Trump shades Swift to create tabloid fodder
Fortunately, that didn’t come into play in Super Bowl LIX on Sunday at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana. The Philadelphia Eagles roared out to leads of 34-0 and 40-6 and hammered the two-time defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs 40-22 before 65,719 spectators. The Chiefs scored two touchdowns in the last three minutes of the fourth quarter in “garbage time” to cosmetically make the final score look better.
The contest also made news as Trump became the first sitting President of the United States of America to watch the Super Bowl live in person. In a pre-game interview with Fox, Trump predicted a Chiefs victory after praising the team’s quarterback in Patrick Mahomes and his wife Brittany. Trump was pictured getting on Air Force One more than an hour before the contest concluded.
On the flight to the Super Bowl, Trump said he will announce on Monday that the United States will impose 25 per cent tariffs on all steel and aluminum imports including from Canada and Mexico. That got the mainstream news outlets fired up in Canada.
At the Super Bowl, Trump fed the tabloids content. During the Fox broadcast of the game, he was shown during the national anthem to big cheers from the stadium.
On social media channels specifically Platform-X, which is owned by close Trump associate Elon Musk, video was shown during the game of the fans booing music superstar Taylor Swift when she was shown on the facility’s big screen.
For the presidential election held this past November in 2024, Swift endorsed Kamala Harris, who was the Democratic candidate. Swift is also dating Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.
Trump responded on Truth Social to Swift’s endorsement of Harris that he hated Swift and was not a fan of her.
As the Eagles route in the Super Bowl continued, posts circulated on social media of the crowd cheering Trump and booing Swift. Trump shared one of the posts of the duel video of him getting cheered and Swift being booed on Truth Social.
He also put out a post on Truth Social that said, “The only one that had a tougher night than the Kansas City Chiefs was Taylor Swift. She got BOOED out of the Stadium. MAGA is very unforgiving!”
Both social media actions come off as being childish and petty. Trump does like to throw dirt on his perceived enemies.
Trump supporters on Platform-X on the other hand reveled over the Truth Social post and the fact he shared the post of him getting cheered and Swift being booed.
A year ago in the Chiefs 25-22 overtime Super Bowl victory over the San Francisco 49ERS in Las Vegas, Nevada, Swift was the big celebrity star with her relationship with Kelce drawing tonnes of attention. Now, all of that feels like it happened in some other universe.
All of a sudden, there were no conspiracy theories that the NFL officials were making calls to favour the Chiefs in order to make Swift happy.
Actually, there was no way to save the Chiefs on Sunday with favourable calls, if you believe that conspiracy theory. The Eagles were that good.
Philadelphia had the NFL’s top defence during the 2024 regular season giving up just 278.4 total yards per game, and that defensive unit was as good as advertised on Sunday.
In an NFL where it has become increasingly harder to be a physical team due to rule changes, the Eagles defence hammered the Chiefs. Philadelphia’s defensive pressure resulted in six quarterback sacks.
Linebacker Josh Sweat had 2.5 sacks to lead the Eagles, while defensive tackle Milton Williams had a pair of sacks, fellow defensive tackle Jordan Davis had a single sack and linebacker Jalyx Hurt had a half sack.
Rookie defensive back Cooper DeJean returned an interception 38 yards for a touchdown that put the Eagles up 17-0 with just over seven minutes remaining in the second quarter. That play was a huge turning point in the contest. The body language of the Chiefs players and coaches just dropped right down after that play and never recovered for the rest of the game.
Linebacker Zack Baun had a diving interception that set the Eagles up on the Chiefs 14 yard line with 1:45 remaining in the second quarter. Two plays later, Eagles star quarterback Jalen Hurts connected with receiver A.J. Brown on a 12-yard touchdown toss that put the Eagles up 24-0 going into halftime.
In the third quarter, the Eagles pushed their edge out to 27-0 on a 29-yard field goal from kicker Jake Elliott. After forcing a turnover on downs with just under three minutes to play in the frame, Hurts connected with receiver DeVonta Smith on a 46 yard touchdown bomb to increase the Eagles advantage to 34-0.
At that point if the game was a boxing match, the referee would have stopped the fight.
It seemed like the Eagles were channeling the 1985 Chicago Bears, when they hammered the New England Patriots before the era of Tom Brady and Bill Belichick 46-10 in Super Bowl XX. Actually, one was wondering if the Eagles were going to post the first shutout in the history of the Super Bowl and one up the 1985 Bears and the 2000 Baltimore Ravens.
The 2000 Ravens only gave up a kickoff return touchdown in thumping the New York Giants 34-7 in Super Bowl XXXV.
On Sunday, Hurts had his finest hour in the NFL being named the game MVP of his team’s Super Bowl win. He completed 17-of-22 passes for 221 yards and two touchdowns, while throwing one interception. Hurts, who won an NCAA championship with the University of Alabama Crimson Tide Football Team in 2017, ran the ball 11 times for 72 yards and scored the Eagles first major on the “tush push” play.
Eagles superstar running back Saquon Barkley turned heads in 2024 leading the NFL in rushing during regular season running the ball 345 times for 2,005 yards and 13 touchdowns. The Chiefs were focused on stopping Barkley, who ran the ball 25 times for 57 yards. Barkley did come up with six big catches for 40 yards and was overjoyed to get a Super Bowl win on his 28th birthday.
Elliott made all four of his field goal attempts with a long from 50 yards out. Eagles head coach Nick Sirianni looked like a genius with how well his team played.
Overall, the Eagles were full marks for their impressive win, and they were the night’s biggest story. The Trump shading Swift tabloid moves on social media was a secondary story that is attracting a lot of looks.
Welcome to the new reality where sports and politics mixes with Trump serving a second term as President of the United States. Don’t expect these types of occurrence to go away any time soon.
If you have any comments you would like to pass along about this post, feel free to email them to stankssports@gmail.com.
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