National Football League

How do NFL rookies get personalized draft night jerseys so fast?

Published Apr. 29, 2016 1:21 p.m. ET

foxsports

The first round of the NFL Draft is an annual maelstrom, and never has the chaos been crystallized more perfectly than in the Laremy Tunsil drama that unfolded Thursday night in Chicago.

Video of the Ole Miss lineman in a smoke-filled gas mask sent the entire evening spiraling into madness. From there, all there was to do was sit back and see what came next.

Through all this, a small team sat backstage at Auditorium Theatre waiting to see if and when they'd be putting Tunsil's name on a jersey.

This is the jersey pressing crew, which first assembled in 2012 when Nike decided to take on the challenge of customizing draft day jerseys with the name of their recipient—a process that requires quick communication and faster scrambling.

In 2014, The New York Times reported a feature on the process. Partnering with Stahls, an apparel customization company, the jersey team works with an NFL official in a small room outfitted with a thermal press.

Picks coming in from teams are immediately relayed from the official to the pressing room workers, who then match the athlete with one of the pre-designed templates they've made for the players in attendance.

From here, they use a thermal presser to transfer the name onto the appropriate jersey and present it to a fan of the team, who in turn presents it to NFL commissioner Roger Goodell. After that, it's photo time, baby.

All of this happens in a very right window. The jersey room has about two minutes between the selection coming in and the on-stage presentation. In that span, they have to locate the right name plate with the right team font and get it pressed and moving.

So just know, when Laremy Tunsil started to fall, a team of working professionals backstage with all the angles covered. No matter the team or place, they'd have it covered with a minute's notice.

Dan is on Twitter.