Pat McAfee Becomes Lionel Messi Fan After Inter Miami Victory

Lionel Messi's arrival at Inter Miami attracted a lot of eyes to MLS, and he's even making new fans.

LeBron James, Serena Williams and other celebrities watched Messi's Inter Miami debut match on July 21. Giannis Antetokounmpo was at the Leagues Cup final when Inter Miami faced off against Nashville SC. Joe Burrow, Ja'Marr Chase and other Cincinnati Bengals players joined the party Wednesday when Inter Miami arrived at TQL Stadium for the U.S. Open Cup semifinal.

Inter Miami won in penalties and moved on to play the Houston Dynamo in the final on Sept. 27. Messi is undefeated in eight matches with Inter Miami and has scored or assisted in all of those matches. Yet, he hasn't officially made his MLS regular-season debut because those matches have been in tournaments.

Inter Miami is in last place in the Eastern Conference, but Messi and the team's new signings beat the league points leader Wednesday night. That was enough to convince Pat McAfee to hop on the hype train.

" ... I was watching (Wednesday) night, you know how people say, 'This is your club.' Inter Miami's my club," McAfee said on the "Pat McAfee Show' on Thursday. "'Oh, you're a bandwagon fan.' Yeah, I'm an Inter Miami fan. I was with this team when they were the worst team in the MLS. This ain't through thick and thin. This is the thickest they can possibly get. This is the bottom of the (expletive) thing.

"So what? Yeah, we decided to become fans after the greatest player of all time signed there with three of his friends, who are probably the best players the MLS has seen in some time. Sorry, they signed the Messi of MLS Josef Martinez to also be on their team that Messi did not know before getting there. Now he's scoring game-winners, game-tyers. Sorry."

McAfee will be the first one to tell you he isn't the most knowledgeable soccer fan. He opted to use the Castilian Spanish way of saying Messi's name even though the 36-year-old played for Barcelona but isn't from the region.

But it's the attention Inter Miami and MLS hoped for when Messi signed, and it might test the spending limits the league puts on teams if another big-time star wants to play in the league.

Inter Miami is back in MLS action this Saturday against the New York Red Bulls at Red Bull Arena. It's not known if Messi will play in the match since manager Tata Martino noted the team would try to handle his workload.