(Posted 8-17-26)

Greetings from The Booth!

As we wait for College and NFL Football, and watch another Nationals season go down in flames, jersey numbers have become a prime topic in the Nation’s Capital.

Let’s start with the wildfire that is the Jayden Daniels controversy. You can read about this–it’s everywhere–but the gist of the story is that the number 5 that Daniels wore during his time as the Heisman Trophy winning quarterback at LSU was recently given to Tiger’s cornerback DJ Pickett, who apparently was promised the number when he was recruited by the school. This move went against Daniels’ wishes, prompting the Washington quarterback to issue a cease and desist order to LSU to refrain from using his name, image, and likeness.

There’s a lot of nuance to the story, as number retirement is a very complicated thing. A statement issued by the Daniels family states that “Jayden and his family had every reason to believe that his number would…be honored and protected in recognition of his extraordinary contributions to the university.” Meanwhile, the LSU policy states that an athlete must have completed competition for five years before being considered for jersey retirement. Daniels left the school in 2023.

As for the cease and desist, Daniels’ contract with LSU gave the school only 180 days after his final college game to use his name, image, and likeness, so he has every right to issue the order. Yet, he has become the villain in this whole story. Even other sports teams have been trolling the Commanders signal-caller.

(Sidebar: The New York Mets, in the midst of sweeping the Nats this past weekend, posted on social media after one of those wins that they stopped at 4 runs out of respect for Jayden Daniels. The Mets only need to look at themselves, floundering in last place in the NL East, and worry about playing baseball. The Mets can pound sand).

It seems to me that there are a host of other NFL players more deserving of being vilified than Jayden Daniels (One was just arrested this weekend for domestic abuse). He’s a model player, team leader, and by all accounts a solid citizen, whose primary focus is playing football.  And I might add that he’s the only quarterback in the recent Netflix series of the same name that doesn’t drop an f-bomb every 2 seconds.

Yet, in the world of social media, where anonymity and lack of accountability and facts rule, a quality young man is being cast as the bad guy. Facts matter, and the fact is that Daniels is within his rights to order LSU to stop profiting from his past glories, especially if they promised to protect his number (as he claims), then promising another player that he could wear that number. As former Tiger coach Brian Kelly said, we can’t treat one Heisman winner one way (Joe Burrow, whose number 9 is protected) and another Heisman winner (Daniels) differently.

I have a feeling that once NFL play starts for real, this story will fade from the news cycle and will be much ado about nothing. As for me, all I care about is number 5 raising a number 1 as he hoists a Lombardi Trophy.

Until the next visit from The Booth…HTTC!

RW