nora Princiotti went on a journey through Buffalo—from tailgates to the bar scene, and even the depths of dating apps—to figure out just what it is about Josh that has Western New York swooning. As the Bills enter the playoffs, will this love story have a happy ending? Part 1: The Glow-Up (5:19) Part 2: Name Two People Who Match Each Other’s Freak (12:52) Part 3: Looking for Love in Orchard Park (17:45) Part 4: Love on the Brain (23:44) Part 5: To Ship or Not to Ship (30:01) Part 6: Happily Ever After? (34:07) Host: Nora Princiotti Story Editing: Lindsay Jones and Conor Nevins Producers: Kaya McMullen and Vikram Patel Fact checking: Colby Payne Copy editing: Jack McCluskey Sound Design: Kaya McMullen Mixing and Mastering: Scott Somerville Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Location. Buffalo, New York. Age range. Okay, it's suggesting 28 to 37, but that feels limited. So I'm going to expand it. Is this weird? I'm going to do it. Looking for everyone. They want pictures for my profile, but I am just here to lurk,

and my fiancé honestly might have thoughts about that, so I am going to leave a blink. Okay, stop. I promise you this is a football podcast, and I swear, here I am, downloading the dating app Hinge for the first time in quite a few years and setting it up to lightly catfish the people of Western New York for work purposes only.

Really, I'm testing a theory. I have an idea of what I'm going to find when I click finish, which I'm about to do. Okay, changing names to protect the innocent. Here is Sam. He's wearing Bill's suspenders. I'm looking for someone who likes free drinks, pizza, laughing uncontrollably, and will use my extra bills season ticket. That's just pandering.

Dating me will look like, and it's a mirror selfie with his arm around a cardboard cutout of one Joshua Patrick Allen. Swipe. Kyle, Bill's hat. Another Bill's hat. Jason, typical Sunday. Bills, obviously. Adam, typical Sunday, bills. Irrational fear.

Disney adults. I won't shut up about Josh Allen. Alana, typical Sunday, not shutting up about Josh Allen being America's sweetheart. Ryan in a Josh jersey, Spencer in a Josh jersey. Ryan, my most irrational fear is Josh Allen never winning a Super Bowl. Another Adam in a Josh jersey. Max, I hype myself up by watching Josh Allen highlights. I can see that Stefan has a photo with Josh Allen.

And then I'm convinced that the duolingo bird is going to kill me in my soul. Sleep. Rudy wants someone who can tailgate a Bill's game in the snow on a 10-degree Sunday. That is kind of asking a lot. Larry, I'll know it's time to delete Hinge when I find a relationship like Stefan Diggs and Josh Allen's, and then underneath it says, update, didn't age so well. These are just a sampling of similar Josh Allen inspired messages, shoutouts, or images on dating profiles around Buffalo. all of which are evidence to help answer a question I've been asking for a while. What is it about Bill's fans and Josh Allen? You know what I mean? It's the thing where you see a couple at the game and the woman has a sign that says, Josh, I'd leave my husband for you. And next to her is the husband. And he's got the sign that says, Josh, I'd leave my wife for you. Of course, football fans are inclined to support their team star quarterback. But you don't see many of those signs anywhere else. Most fan bases don't use loving QB1 as a romantic green flag. I covered the Patriots during the Tom Brady era, and people named their dogs after that guy.

But they didn't bring him up to try to get a date. So, I'll say it again. What is it about Josh? I'm not just asking why he shows up on so many hinge profiles, but I do think that's instructive. What someone puts on a dating app profile isn't just about what they like. It's about what they think represents the best, most attractive version of themselves. That's not just fandom. That's pride.

That's love. I've been amused by the unique rapport between Bill's fans and Josh Allen for a while. And I've wondered how exactly a low-key guy who's never won an MVP or a Super Bowl becomes the most intensely beloved player in the NFL. I think it's high time I found out. These playoffs could change everything for Josh Allen and Buffalo. The Bills are the number two seed in the AFC. Any path to the Super Bowl will likely go through Kansas City,

and Buffalo knows very well how tough a road that is. But they did beat the Chiefs earlier this season. The Bills have scored more points this year than anyone else in their conference. And there's been a special lightness to this team. One that makes you wonder, what if this really is the Bills' year? So earlier this fall, I set out on a mission. It took me to a Bill's tailgate in Buffalo, introduced me to some very cheeky Etsy merch,

