If there was a map for bars in San Francisco, dots of 49ers scarlet and gold would be scattered across it.
But in the Lower Haight Neighborhood, a speck of Seattle Seahawks navy blue would also pop up.
Danny Coyle’s opened in 2006 after owner Brian Coyle bought the Irish bar, called An Bodhran at the time. A bodhran is a traditional Irish handheld drum.
A longtime 49ers fan, Coyle jokingly said Friday that he “sold my soul to the devil” and “went to the dark side” when he turned the bar, which features an orange exterior that sticks out in the largely residential neighborhood, into a Seahawks fan hot spot about 15 years ago.
“We built up great community, and the Seahawks fans have been great,” Coyle said. “And they’ve been loyal, and they’ve been coming in for 15-odd years – and not just for Seahawks games.”
Coyle and Allan Pickens, one of the longstanding regulars, said Danny Coyle’s is the only Seahawks bar in San Francisco.
“There have been other bars that have tried to replicate this, but Danny Coyle’s put in the time, they put in the effort, you know?” Pickens said. “They allowed us to have a space that a lot of bars in a rival city would not let you have.”
Jerome Zech, a young disc jockey who worked across the street from the bar at Groove Merchant Records, started the movement.
He asked Coyle if the bar owner could dedicate one of the TVs at his Irish sports pub to the Seahawks game. Coyle obliged.
He said Zech started bringing seven or eight people with him to watch the games. Zech, a savvy social media user, used his skills to attract even more Seattle fans to the neighborhood bar.
“That sort of snowballed from there,” Coyle said.
He renamed the bar Danny Coyle’s after his father, who is now 87. The father and son hail from Derry City, Northern Ireland, and Brian Coyle immigrated to San Francisco in 1991 when the 49ers were fresh off back-to-back Super Bowl titles. He’s been a 49ers fan ever since.
Per tradition, many Seahawks fans continue to watch Seattle games on a TV in the corner of the bar near the front Haight Street entrance. An illuminated Seahawks sign and a blue 12th Man jersey hang near the TV.
Around the time of the COVID-19 pandemic, a black line appeared on the screen. With the bar facing financial constraints from the pandemic, Seahawks fans stepped up and purchased a new 50-inch TV that remains in the corner today.
“That really touched my heart,” Coyle said. “I thought that was amazing.”
Coyle said the bar is not strictly a Seahawks bar. It’s also a soccer bar, or as Coyle calls it, “real football,” for Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur and Bayern Munich fans. Soccer scarves hang from the bar ceiling, and Coyle opens the bar at 4 in the morning for those certain early morning overseas soccer games.
Cameron Billon, who has gone to Danny Coyle’s for almost 10 years and spent the last two living above the bar, was one of those Manchester United fans who woke up early and drove to the bar to watch the game.
Coyle said his bar is also a University of North Carolina basketball bar after Tar Heels fans wanted a place to support their school. But it’s perhaps best known as a Seahawks watering hole. The 49ers and any other team from any sport are, of course, welcome. A few 49ers signs, like a red 49ers towel, are posted on the walls and ceilings.
Coyle said it’s a friendly bar where 49ers and Seahawks fans share in “good banter.”
“It never gets salty,” he said.
Billon, 32, agreed.
“The fact that they embrace the Seahawks is remarkable, because it kind of breaks down a barrier when it comes to fandom,” he said.
Pickens, a 36-year-old Seahawks fan born and raised in San Francisco, has been watching Seahawks games at Danny Coyle’s since 2014, including that season’s Super Bowl when Pickens’ Seahawks were handed a crushing loss by the New England Patriots.
“Very unfortunate ending, but I have not left since,” Pickens said of the bar.
The place is typically packed with Seahawks fans on a fall Sunday, Pickens said, but he expects a “madhouse” this Sunday.
“This bar is synonymous, when it comes to big football games, to having people standing outside in line, probably 10 to 15 deep,” he said.
Coyle also expects it to be busier. He said he will have a doorman and a guest Sunday, so the Seahawks regulars can ensure their spot inside.
How do Seahawks fans find the bar or know it’s Seattle-friendly in enemy territory?
Pickens said Google research will do the trick. Or, simply walk past it when the Seahawks score a touchdown and listen to the “SEA … HAWKS” chants, which Pickens is typically the catalyst for, he said.
Coyle said they’ll get ready to close the door and windows of the bar when it looks like the Seahawks are going to score, so the chants and bell ringing don’t disturb the neighbors.
Billon said he can hear the chants from below on a Seahawks Sunday.
“It permeates and it rattles the building,” Billon said. “So, it is a Seahawks bar.”
Campbell Watson, of Vancouver, British Columbia, was another Seahawks fan enjoying a beverage Thursday night at Danny Coyle’s.
Watson, wearing a blue Seahawks “12” jersey and a blue Seahawks hat, is going with his friend to the Super Bowl at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara.
A longtime Seahawks season-ticket holder, Watson watched the Seahawks take home the Lombardi Trophy when his team throttled the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl 48 in New York.
Just like he did the week of that game in New York, Watson, 47, found a bar in San Francisco where Seahawks fans could congregate.
“It’s a local bar, which I love,” Watson said of Danny Coyle’s.
Pickens said he will be watching from his favorite bar in his custom blue “12” Seahawks jersey with the bar’s name emblazoned on it. He has a matching Seahawks hat also with the bar’s name and “12” on it.
Pickens said he likes Seattle’s chances against the Patriots Sunday and hopes his team can redeem itself from its last Super Bowl loss to the Patriots, which still haunts him.
“If we win, which I’m hoping we win, what that means not only for this bar, but for the city of Seattle who have wanted to get the stench of Super Bowl 49 out of their system, and how fitting we’re not only playing the Patriots, the team that beat us, but we’re playing in the 49ers stadium, not 50 miles from where you and I are talking now,” he said.
He’s already got plans if they win. He planned to pick up a cigar Saturday.
“I’m gonna smoke that with glory if we win this game,” Pickens said.
He’s also going to wear a replica WWE Winged Eagle championship wrestling belt if Seattle comes out on top.
“I’m just gonna walk around this city with that belt over my shoulder, with a cigar in my mouth and saying, ‘We did it,’” Pickens said.
And if the Seahawks lose?
It’s going to be a long offseason, he said, but he will appreciate the team’s accomplishments.
He said this season’s might be his favorite Seahawks team, maybe even more than the Seahawks teams that appeared in back-to-back Super Bowls more than a decade ago. The defense from those teams was referred to as the “Legion of Boom.”
“But they got to win the Super Bowl,” he said. “LOB won the Super Bowl. They got to win it here.”