Super Bowl Streakers – How Often is there a Streaker at the Super Bowl?

With the Kansas City Chiefs having won their second Super Bowl in a row in 2024, you would be forgiven for thinking that this article might be about American football teams that have managed to go on a bit of a winning streak and win twice in succession. Instead, it is a look at the literal streaking that has taken place over the years, with some people choosing one of the biggest events in sport to bear all for the world to see.

It might not be your idea of how to spend a Super Bowl, especially considering the fact that tickets cost an inordinate amount of money, but for some people it is exactly what they want to do.

What makes things a little bit odder is the fact that you can actually place a bet on whether or not there will be a streaker. Given the manner in which betting is a tricky thing to do legally in every state in America, those that do allow it tend to be keen to allow you to bet on countless weird and wonderful things, so we perhaps shouldn’t be that surprised that wagering on a streaker making their way onto the pitch is something that some betting companies are willing to do. The problem is, you need to be careful that the streaker meets all of the requirements to get a pay out, which includes you not doing the streaking.

What We’re Talking About

According to Dictionary.com, streaking is ‘an act or instance of running naked through a public place’. It is not uncommon for people to streak during major public occasions, often in order to draw attention to some sort of issue that the streaker is protesting against. Of course, if they are fulfilling the brief and running naked then most people are going to be focussed on their genitals far more than they’re going to be thinking about any particular cause that the person is protesting about. Another reason to streak is because you have been dared to, or someone has made a bet that you won’t streak and you want to win said bet.

That is what happened in 1799, when a man was arrested at London’s Mansion House after accepting a ten guinea wager to run named from Cornhill to Cheapside. In sport, the first incident of streaking took place during a match between Arsenal and Manchester City in 1974. That happened a day before there had been a streaker in a cricket match between Australia and New Zealand. In fact, 1974 is often considered to be the high point of the popularity of streaking, with thousands of events taking place around the world. One such example was Robert Opel, who streaked holding a peace sign during the Oscars ceremony that year.

Famous Examples of Streaking at the Super Bowl

There have been some well-known examples of streaking at the Super Bowl. With some people paying tens of thousands of dollars for tickets, you would absolutely be forgiven for thinking that someone would be absolutely mad to want to then streak and face the fine and likely ban from future events that would accompany such a decision. Even so, there have been more than a couple of times when someone has taken off some or all of their clothes in order to head out onto the turf during one of the world’s most famous games of of American football, so here is a look at them:

Super Bowl XXXVIII (2004)

Super Bowl XXXVIII saw the champions of the National Football Conference, the Carolina Panthers, up against the New England Patriots, who had won the American Football Conference, in order to decide upon the champion of the 2003 season. It took place on the first of February 2004 at the Reliant Stadium in Houston, Texas and would go on to be thought of as one of the most well-played and exciting Super Bowls that there has ever been. Peter King, for example, wrote in Sports Illustrated that it was the ‘Greatest Super Bowl of all time‘. It was considered to be an event that ‘had it all’, which, as it happens included a streaker.

Just prior to the second-half getting underway, a British streaker named Mark Roberts made his way onto the field dressed as a referee. Once there, he took his clothes off and did a dance wearing only a thong. He was tackled to the ground by the Patriots linebacker Matt Chatham, after which he was arrested. In the wake of the incident he managed to avoid jail and was given a fine of $1,000 for trespassing. Annoyingly for Roberts, though, his stunt was overshadowed by what happened during the half-time show, when one of Janet Jackson’s breasts was exposed by Justin Timberlake, later to be referred to as a ‘wardrobe malfunction‘.

Super Bowl LV (2021)

Taking place in 2021, Super Bowl LV was the final game of the 2020 season and pitted the Kansas City Chiefs up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as the winners of the American Football Conference and the National Football Conference respectively. It was played on the seventh of February and boasted the lowest attendance at any Super Bowl on account of the fact that the capacity of the Raymond James Stadium was limited owing to the global health crisis of the time. In spite of the scarcity of tickets, one person who managed to get hold of one was Yuri Andrade, who took to the field in a pink one-piece that had the name of an adult website emblazoned on it.