had me interrogating parisocial theory with a college professor, and yes, swiping through hinge from my office desk. All to understand why the people who love Josh have formed this unshakable devotion for better or for worse through wins and losses in sickness, and in health. From The Ringer in Spotify, I'm Nora Prenciotti. And this is,

there's something about Josh. And in case you were wondering, yes, this is a love story. Part one, The Glow Up. What you are about to hear is just a sampling of how Bill's fans I spoke with for this piece

talked about Josh Allen. How would you describe, Josh? I'm like blushing, just hearing you say his name. I like the love I feel in my heart for Josh Allen is so strong. He is a Christ-like figure. It's that warm goosebumps feeling, you know? I love that man. He's like a dad slash brother slash boyfriend. I'm blushing. I honestly am because I'm like his eyes. I love all of his haircuts. How many times a day do you think you think about Josh Allen? Oh, God.

What's the statistic in terms of how often men think about sex? It's like every seven seconds or something like that. Honestly, the Josh Allen thoughts are close to that. Like, I'm not even lying. They rival that. Now, those are feelings that have had a few years to marinate. But there was a time when Josh Allen was not considered the savior-sex symbol of Western New York.

Before he was drafted out of Wyoming in 2018, Josh was what you might call a bit of a project. His profile looked like this. Six foot five, a cannon for an arm, but some serious red flag decision-making. Every team says, no, really, I can fix him when it's draft season. But when Buffalo took Allen's seventh overall that year, a lot of Bill's fans weren't happy.

Tell me the story of Josh Allen being drafted by the bills as you experienced it. I was so miserable. I was 100% like, I feel like general consensus from like the smart people was like, this guy. I'm going to point out that Victoria used air quotes around smart people. That's Victoria Zeller. Victoria is an author, sportswriter, and Buffalonian, and self-described notorious Bill's psycho poster. Victoria is describing to me why she originally found the Allen draft pick completely maddening. 2018 was a huge draft for quarterbacks.

Five of them went in the first round, and most of the draft analysts weren't that high on Allen. It's fair to say that he was in need of a glow-up. Allen was big and sturdy and a powerful running threat, but he had a completion rate of just 56% in college. Wyoming didn't exactly surround him with top-tier talent, but the Mountain West Conference also didn't put him up against top-tier competition. He looked like the type of big, toolsy quarterback, old school scouts fall in love with because they see John Elway, but so many of those guys just don't pan out.

There were a lot of quarterbacks that people were really excited about. I remember that I was all about Josh Rosen that year. That was my guy. There were Josh Rosen partisans. There were Sam Darnold partisans. There were not that many Lamar Jackson partisans, which, you know, a lot of people blew that one, I guess, also. But I was so vigilantly, Auntie Allen, just because you'd never seen any quarterback make

the leap from what he was in college to being like an NFL quarterback that wouldn't be like a complete and total embarrassment. And yeah, when they picked him, I was so mad. I was the kind of mad where I had to, like, go on a, like, four-mile walk right away, just like, I need to get outside. I need to burn off some of this energy. I just can't, I cannot live with what my stupid football team did. Another piece of context is that, well, it's the bills.

The bills have been hurt before drafting quarterbacks. Their best passer ever to that point was Jim Kelly. He quarterbacked the 90s' Bills teams that went to the Super Bowl four years in a row and lost every time. Kelly is a beloved hall of famer, but even his relationship with Buffalo got off to a pretty rocky start. When the Bills drafted Kelly out of the University of Miami in 1983, he was so against moving to Western New York that he chose to go play in the USFL instead. He didn't actually play for the Bills until that league folded in 1986. And since Kelly, the history of Bills' quarterbacks had not been great, especially when it came to the ones they had drafted.

Before Allen arrived, Kelly was the last quarterback to lead the Bills to a playoff win, and that was in 1995. So by the 2018 draft, Bills fans were more than nervous about picking the wrong guy. It was rounding into that quarterback class. with Baker and Lamar and Darnold and Rosen and Josh Allen. And we knew that the bills were going to get one of those guys. And to me, there was some fear attached to that because the previous quarterbacks they had drafted in early rounds

were like J.P. Lossman, not a very good NFL career on that guy. E.J. Manuel, worse than J. Lossman somehow. Andrew Grudadarro is the ringer's resident Bills fan. He's from Rochester, New York, where the Bills have training camp. You heard Andrew earlier say he thinks about Josh Allen about once every seven seconds. Yes, I work with that guy. Andrew grew up in those 90s Super Bowl losing years. He doesn't think the Music City miracle was terribly miraculous.

