National Football League

Malik Nabers to wear No. 1 for Giants, which was first number retired in NFL history

Published Aug. 28, 2024 8:53 p.m. ET

As the New York Giants honor their 100th season of existence, a big part of that history is now tied to prized rookie wide receiver Malik Nabers.

Nabers, the sixth overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft out of LSU, has received permission from the family of former Giants star player Ray Flaherty to wear Flaherty's No. 1 — which became the first number retired in professional football history at the end of the 1935 season.

Nabers thanked Flaherty's family in a statement accompanying the team's announcement of his number change.

"I understand the responsibility, and I will do everything in my power to honor the Flaherty family and this organization," Nabers said. "I will wear the number with great pride [and] can't wait for the season to start."

Nabers wore No. 8 during his days as a standout wide receiver at LSU and wore No. 9 for the Giants in the preseason (No. 8 is worn by starting quarterback Daniel Jones).

Flaherty is a Pro Football Hall of Famer who led the Giants to the NFL Championship in 1934, more than 30 years before the inception of the Super Bowl. He was a seven-time first-team All-Pro in the late 1920s and early 1930s, sandwiched around a year he spent on the sidelines in 1930 coaching the football team at his alma mater, Gonzaga. (Gonzaga would fold its football program in 1941 and is now known as one of the most prominent non-football athletic colleges in the nation thanks to the success of its men's basketball program.)

Flaherty would later coach the modern-day Washington Commanders from 1936-1942 and would later be named as one of the most influential figures in the franchise's history.

Flaherty died in 1994, nine years before Nabers was born in 2003.

Nabers topped 1,000 receiving yards in his final two college football seasons at LSU, including a 2023 campaign where his 1,569 receiving yards from Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Jayden Daniels were second in the entire FBS behind fellow top-10 pick Rome Odunze. Nabers figures to immediately become the top receiver on the Giants' roster.

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