Which NFL fans have been the most stressed in the playoffs?

Following our regular season campaign to find the Most Stressed NFL fans, we decided to delve into the data once more to analyze social media when the stakes are at their highest; the NFL playoffs. 

Using our social media analytics tool, Pickswise examined over 100,000 tweets sent to official team Twitter handles between January 11-February 1 this year. 

Leading the way at the top are the Cincinnati Bengals with over 8,000 stressful tweets aimed at their team’s Twitter handle. This is somewhat surprising considering the low expectations going into the season, which is backed by the regular season data as they were down in 26th in our previous study. 

However, Joe Burrow has made them believe by not only ending their 32-year playoff win drought (and allowing fans to finally text about their team winning a postseason game), but also letting them dream of success for the first time in a long time. That dream was so close to being crushed against the Chiefs in what was a crazy comeback, so fans were clearly feeling all the emotions being within touching distance of the big game.

In what is less likely to be surprising news, the Dallas Cowboys were up in second with over 7,000 tweets even though their playoff adventure ended after one game. Fans of ‘America’s Team’ are known for being vocal and the manner of their defeat to the San Francisco 49ers definitely contributed as they quite embarrassingly didn’t even get a chance to have a shot at the end zone after a mix-up over how the rules work. 

All the way down at the bottom are the Arizona Cardinals, who filled the same spot during the regular season. The Cards did only play once, though, and maybe it was such a heavy defeat that even their most loyal of fans lost interest at an early stage.

In terms of other teams that saw a huge shift compared to the regular season, the 49ers and the Kansas City Chiefs led the way. The second-half shutdown of Patrick Mahomes by the Bengals belied belief as the Chiefs looked destined for a third consecutive Super Bowl, so it’s probably not a revelation that the fans took to Twitter.

After featuring in three close games that went down to the wire, it’s hardly shocking to see the 49ers up in fourth even if they didn’t have the highest of expectations around them after finishing the season strongly to scrape into the playoffs. Kyle Shanahan got the most out of his men, but conceding 13 unanswered points to the Los Angeles Rams in the fourth quarter was a sucker punch, to say the least.

The playoffs are clearly a whirlwind of emotions for the fans involved and the Twitter handles of the respective teams feel the brunt of this. Take a look below to see how the teams stack up against each other and just how many negative tweets have been sent regarding these sides over the last few weeks.

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