He did not appreciate watching two decades of Tom Brady and Bill Belichick's power coupling in the AFC East. He's conditioned not to expect things with the bills to always work out. And he was more than aware of what certain experts thought about Josh Allen. I think on draft night, everyone at the ringer made fun of me. And work there then. Yeah. You may have gotten in on the dunking.

There were plenty of reasons to think this wouldn't work out. But you can also see a kind of miscongeniality makeover arc coming, right? Allen was just a little rough around the edges. And Buffalo, worn down by years of heartbreak and rejection, was just looking for a quarterback who would actually care. I know the bar is on the floor here. And one thing Josh Allen showed very quickly was that he did care. Remember how Jim Kelly denied the bills on draft night?

There's even a story, possibly apocryphal, that he didn't want to play there so badly that he cried. And Alan didn't do that. In his first comments, in a video he recorded almost immediately after the Bills chose him, he made a point of saying that he chose them back. Bill's Mafia, Josh Allen here. I just want to thank you guys for allowing me to be part of Bill's Mafia. It's a match bait in heaven.

I love wings. It went a long way. Part two. Name two people who match each other's freak. If you're listening to this podcast, you're probably familiar with Josh Allen's career trajectory. And if you're not familiar with it, spoiler alert, he turned out to be really good.

But more than that, at least for our purposes, what I want you to keep in mind about Josh Allen's game is this. He likes to jump over people, or run through them, or throw a ball in precarious spots. This is the key to understanding him. It took some time for Josh Allen to be a good and a good, NFL player, but he has always been an exciting one. I think the third game was against the Vikings.

Allen steps up. And he jumped over Anthony Barr. Chops over the defenders to pick up the first. Now, how many quarterbacks have you ever seen hurdle anyone? That's Andrew Grudadarro again. He's talking about a game during Josh Allen's rookie season in which he hurtled a linebacker, to the delight of Bill's fans and of Jim Nance. And they won by.

a lot. And he, not only did he jump over Barr, but he also had an incredible rushing touchdown, where it was like, holy shit. This guy is unbelievable. Even if he's...

Out of his mind? Yes. Even if it seems like he doesn't have a brain. He's unreal. Like, I've never had a quarterback who could, like, take a hit from a linebacker, let alone jump over one.

So then it was like, hell yeah. Like this, like, I don't even know if at that time I was like, like, please let us win nine games. I think I was just like, I will gladly watch Josh Allen do the most ridiculous things I've ever seen anyone try to do on a football team. Cooled it a little over time. But in a big moment, watching Josh Allen still means knowing anything could happen on any given play.

In his first playoff game in January 2020, he made an ESPN announcer say this after he attempted an ill-advised lateral while being tackled to the ground. But how unnecessary was that? Why would you ever do this? But he can also be Superman out there. He mows down linebackers, he turns fumbles into touchdowns, He hurdles anyone in his path. He's Josh Allen.

Earlier this season, he became the first quarterback ever to throw, catch, and run for a touchdown in a single game. It's like everyone else is playing real football, but he's playing a Madden game come to life. It's an appealing play style and maybe even an endearing one

because you never have to ask how hard he's trying. One more thing about all the hurtling. It has become so associated with Josh Allen over the past six years, that if you visit downtown Buffalo, you'll see a street called Hurdle Avenue, H-E-R-T-E-L, that's been renamed Hurtle Avenue in Allen's honor.

There have been fatheads of a leaping Josh positioned over the street signs. I don't think that's surprising. Again, it's hard to see the guy launching himself over 250-pound NFL players and not feel like he cares every bit as much as you do. But doesn't it seem especially fitting for Buffalo, a place whose fans have a reputation for jumping into tables and supporting their team with that same kind of reckless abandon? Yeah, there's a recklessness and a joie de vivre, you know?

There's such a lack of, not self-awareness, but it's such a lack of, like, embarrassment about it. And very much, like, we're going to O.P. this weekend. We're getting ripped on. Crown Royal and we're going to jump through a table that we set on fire. And that's what it is. That's Bill's football. And yeah, like, you know, Josh is not, to my knowledge, I don't think he's ever jumped through a table. I think he said he will when they win a Super Bowl.

