On the official account for the building, there was a photo posted of the top section shining bright in green along with the caption: “Fly @Eagles Fly!
“We’re going Green and White in honor of the Eagles NFC Championship Victory.”
The display has angered some New Yorkers, who saw the city’s Giants eliminated from the playoffs last week by the Eagles, and the Jets implode during the regular season to miss out on the postseason.
Taking to Twitter, many questioned the thinking behind the lighting with one writing: “‘Here’s an idea… Let’s make our own city genuinely angry at us!’ - The Empire State Building marketing team”
Another was not impressed, tweeting: “This has to be a joke. A terrible one at that.”
A third referenced an iconic movie moment, replying to the original post: “King Kong should have destroyed you.”
While a fourth queried: “Did you guys get hacked?”
Later, the Empire State Building was looking resplendent in red as it honored AFC Champions Kansas City Chiefs, who beat the Cincinnati Bengals 23-20 in the Championship game.
In a sly response to the reaction to the building turning green for Philly, a photo of it in red was captioned: “That hurt us more than it hurt you. We’re now lit for the @chiefs in honor of their AFC Championship Win.”
The change in color didn’t spark a change in attitude towards the gesture, with a New York Giants podcast slamming the building’s marketing team, tweeting in reply: “Just shut the f*** up.”
Another comment on Twitter said: “Thank you for acknowledging the pain and then gaslighting us again.”
A third commenter felt that a “sorry” was required, tweeting: “Still deserves an apology to all New Yorkers and Giants/Jets fans.”
Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes had plenty to say after the game, telling reporters: “I want to thank God, he healed my body this week, gave me the strength to be out here and battle through that.
“We said it from the beginning, when we were in the locker room, we’ve got to be together. And this team stepped up, against a great football team.”
With Bengals’ quarterback Joe Burrow getting plenty of headlines before the game and being compared to NFL great, Tom Brady, Mahomes was quick to say that the Chiefs still owned their home.
He said: “We showed that this place is Arrowhead, it’s not ‘Burrowhead’ out here.”
Mahomes also praised the Eagles and Burrow, saying: “They’re a great football team. A great quarterback.
“It’s going to be a great challenge for us. I’m going to celebrate this one first… but we’ll be ready to go in the Super Bowl.”
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