‘Sydney Sweeney count ur days’: Woman was doing her toenails. Then the sound of an ad from her sisters’ TV led her running to her room

A woman who posts on TikTok as @pyt3ly said in a recent video that she was doing her toenails when she heard a sports ad coming from her little sisters’ television. On-screen text in the video read, “When I’m doing my toenails and hear ‘sports. Sports. Sports. Sports.’ From my little sisters tv.”

In the caption, she wrote, “Sydney Sweeney count ur days woman. This is insane bro.” The clip had gained 12.5 million views, 1.5 million likes, and more than 8,000 comments.

The video opened with her filming herself as she reacted. She asked, “You guys gonna skip that ad?” An off-screen voice from the TV said, “You can tell time by measuring the sun’s distance from the horizon,” and then, “Looks like Happy Hour.” She asked if the last sports ad had let them skip. One sister said, “No.”

The ad she reacted to is Novig’s Sydney Sweeney campaign

In @pyt3ly’s video, another ad started. A voice said, “It’s never too early for holiday cheer.” She asked, “Did you guys watch it?” A sister said, “Yeah.” She replied, “Oh, I’m so sorry. That’s a bad ad,” and told them, “Next time it shows up, scream my name really loud so I can ban it from the TV. That’s a really bad ad.” The camera also moved across a cluttered dresser and a bed.

The television showed the words “Just Sports.” The spot appeared to be a Novig advertisement featuring actress Sydney Sweeney.

According to ABC7 News, the ads show Sweeney in sports settings, including on top of a basketball hoop and inside a hockey goal, wearing little to no clothing. In the ad, Sweeney says Novig is “just sports, so they wanted to show just sports.”

Novig CEO Jacob Fortinsky said Tuesday, on a panel sponsored by Front Office Sports, that Sweeney was “driving a lot of the visuals and the messaging.” He called it “a very exciting process to work with her both on the commercial side as well as on the creative side,” and added, “It really was Sydney who was driving a lot of the visuals and the messaging.”

Fortinsky said, “We’re hugely supportive of women’s sports. I think it’s a huge component our platform.” He also said, “I think we never intended to portray female sports. Sydney’s an actress, the biggest movie star in the world.”

He said the ad was focused on Novig as a sports-focused prediction market, and that the company was “very happy with how positive the feedback has been overall,” even though he had expected some negative reaction tied to opinions people already had of Sweeney. For Novig, the criticism doesn’t stop at the ad’s portrayal of women, as one woman says she realized an elderly woman was shaming her for what she was wearing.

He told Front Office Sports earlier this month that Sweeney is now an equity holder. He said she approached the company “initially interested in some sort of equity partnership, and the conversation really went from there.”

Female athletes have criticized the campaign. Gymnast Gracie Kramer shared a TikTok of herself competing with the text, “idk what Sydney Sweeney was doing, but this is what a woman in sports looks like.” The criticism has centered on how the ad uses women’s bodies, as an analysis argues that the Novig ad’s nudity isn’t the problem but how it is used, with female athletes paying the price.

International rugby player Sofie Fella said in an Instagram video that the ad was “disrespectful” to people who had worked to “untangle” women’s sports from expectations about looks. She asked, “Instead of paying female athletes properly or instead of putting it into the women’s sports economy, we’re spending money making ads like this?”

In the comments,  @pyt3ly later wrote, “GUYS. MY SISTERS ARE UNDER THE AGE OF 8 THEY DON’T SEE AND NEVER SEEN STUFF LIKE THAT THATS WHY I REACTED THAT WAY. ALSO for those that care about the room their room and my mom keeps extra ‘miscellaneous’ items in there if there isn’t a designated place for them mainly gift backs and electronic items.”

Some viewers focused on the ad not being skippable. One wrote, “NO BC WHY ISN’T IT SKIPPABLE!?!!??” Another said, “Making it non skippable is CRAZY.” A third claimed to have seen it on a children’s app, writing, “I got it on DISNEY PLUS!!! A KIDS FREAKING APP.”

Other commenters said the reaction went too far. One wrote, “You doing too much.” Another said, “She’s acting like it’s the end of the world.” A separate commenter argued the anger was aimed at the wrong person, writing, “Yall more mad at Sydeny than the producers that are airing the commercial.”