But he... I wonder if even contractually that might be something that would be discouraged. He metaphorically jumps through a table almost every week. Part three. looking for love in Orchard Park. Okay, so I can see how a player like Josh Allen would be incredibly fun to root for. But how deep does this love really go? As much fun as I had swiping in my PJs,

I felt like I needed to hit the pavement to really find out for myself. So in November, I went up to Orchard Park and spent several hours before the Bill's Dolphins game, walking around the tailgates and talking to fans about the man they really do call Daddy Allen. Daddy Allen. My fiancé is obsessed with Josh Allen as well. I think he would leave me for Josh Allen. Josh Allen has the greatest arm and he's the most handsome quarterback of the NFL being. He is the most handsome quarterback. I will say it. Okay. I'm sorry, there's a follow-up question. His game is very risky. It's sexy.

Alan fit right in right off the bat. He was just, he was a normal guy. He didn't seem like a celebrity or, and that's the same thing. He's dating a movie star. Very low-key, you don't hear anything. You know, it's not like in Kansas City how they got a plaster Taylor Swift everywhere. Strong, sexy, humble, can handle the cold. To be honest, the list of attributes people offered was giving romance novel Lumberjack

as much as it was NFL quarterback. But I got the picture. As they say, chicks dig the long ball. And the enthusiasm is undeniable. If you walk around a Bill's tailgate, as you might expect, there's a lot of Buffalo attire. From vintage letterman jackets to Zubaz everything, to, of course, Josh Allen, Bill's jerseys galore.

But the real prize in terms of status symbols? A Josh jersey from before. he was a bill. A Josh Allen Firebaugh High School sweatshirt or a Wyoming Josh jersey is regarded with reverence. One of the fans I talked to was Connor Stocker, who was wearing a Josh Allen Fireball High School sweatshirt he bought at the local Wegmans. The way he described getting it sounded like a limited edition sneaker drop. Originally, only 50 of each size sweatshirt was available, though to his annoyance, more were eventually released. But waiting in line was a small price to pay to show his affection.

I had went 20-something years of my life of mediocrity with the bills, cheering for guys like Gibran Hamden, Thad Lewis, J.P. Lawsman, countless other mediocre quarterbacks. So to get the unicorn that we did of Josh Allen is something that people should not forget about. How do you feel about him just sort of as a guy? He's the best. Yeah. The best.

He's, he is, he's me. Me and Josh are the same, except he's a little bit more of an athlete. There is even more creative Bill's merch for sale online. Bill's Etsy sells wine toats that say, drink until your husband looks like Josh, supposedly Josh scented candles, and my personal favorite motif, juicy Josh.

The Juicy Josh design is by an artist from Rochester, named Akasia Crozier. It comes as a t-shirt or a hoodie or a magnet, and it's sort of a dual homage to Y2K fashion and to the bills. Crozier's design is of Josh Allen getting set to throw a football, drawn from behind. On top, he's wearing a typical jersey, but instead of football pants, he's wearing pink, low-rise track pants a la juicy couture with the word juicy written across the Rear. Juicy Josh is certainly an expression of the type of fandom I'm trying to understand here. So when I saw it, or him, I should say, I talked to Crozier to learn more about her creative process. The pants are discernibly low rise. Yes. Oh yeah, there's a buck crack. I feel like it was necessary. Just because, like, to sort of capture the juicy sweats of it all, was there something about Josh that made you feel like, you?

you know, okay, here's the thing. My boyfriend's in the other room, and he would agree. He's a very good-looking guy. They work out probably 24-7. I don't really know their schedule, but that fun is good. It doesn't matter where you land on the political spectrum, on the sexuality spectrum. That is a good one.

It is the one unifier in these dark times. But yeah, I don't really know. I think it was just a silly thing that turned. a little bit more popular. So I was like, let's roll with it. In visiting Buffalo and talking to Bill's fans, and after my brief return to Hinge, I've found that Josh Allen isn't only adored in Buffalo.

He's idolized, romanticized, objectified, and commodified. Clearly, this is a relationship that goes beyond plain rooting interest. You heard those fans at the tailgates. They love Josh. They feel like they know him. They might even feel like they are him. And while you certainly get a sense walking around Orchard Park that Buffalo is a smaller, tighter-knit NFL community than most,

the majority of these fans have only ever met Josh Allen through a screen. I wanted to understand more about how that kind of bond forms and what it might mean for this relationship. So I talked to an expert. Part 4. Love on the Brain. I'm Gail Steaver. I'm a professor for SUNY Empire State University. And for 36 years, I have done in the vernacular, it's called fan studies, but it's also

parisocial theory, which is the study of relationships we have with people that we know a lot about and they don't know us back. I don't know about you. but I hear the phrase parasocial relationship a lot these days. As Professor Stiever said, a parasycial relationship is really any relationship we have with someone who doesn't know us. I hear them brought up a lot to describe how fans become attached to entertainers like movie stars or musicians, but less often with athletes. To some extent, I think that makes sense.

