Ahead of International Cursing Day on November 9, The Action Network has analyzed over 9.7 million comments from the subreddits of 205 teams across 10 major sports leagues (NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, MLS, Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga and Ligue 1) to find out which fandoms are the most foul-mouthed and which are the most polite. Each team was assigned a percentage value based on the share of all comments analyzed for that team that contained at least one swear word. For foreign leagues, the swear words of their languages were also included: Spanish for La Liga, Italian for Serie A, German for the Bundesliga and French for Ligue 1.
Highlights
- Edmonton Oilers (NHL) turned out to be the most foul-mouthed fandom across all leagues, with 17.89% of their comments containing swear words, ahead of Athletic Bilbao (#2 most foul-mouthed fandom, La Liga, 17.17% comments included swear words) and Dallas Stars (#3 most foul-mouthed fandom, NHL, 15.44% included swear words).
- St. Louis Cardinals (MLB) are the most polite fandom, with just 3.13% of their comments containing swear words, ahead of Baltimore Orioles (#2 most polite fandom, MLB, only 3.37% included swear words) and Washington Nationals (#3 most polite fandom, MLB, only 3.47% included swear words).
You can see the results of all 200+ analyzed teams in the interactive table below, including the most popular swear word per fandom.
The Most Foul-Mouthed Sports Fandoms
To find the most foul-mouthed fandoms, we calculated the share of comments in each team’s subreddit that contained at least one swear word.
Edmonton Oilers (NHL) turned out to be the most foul-mouthed fandom in the ranking, with 17.89% of its comments containing swear words. Athletic Bilbao (La Liga) ranked second with 17.17% of their comments including profanities, followed by Dallas Stars (NHL) in third with 15.44% of their comments including swear words. Boston Bruins (NHL) came in fourth with 15.33%, and Atlético Madrid (La Liga) rounded out the top five with 15.17% of vulgar comments. Three of the five most foul-mouthed fandoms are NHL teams, and the other two are La Liga clubs.
The Most Polite Sports Fandoms
On the other hand, to find the most polite fandoms, we looked at the teams with the lowest share of comments containing swear words.
St. Louis Cardinals (MLB) took the top spot as the most polite fandom, with only 3.13% of its comments containing swear words. Baltimore Orioles (MLB) ranked second with only 3.37% vulgar comments, while Washington Nationals (MLB) came third with 3.47% including profanities. Philadelphia Phillies (MLB) and Detroit Tigers (MLB) followed in fourth and fifth place, both at 3.48% vulgar comments when rounded, with Philadelphia Phillies edging ahead by a fraction of a percentage point. Notably, all five of the most polite fandoms are MLB teams.
Polymarket currently offers multiple markets for the sports leagues mentioned in this analysis; if you are interested in prediction markets, you can have a look at our Polymarket promo code.
Methodology
- The Action Network analyzed comments from the subreddits of 205 teams across 10 leagues, collected throughout 2026. The final date of analysis was November 2026.
- Only fandoms with at least 1,000+ available comments are included in the analysis.
- The analysis covers the NFL (32 teams), NBA (30), NHL (32), MLB (30), MLS (30), Premier League (20), La Liga (5), Serie A (12), Bundesliga (11) and Ligue 1 (3).
- In total, 9,742,491 comments were analyzed.
- Of those, 949,750 comments were identified as containing at least one swear word, based on a list of English swear words. For foreign leagues, the swear words of their languages were also included: Spanish for La Liga, Italian for Serie A, German for the Bundesliga and French for Ligue 1.
- Each team was assigned a percentage value based on the share of all comments analyzed for that team that contained at least one swear word.
