Michael Sam Rookie Jersey Outselling Everyone’s Except Johnny Manziel’s

NCAA Football: Cotton Bowl-Oklahoma State vs Missouri

Michael Sam may have gone lower in the NFL draft than he expected or hoped, but his rookie jersey is near the top of the heap:

NEW YORK (AP) — The 249th pick in the NFL draft has the second most popular jersey of all the players selected last weekend.

Michael Sam’s Rams jersey was the No. 2 seller among rookies on NFLShop.com. Sam became the first openly gay player to be drafted when St. Louis took him late in the seventh and final round Saturday.

The top seller was quarterback Johnny Manziel’s.

It seems the market has spoken.

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Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. al-Ameda says:

    The sports gear market is amazing. A great college player need not be a good professional (hello Tim Tebow) to become an instant multi-millionaire. A college star with some personality and award credentials is well-advised to strike when the iron is hot, because that fame is often fleeting.

    Michael Sam is definitely an anomaly, his circumstance is unparalleled, however there is probably a 50/50 chance that his career could be very short.

    Finally, I follow all major sports closely and I’ve never bought a player jersey in my life. I’ve owned baseball gloves with a player name on it, and I have sports socks with soccer star Zinedine Zidane’s name on them, but jerseys? Nope.