Especially at a sport like football, where rosters are large and players change teams, most fans root for the laundry. But a relationship with a specific favorite player could be parisocial, right? I called Professor Steaver to get an answer to that question, and to see if Bill's fans and Josh Allen fit the mold. On a basic level, she said, the answer is, of course, yes. Again, if any relationship between someone who's aware of another person who doesn't know them back as parisocial,

then that describes almost every football fan or every person. But when we hear about parasocial relationships that develop in intensity, it's usually about the ones that combine with fandom. Professor Steaver told me that in her research, she's found three main beliefs about a public figure that tend to lead to that. They were, this person is really good at what they do. So Michael Jackson is the best live entertainer, singer, dancer I've ever seen. Isn't he great?

Or this person is attractive, and I feel kind of, you know, squishy, romantic crush feelings for this person. Or this person is a good person. They're philanthropic. They give back to society. They're involved in charity. They're generous. They're kind.

And those were sort of the big three. Let's put those three factors to the test with some of our Josh Allen fans. First, do they think he's talented? It's like people who are so good at what they do that they like become more than just a person. Second, is it possible? that some of them might have a little crush. All of my friends think he's extremely handsome. We have talked about it.

We think he's cool. We think he's adorable. Third, do they think he is a good person? He is, like, so tough and loyal and committed, which is, like, kind of the foundation of Buffalo. So, like, you know, we call ourselves the city of good neighbors, right? You have to kind of support everybody when the snowstorm hits. Those might seem like basic rooting interests, but what Professor Steaver told me is that when we feel

those ways about someone, even if we don't know them in real life, those relationships can intensify quickly. The thing is, the human brain is actually not great at differentiating when a relationship takes place in real life or through a screen. When your brain is processing an interaction with another person, even if they're not sitting in front of you, the brain has a hard time differentiating between my friend sitting across the table having dinner with me and Stephen Colbert who's talking to me from my TV. And so my brain who says, oh, there's my new friend, Stephen. Oh, isn't he funny? You know, because it was part of my brain that doesn't know that I don't really know him. When we watch someone like that over time, they do become very familiar.

We learn their voice, their sense of humor, their body language, and their mannerisms. From a psychologist's perspective, this is a big deal. Since getting to know these characteristics helps humans form the attachments that allow us to fulfill our two most basic needs to survive and to reproduce. It's not just, I think you're talented and a good person and those are objectively good things. and therefore I think it's, it's, I get the warm, fuzzy feeling. Yes, because you as a human being, you know, your brain knows that if you need to be protected and hopefully you're going to reproduce and particularly at a certain age, that's why the crush phenomenon, the whole romantic attachment thing, is associated so heavily with adolescence

and young adulthood, because that's the time in our lives when that's our agenda anyway. and whether we think we want to get married and have kids or not, there's a part of our brain that thinks we should and is being drawn to attractive potential mates. I mean, you know, this is all very objectifying of it all. But really, somewhere in the background, you see an attractive person of whichever sex you happen to be attracted to on media, and your brain is going, oh, yeah, go for him.

But the brain doesn't know that you're never even going to meet that person. So you could say that according to science, there's not much separating how Bill's fans feel about Josh Allen from how babies feel about the first person who holds them and coos to them, or how hormonal teenagers feel about each other. I have had a child in the last five months. I have been married four years now. Those two things are also extremely important to me. Josh Allen is probably the most important thing to me that I have no true intimate relationship with, although I feel as though I have an intimate relationship with them. Part 5. To ship or not to ship? Okay, so this relationship is serious. But I do think it's fair to wonder.

Is it healthy? Do we ship these devoted Bills fans and their quarterback slash regional mascot slash community hall pass? I guess I can't be sure, but I don't think. Bill's fans are just getting their basic needs of affection and belonging met via Josh Allen. But there is a fine line between intensity and dependence, and Bill's fandom in general sometimes straddles that line. The tailgates and the table jumping and the cases of Labat Blue before noon make up one of the most fun game day experiences in the NFL. But most buffaloans I spoke with would tell you that some of that rowdiness is the expression of a Rust Belt community that has known some hard times.

