Taylor Swift fans are obsessed with fantasy football-style game ‘Swiftball’ where they guess what she will wear or play at her sell-out Eras Tour shows
- Superfan Allie created Swiftball to gift a copy of Taylor Swift’s album Midnights
- The game – played by more than 18,000 – was even referenced by the singer
Football lovers are about to set their starting fantasy line-ups, but for Taylor Swift fans the season is already in full swing.
Taylor, 33, just wrapped up the US dates of her Eras Tour after performing since April for thousands of Swifties who were able to snag highly coveted tickets to the sold out shows.
Beyond the stadium walls, fans are tuning into to livestreams on TikTok to watch the hitmaker belt out the biggest hits from her 17-year career – and are even playing Swiftball, a fantasy football style game where they predict elements of each show.
Allie, a Swiftie who attended Taylor’s show in New Jersey in May, launched Swiftball on Twitter amid her ‘post-concert sadness’ as a way to gift an extra copy of the singer’s Midnights album to a deserving fan.
She created a fantasy ballot for her ‘one-time giveaway’ where fans could guess which outfits, guitars, songs and more would included at the next show. But the game went viral and was played by more than 18,000 fans last week.
Taylor herself is seemingly aware of the game, even apparently referencing it just last weekend as she thanked fans for ‘following this tour like it’s your favourite sport’.
Taylor, 33, just wrapped up the US dates of her Eras Tour after performing since April for thousands of Swifties who were able to snag highly coveted tickets to the sold out shows. Pictured: Performing at SoFi stadium, California on August 3
Allie, a Swiftie who attended Taylor’s show in New Jersey in May, launched Swiftball on Twitter amid her ‘post-concert sadness’ as a way to gift an extra copy of the singer’s Midnights album to a deserving fan
Swiftball has since gone viral – even trending on Twitter multiple times and as recently as last weekend – and was played by more than 18,000 fans last week
Allie Fantasy Swiftball – the game’s official name – sees Swifties across the globe competing for Taylor-themed prizes that are donated by members of the fandom.
Players fill out a ballot using a Google Doc ahead of each show. The ballot, worth a total of 113 points, features 24 questions that see fans predict what they think the Bad Blood hitmaker will do at the upcoming tour stop.
Swifties will guess which costume Taylor will wear during her sets or what colour guitar she will use when she plays the song Lover.
They also take a crack at guessing more unpredictable elements of the show, like which two surprise songs will the songstress perform, whether she will bring out any special guests, or how many minutes the standing ovation after the song Champagne Problems will last.
Fans can edit their Swiftball line-up, so to speak, until the moment Taylor takes the stage, but once the singer starts to perform the ballots are locked.
Many Swifties will tune in to livestreams of the concert being run by fans physically in the stands, so they can see in live time how their ballot scored.
Most nights Allie will tweet updates about elements of the concert as they unfold. She and her Swiftball team will then reveal the winners the next day.
Allie, who now operates Swiftball with a team of six others, never expected her game to grow into a fandom phenomenon, sharing that the whole experience has been ‘mind blowing’
The fantasy ballot got fans to guess which outfits, guitars, songs and more would included at the next show. Pictured: Performing at SoFi stadium, California on August 3
Players also take a crack at guessing more unpredictable elements of the show, like which two surprise songs will the songstress perform. Pictured: Performing at SoFi stadium, California on August 3
It is nearly impossible to get a perfect score on the ballot, so the fan with the highest point value after the show wins. However, due to the sheer number of participants there are often ties.
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According to the Swiftball ballot, in the event of a tie, the ‘player who correctly guessed both surprise songs’ will win.
But if the tied winners have both correctly guessed the surprise songs or have the same number of surprise songs correct, the winner is determined by ‘the most correct answers in a row, going in order of the categories’.
‘In the event of an entirely duplicated ballot, the winner will be whoever has submitted their ballot first,’ the rules state. ‘If both winners submitted at the same time, a random generator will be used to determine the winner.’
Allie, who now operates Swiftball with a team of six others, never expected her game to grow into a fandom phenomenon, sharing that the whole experience has been ‘mind blowing’.
She created her ‘fun little guessing game’ for the one-time giveaway after the concert she attended at Met Life Stadium last spring, but says fans enjoyed it so much ‘they asked me to do it again, and then again’.
Allie provided the prizes herself for the first two nights of Swiftball, but then told her followers that she wouldn’t be able to keep purchasing prizes. She says that in response, other Swifties jumped to the rescue.
‘Once one person donated and I mentioned that people were sending prizes, it’s like the floodgates are open,’ she told USA Today. ‘My DMs are always flooded with people being like I have this that I would love to donate, or I would love to donate stuff from my Etsy, or I have old merch that I don’t use, or I accidentally ordered this in the wrong size, have this as a prize.’
She added that the best part of running the game is that ‘everyone is so so generous and wonderful and lovely’.
Fans suspect that Taylor is aware of Swiftball’s existence. Last weekend, during her evermore set on night one of her Los Angeles residency, she thanked fans for ‘following this tour like it’s your favourite sport’. Taylor is pictured during the evermore set of her LA show last Friday
On average, Swiftball has 8,000 to 10,000 players, however on Thursday last week more than 18,000 people submitted ballots, setting a new participation record. Pictured: Performing at SoFi stadium, Los Angeles on August 7
Allie also revealed that she had been solely operating Swiftball for several weeks, but as the game grew – so did her team, which is comprised solely of volunteers who each have a specific role. Roles vary from curating digital content to tallying up ballots.
Raghav Kalra, who is a member of the team, told the news outlet that the biggest part of his job is checking through the short answer entries that fans type manually to ensure the proper points are awarded.
‘I still go and manually check that every single person who had that particular entry for the surprise song or anything close to it, which can be granted as an acceptable response, does get points,’ he explained.
He described it as a ‘double-checking process’ and said he believes it is ‘definitely the most intense part of the night’.
On average, Swiftball has 8,000 to 10,000 players, however on Thursday last week more than 18,000 people submitted ballots, setting a new participation record.
The game has also trended on Twitter and fans suspect that Taylor – who during the Eras tour has admitted that her staff informs her about fans’ social media conversations – is aware of its existence.
Last weekend, during her evermore set on night one of her Los Angeles residency, she said: ‘To anyone who’s been following this tour like it’s your favourite sport, I love you so much.’
Taylor performed the final show of the first leg of the US eras tour on Wednesday in Los Angeles. She embarks on the South American leg of the tour later this month.
Allie announced in a post after the final Los Angeles show that Swiftball will return on August 24 when the Blank Space songstress takes the Eras Tour to Mexico City. MailOnline has approached Allie for comment.
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