He made it onto the field of play with a little over five minutes left of the match, with the good news being that it didn’t have much of an impact on the outcome of the game because the Tampa Bay Buccaneers won 31-9. He got a call for his run by the famous Kevin Harlan, who berated him not for streaking but for pulling his pants down, saying, “Pull up your pants, take off the bra and be a man.” It later emerged that he’d decided to do the stunt because he’d placed a bet on there being a streaker, wagering $50,000 on it happening in order to win $374,000 on the occurrence taking place during the game.

The problem for Andrade is that he bragged about it to a radio station in Tampa Bay, saying that they’d placed a bet with Bovada. That obviously meant that there were ‘irregularities’ with the betting patterns, with Bovada responding by refunding all of the people that placed a bet on there not being a streaker and paying out on the legitimate ones that said that there would be one. They released a statement saying, “Our players have always trusted us to ensure the integrity of all props offered in our sportsbook. We will continue to make sure that any publicity stunts or ill-intended behaviour cannot adversely affect the outcome of a player’s wager.”

Super Bowl LVIII (2024)

Super Bowl LVIII was a close-run affair, with the Kansas City Chiefs needing overtime in order to win 25-22 over the San Francisco 49ers. Before Patrick Mahomes could be named MVP in the Super Bowl for the third time in his career, though, having thrown 333 yards and getting two touchdowns, play was delayed momentarily in order to deal with a couple of almost-streakers. The game saw the National Football Conference winners in the 49ers take on the Chiefs, who had won the American Football Conference, at the Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas; the first time that Sin City had hosted the world’s most famous American football game.

It was not the most thrilling of matches, being just the second Super Bowl to be decided in overtime after Super Bowl LI. One thing that did add a bit of excitement to proceedings, though, was when Alex Gonzalez made it onto the field wearing just a pair of pants and some trainers, having removed his top. At the same time that Gonzalez ran onto the field, a co-conspirator attempted to do the same thing but was taken down by security on the site of the pitch. He has his social media handle and the hashtag ‘Set and Forget’ written on his chest, having his own attempt to draw attention to what he was trying to say written large on his skin.

The decision to ‘streak’, if you can call it that when you keep some clothes on, was made the in the build-up to the match and set in stone the day before. That was when Gonzalez was at the UFC fight in Las Vegas and discussed his plan to place a bet on their being a streaker with the likes of Dr Phil and the Nelk Boys. He reportedly told them all to bet big on there being a streaker, which he planned to do himself before being said streaker. The only problem was that they couldn’t find any companies willing to take their prop bet, in spite of the fact that he’d already spent $42,000 on front-row tickets for the big game.

Why Some Streakers Keep Their Clothes On

In the strictest sense, a streaker is only a streaker if they do it completely naked. Whilst most people would be willing to make an exception for shoes, it is the nudity that is the point of the streaking, which begs the question about why some would choose to do it still wearing some clothes. When Mark Roberts ran onto the pitch at Super Bowl XXXVIII, he did so naked but for a thong. Yuri Andrade was wearing a pink one-piece when he ran onto the pitch during Super Bowl LV, whilst Mark Gonzalez and his friend both had their pants still on when getting involved in the coverage of Super Bowl LVIII, so there must be a reason for it.

The answer almost certainly comes in the form of self-preservation. Mark Roberts was only fined $1,000, but it might have been a lot worse if he’d been fully naked when he streaked. There was a steeper punishment for Andrade, who was given 100 hours of community service and a year of probation, with the likelihood being that Gonzalez and his friend would serve a similar fate. It is because streaking isn’t illegal per se, although that depends entirely on which state you’re in when you do it. In Nevada, for example, it is illegal to engage in an act of ‘indecent or obscene exposure‘, so they were wise to remain trousered.

What we do know is that streaking at the Super Bowl isn’t that common, all things considered. There have been three known examples of it to date, if you count the two people that did it in 2024 as one incident of streaking given the fact that it happened at the same time. That means that three Super Bowls out of the 58 that have taken place so far have seen a streaker. That is the equivalent of 5.17% of Super Bowls. That being said, with the first one having been at Super Bowl 38, there have been 21 Super Bowls including that one. That makes it 14.29%, with the number of times there’s a streaker seemingly increasing. Will there be a fully naked one sometime soon?