In ongoing news, Elon Musk is setting his sights on clearing fake/spam accounts off Twitter, but how could this affect the Twitter following of teams in the NFL?
Photo: ComplexBy running a fake follower audit, Gambling.com reveals which NFL team and NFL QB have the highest number of fake followers in the NFL and are likely to lose out the most.
The New England Patriots stand to lose the most followers in the league with an estimated 2.1 million fake followers, and the Broncos’ Russell Wilson would be the worst affected QB with an estimated 1.9 million fake followers.
In April, Elon Musk stated he would “die trying” in the fight to eradicate Twitter from spam accounts.
With Musk’s recent acquisition of Twitter, there has been continuing news surrounding the plans, but how could this affect the teams and players in the NFL’s Twitter followings?
Using SparkToro’s fake follower audit, the guys at Gambling.com have ranked which NFL Teams and QBs could be the worst hit.
It’s no surprise that they have a massive social media following, considering their major success over the past two decades, but the New England Patriots are the ones who are set to be the most affected by Musk’s crackdown on fake accounts, with 2.1 million of their 4.7 million followers estimated to be fake.
The Dallas Cowboys and the Philadelphia Eagles could also be massively affected by Musk’s plans, with the two franchises each having an estimated 2.0 million and 1.6 million fake followers on Twitter, respectively.
The table below ranks all NFL teams in order of the number of followers potentially lost:
| Team | Number of Followers (Twitter) | Percentage of Fake Followers | Fake Follower Number |
| New England Patriots | 4,700,000 | 44.7% | 2,098,950 |
| Dallas Cowboys | 4,300,000 | 47.4% | 2,048,852 |
| Philadelphia Eagles | 3,700,000 | 44.5% | 1,632,100 |
| Pittsburgh Steelers | 3,700,000 | 40.6% | 1,517,706 |
| Carolina Panthers | 3,100,000 | 41.9% | 1,292,349 |
| Green Bay Packers | 2,500,000 | 43.9% | 1,127,345 |
| Seattle Seahawks | 2,600,000 | 42.6% | 1,093,553 |
| San Francisco 49ers | 2,400,000 | 44.3% | 1,046,503 |
| Kansas City Chiefs | 2,190,000 | 45.2% | 990,232 |
| Atlanta Falcons | 2,400,000 | 39.4% | 961,092 |
| Houston Texans | 1,950,000 | 47.3% | 924,244 |
| Chicago Bears | 2,000,000 | 41.6% | 840,211 |
| New York Giants | 2,000,000 | 40.6% | 800,342 |
| New Orleans Saints | 1,700,000 | 44.5% | 771,382 |
| Baltimore Ravens | 1,800,000 | 42.0% | 762,434 |
| Las Vegas Raiders | 1,900,000 | 37.7% | 719,712 |
| Cleveland Browns | 1,570,000 | 43.6% | 684,360 |
| Minnesota Vikings | 1,500,000 | 41.0% | 613,936 |
| Detroit Lions | 1,500,000 | 40.9% | 608,835 |
| Buffalo Bills | 1,450,000 | 40.1% | 581,786 |
| Washington Commanders | 1,400,000 | 41.0% | 572,245 |
| Cincinnati Bengals | 1,320,000 | 41.3% | 545,073 |
| Indianapolis Colts | 1,210,000 | 43.9% | 533,374 |
| New York Jets | 1,300,000 | 38.9% | 513,454 |
| Tampa Bay Buccaneers | 1,200,000 | 40.8% | 509,728 |
| Los Angeles Rams | 1,200,000 | 40.8% | 492,452 |
| Arizona Cardinals | 1,100,000 | 42.2% | 475,583 |
| Tennessee Titans | 1,000,000 | 44.8% | 455,020 |
| Miami Dolphins | 1,200,000 | 36.4% | 436,595 |
| Los Angeles Chargers | 1,060,000 | 37.6% | 399,832 |
| Jacksonville Jaguars | 784,000 | 41.9% | 328,799 |
| Denver Broncos | 2,270,000 | 39.8% | 1,101 |
With the teams in the NFL standing to lose out on millions of followers due to Musk’s purge, Gambling.com decided to also analyze the followers of each starting QB in the NFL to reveal how they would be affected.
Coming in the top is the Denver Broncos’ star QB Russell Wilson with 1.9m of his followers estimated to be fake, closely followed by Aaron Rodgers of the Packers and Tom Brady of the Bucs, with an estimated 1.8 million and 1.1 million of their Twitter followers estimated to be fake, respectively.
The table below shows the top 10 NFL QBs in order of highest number of fake followers:
| Quarterback | Number of Followers | % of Fake Followers | Fake Followers |
| Russell Wilson | 5,600,000 | 32.9% | 1,859,327 |
| Aaron Rodgers | 4,600,000 | 38.4% | 1,762,873 |
| Tom Brady | 2,900,000 | 37.0% | 1,087,880 |
| Patrick Mahomes | 2,300,000 | 41.9% | 952,765 |
| Dak Prescott | 1,490,000 | 42.3% | 629,381 |
| Lamar Jackson | 1,100,000 | 28.9% | 312,690 |
| Joe Burrow | 890,000 | 32.3% | 288,418 |
| Derek Carr | 490,000 | 38.9% | 191,583 |
| Josh Allen | 450,000 | 33.8% | 151,874 |
| Andy Dalton | 227,000 | 61.7% | 140,280 |
Methodology
To collect the data, Gambling.com ran the Twitter accounts of every team and QB in the NFL through SparkToro’s fake follower audit tool. This took a sample of 2,000 random followers and ran diagnostics found to strongly correlate with these types of fake followers (bots, spam accounts, inactive users, propaganda, or other non-engaged/non-real users).
Data accurate as of 30th November 2022.
Featured Image: Complex