And at a glance, there is also a somewhat basic heteronormative vibe to what we're talking about here, whether it's guys making towel-snapping jokes about their bro who represents a very traditional form of masculinity, or women laughing along or coveting that jock ideal themselves. I found elements of all those patterns present in the Josh Buffalo relationship. But I also found that they don't paint a complete picture. These bonds were not formed just to cover up a darkness. And the way Bill's fans feel about Josh Allen also doesn't fit neatly into the traditional dynamics of heteronormative attraction. Just north of the Buffalo City Center, there's a historically queer neighborhood that happens to be called Allentown.

And in Allentown, there's a popular queer bar called 26 Allen, which throws dance parties and trivia nights and hosts Bill's watch parties for every game. I talked to Zach Berberie, who opened 26 with three other business partners in 2023, and who tends bar on Sundays. He said that the stereotype that queer people aren't into sports really stings in a place like Buffalo, where fandom is such a gateway into the overall community. And 26 is a place where queer pride and Bill's pride can mix. And there's definitely plenty of support for Josh Allen.

He's got that boyish charm that's also very endearing to the queer community because a lot of people in the queer community think he's very cute. And he's got that bro like ad to, but it's not like toxic at all. He's just like, he just seems like so like wholesome. It's just like you want to give him a hug. So as we are talking on this Zoom here, Zach, I see it. I believe you have Josh sketched in like Tom of Finland style behind you. I was hoping you would notice this. Behind Zach is a little bit less than life-size, framed pencil drawing of Josh Allen, lying in repose, wearing a leather harness.

I'd seen a photo of it hung up in the bar and was going to ask Zach about it. And then he brought it up to his office unprompted as a backdrop for our interview. Tell me about it. I would love to. And I think it's a true expression of the intersectionality of like queer culture in Buffalo and Josh. So there is a local artist. His name is Tom Matthias. He's got an incredible portfolio of work from realism to like geometry and stuff like that.

But my partner was at, she was getting her haircut. And she saw a bust of Josh Allen. It's like a pencil drawing, like the one I'm holding. And he like had like, you know, the leather daddy cap. He had no shirt on and like kind of like two harness straps. And so she was telling me about it. And I was like, okay, I know Thomas. Like, Thomas comes in all the time.

So I asked them, I'm like, hey, this bust you did is incredible. Can we commission you to do a full-blown piece of Josh as like a leather daddy? And he was like, I would love to do that. Part six. Happily Ever After. I think I'm starting to get it. This really is love. But that brings me to wonder.

Will Buffalo and Josh get a happily ever after? For as much as Alan has flourished as a player, and his bond with the fan bases deepened. Up until now, the Bills have been the always the bridesmaid team of the Patrick Mahomes era. They may have found each other, but together, they've still known a lot of heartbreak. I will not be able to erase the look on his face

when they lost that game to Kansas City in 13 seconds. I'm getting emotional thinking about it now. It's so sad. And so there's a little bit of like a you pick us up, we'll pick you up thing. Fan bases can be tough on their own players when they don't succeed. But most are protective of their quarterbacks. I asked Andrew about that, about whether what he was describing was the default setting for sports fandom,

or whether what Bill's fans feel for Josh Allen is different. Yeah, I do think there's a deeper, level to it, which, again, like, I don't think it's like a shot at any other quarterback, but I think it's more of a reflection of Buffalo and Bill's fans. We talked Bill's history, most famously the four consecutive Super Bowl losses, painful last-second losses, the sad state of Buffalo's NHL team, the Sabres. We're wounded, man. Like, we, it's hard.

Like, it's hard to be a fan of Buffalo sports. We have not won a championship. The Sabres have not won. The Bills have not won. It's been over half a century that we haven't gotten the thing that Tampa Bay Buccaneers fans have gotten multiple times. Like, we see everyone else getting the thing. While we don't get it in the most horrific. ways possible.

