Where to watch the Taylor Swift football game in San Francisco
Here are a few places to watch Super Bowl Sunday when our beloved San Francisco 49ers will take on the Kansas City Chiefs.
By M. T. Eley
If you’re not the type to reserve a booth at a favorite pub the moment you found out the 49ers were playing the Kansas City Chiefs this Sunday, I have news: I am legally obligated as a member of the press to tell you that Taylor Swift is dating KC tight end Travis Kelce.
“KC Tight End” would make a great name for an amateur wrestler, I agree. More importantly: where can you go for Sunday’s game that doesn’t require reservations and does have televisions? Here’s five.
The Lark Bar
685 Market Street
Opens at 12PM
Come for: Detroit-style pizza, retro sports bar feels
The Lark Bar is yet another addition to the wonderfully curated Future Bars lineup. This one is a late-20th century sports bar through and through: light-paneled walls brimming with sports bric-a-brac, surrounding a well-stocked bar and a dozen or so taps.
Sunday features a block party starting at 12PM in Annie Street just outside, weather permitting, with a big screen TV and pizza from nearby Joyride Pizza, whose Detroit-style pies are crusty, richly greasy and everything they should be.
The Mad Dog in the Fog
1568 Haight Street
Opens at 10AM
Come for: cheap wings and buckets, sports mosh pit
Haight-Ashbury isn’t the first place I’d look for a sports bar, but anyone who walked by the open windows of Mad Dog during World Cup season will know this place gets standing-room-only fast. Dim, euro-pub aesthetics abound but I’m sure it works for American football, too.
Pitchers of beer and chicken wings are the modus operandi here, although you might dabble in some other menu options including a decent bruschetta. If you want to enjoy the game with a crowd, I’d come here.
Foghorn Taproom
450 Balboa Street
Opens at 12PM
Come for: savory wings and fried chicken, calmer vibes, craft beers
The most family-friendly of all these places given its location in the Inner Richmond, with a great patio and a smaller interior area that gets full fast. If you’re bent on bringing kiddoes or dogs with you to your Super Bowl festivities, this is where I’d do it — just know it’ll still be packed.
The smell of Foghorn’s chicken is unmistakable from Balboa Street, with 13 flavors plus an Impossible vegan option, too. The real draw is a thoughtful stock of craft beer cans, all of which work well with the menu and allow for some fun mix-and-matching.
SF Athletic Club
1750 Divisadero Street
Opens at 12PM
Come for: loaded dogs, root beer floats, group beer deals
It is unlikely a Buffalo Wild Wings will ever open in San Francisco, which is fine because we already have the SF Athletic Club. If you’re from the Midwest like myself and miss home, come here and bask in the glow of more television square footage than a Best Buy, just like Bdubs back in Mount Vernon.
A $20 cover charge is the cost of all that pixelated glory, so plan on recouping some of it by getting a “bathtub” of beer for the gang, which is 24 bottles in a porcelain bowl of ice at a 10% discount versus the individual cost. A bacon-wrapped hotdog with aioli and slaw may be more of a baseball thing but who cares, they’re delicious — especially alongside a root beer float with a nip of rye.
Durty Nelly’s
2328 Irving Street
Opens at 11AM
Come for: classic pub food, fireplace, potentially new friends
If you’re in the mood to watch the “Forty-feckin’-niners” then mosey over to the cheerful Golden State Warriors yellow-and-blue facade of Durty Nelly’s in the Outer Sunset. This place will fill up fast due to its size, dedicated regulars and its hearty fare, and maybe they’ll have the fireplace going, too.
Like any good Irish pub, Durty Nelly’s manages to feel both just-for-locals and warmly hospitable at the same time — “Enter as strangers, leave as friends,” et cetera. Stand by the “bullshit corner” while the 49ers do their thing and you’ll likely strike up a conversation. God bless the Irish, only they could make drinking feel as wholesome as they do.
Honorable mentions
I love these spots, so they’re also worth a try this Sunday: Zeki’s at 1319 California; The Abbey Tavern on 4100 Geary Boulevard; and The Riptide at 3639 Taraval Street.
M. T. Eley is a San Francisco-based writer
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