USA TODAY International Edition

Eagles fan trolls Patriots with billboard

Advertisem­ent on display near Gillette Stadium

- Scott Gleeson

Gina Lewis sees her Eagles fandom as fate, having zero ties to Philadelph­ia as a resident of western Massachuse­tts.

The self-proclaimed “biggest Eagles fan alive” said that when her 16-year-old son, Donovan, was an infant her fandom was born.

“I was never a die-hard fan, hardly ever watched football,” she said. “I was sitting on the couch and my son fell asleep. The remote was across the room, so I couldn’t get up. The Eagles were on, so I watched it and loved it. Have been a fan ever since.”

That’s how she finds herself the object of trash talk in Patriots territory, even after the Eagles’ Super Bowl LII win. But now Lewis has taken her own jab at Patriots fans by spearheadi­ng the placing of an Eagles electronic billboard ad a mile away from Gillette Stadium, just in time for Thursday night’s preseason Super Bowl rematch.

“It’s not meant to be a disrespect­ful thing,” Lewis told USA TODAY by phone on Tuesday morning. “It’s a fun joke. It’s football trash talk. And a thank-you to the Eagles. This is my home, too. It’s not my fault I live in New England. I have a right to put it up.

“I’ve been surrounded for years and years by people giving me crap about the Eagles ... and now they finally won.”

Lewis said the idea for the billboard started with a bet with a co-worker. She bet the Patriots-loving co-worker in June that if she got 4,100 likes and 3,300 retweets in a Twitter post, then he would pay for an ad.

Her co-worker paid $500, and a GoFundMe page has helped raise the rest of the money for the $5,000 billboard. Other money raised will go toward paying the billboard’s artist, Philadelph­iabased Jordan Spector, and then the remaining funds will be donated to the Carson Wentz AO1 Foundation.

“It was all fun, but what basically made me angry was (the co-worker) said the chances of getting a billboard (funded) was about the same as winning another Super Bowl,” she said. “That got me fired up. Then under three hours we had hit our goal. I didn’t know it would happen like this, but Eagles nation doesn’t disappoint.”

The billboard, which shares a revolving spot with five other ads, is a drawing that shows Patriots quarterbac­k Tom Brady getting sacked and Eagles quarterbac­k Nick Foles catching the Lombardi Trophy. The players have jersey numbers to capture the game score 4133. It reads, “Go Birds,” and “World Champs.”

The ad went up Monday via Lamar Advertisin­g, and it will remain there for the next four weeks.

Lewis said she was denied by a half dozen other advertisin­g agencies and had to weed through copyright laws with images in order to make the billboard a reality.

“We had to be creative,” she said. “I hope people understand that’s part of why the logo is smeared.”

Because she lives about two hours from Gillette Stadium, Lewis said the first time she saw the billboard came from fellow Eagles fans on a Facebook fan page. One Eagles fan who lives near Boston, Travis McKeever, caught a glimpse of the billboard from the street and was quick to share it.

“I was thrilled, ecstatic when I saw it,” said McKeever, from York, Pennsylvan­ia. “I’ve been a life-long Eagles fan, and the two weeks leading up to (last season’s) Super Bowl there was so much trash talk. So to have a reminder of the victory in the city of a dynasty was amazing.”

“I definitely didn’t expect it to be this big,” Lewis added. “When you’re part of the Eagles family, it’s a family vibe.”

 ?? COURTESY OF TRAVIS MCKEEVER ?? The Eagles billboard from the street.
COURTESY OF TRAVIS MCKEEVER The Eagles billboard from the street.

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