There's a pull toward players who could represent the end of those hard times. But maybe even more than that, it goes to the players who Bill's fans feel have stuck by them and the team through those hard times. Andrew brought up Stefan Diggs, who was beloved in Buffalo too, but who wound up representing the kind of player fans think abandons ship when things get tough. He doesn't think Josh Allen would ever do that. I think we're all very confident that he will never do that. Maybe he will, but look, that's what unconditional love is,

and that's what being in love is, is thinking that it's always going to work out. Everything could change for the bills this postseason. Buffalo has learned the hard way not to take any playoff win for granted. But these bills do have an energy. They've turned what was supposed to be a down year into a real chance to get to the Super Bowl, a real chance to win the Super Bowl. Of course, that kind of success is what this fan base has dreamt of for generations.

If Josh Allen brings a Super Bowl championship to Buffalo, he'll cement his status as the most important and beloved sports figure in the city's history. He'd also jumped to a bigger stage nationally. He's already close. He's done big ad campaigns for brands like Gatorade, Nike, and Verizon. He was on the 2024-Matic. in cover. And though many of the Bills fans I talked to made sure to point out that they keep a much lower profile than some celebrity NFL player couples, Alan recently got engaged to actress

Haley Steinfeld. This is not to say that Josh is in any danger of leaving Buffalo or going Hollywood. But I can't help but wonder what it would mean for this relationship for Josh Allen and the Bills to reach their ultimate goal. The Bills fans I spoke with love seeing Josh and national campaigns and root for his success in all areas. But they also feel some pride in the fact that his face on a billboard for a local car dealership is the first thing you see at the Buffalo airport. He's theirs. Everyone wants to win. But winning isn't all there is to this relationship. Part 7. Tell your homies you love them. It's fair to say that the bulk of this emotion is directed at Josh Allen. And it's probably for the best that most of the time he's not even aware of it.

But as I've gone on this journey to understanding this relationship, what I keep coming back to is that Alan isn't a closed-off person. The last thing he says when he breaks down a pregame huddle is, I love you. He says it in interviews. He says it all the time. If there's one thing that ties together Alan's reckless playstyle and his personality. It's that you can tell he cares. Here's Victoria Zeller again. I think that there's something really genuinely endearing to like see a man on a football field

just like constantly tell his boys that he loves them. Bill's players do have a more intimate relationship with each other than a lot of NFL teams. They live in a smaller city. They're more noticeable when they do go out. So at least with this group, they host game nights at each other's houses. They go to events together. They do seem remarkably comfortable for a group of male colleagues

talking about how much they care for one another. Josh Allen has made the Bills a team that wins. But I think you could also say he's made the Bills a team that loves. And we could probably all benefit from a little more emotional availability these days. In any story about Buffalo, there's an undercurrent, of the city's previous glory, its relative isolation, its chip on its shoulder.

And of course, it's easy to over-intellectualize Rust Belt sports fandom as a means of catharsis. But there is undeniably a relationship between the culture of the region and the way Bill's fans root for their team.

I mean, like, obviously every single sports fan base is extremely passionate, but like just because of the dynamics of Buffalo as a smaller, town as a Rust Belt town where there's this persistent sense that we have a chip on our shoulder that it just gets really intense and like this is the main thing we got. So of course I'm going to

decide that I have a giant crush on the quarterback. What else am I going to do? Because this is the guy who has given my football team purpose for the first time in 25 years. So like it's a lot. There are a lot of like very intense emotions that I think are easier to express. via being like he's daddy. And easier still when, in a way, Josh reciprocates. Josh Allen plays football with his heart on his sleeve. He treats his teammates that way. He has love in his own life, too.

He has known some failures and rejections himself. But they've never turned him into a person afraid to say, I love you. I think there's really something to that in terms of emotional, I don't know what the term is. Caring. Yeah. Just like actually letting yourself have feelings or at least using feelings words in a public space is like,

you know, kind of a big step for a lot of men. A lot of football men are probably not out here talking like that constantly. And I think it's really neat that he shows affection like that publicly. I feel like boys would be happier if they told each other that they loved them more. Like, go tell your homies that you love them. Go hug your homies. And like, Josh is definitely existing in that space. This narrative audio feature was written and reported by me, Nora Princiotti.

The executive producers are Juliette and Sean Fantasy. Story editing by Lindsay Jones and Connor Nevins. This feature was produced by Kaya McMullen and Vikram Patel. Fact-checking by Colby Payne, copy editing by Jack McCluskey, sound design by Kaya McMullen, mixing and mastering by Scott Somerville. The music you heard in this feature is from Epidemic Sound and Blue Dot Sessions. Special thanks to Shiel Kapadia and Arjuna Ramgapal. Thanks for listening.