Falcons block Russell Gage from switching to jersey quantity previously worn by an Atlanta legend

The NFL loosened up its jersey quantity restrictions this offseason and varied gamers throughout the league are taking full benefit as they shake up the quantity they will don on sport day. One of many jersey adjustments set to happen that really would have been permitted below the earlier algorithm may be present in Atlanta with receiver Russell Gage. He is elected to modify from No. 83 to No. 14 heading into subsequent season (the brand new guidelines permit receivers, operating backs and others to put on single digits). That mentioned, No. 14 wasn’t the cross catcher’s first alternative. 

Gage admitted on Thursday that he initially wished to put on No. 10. As he famous, the Falcons blocked Gage from making that particular jersey swap, forcing him to go in a special course. 

“I wished one thing completely different, one thing contemporary,” Gage mentioned of the change, by way of The Atlanta Journal-Consitution. “I truly tried to get 10, but it surely’s retired. I perceive. I simply wished one thing contemporary, one thing new.” 

Whereas Gage could also be below the belief that No. 10 — a quantity famously worn by Steve Bartkowski from 1975-85 — is retired, it technically is not. The Falcons don’t formally retire numbers and as a substitute place their legendary assortment of previous gamers within the Ring of Honor. That mentioned, there are a couple of jersey numbers that the membership has stored on the shelf for the reason that legend has walked away. As an illustration, no participant has worn No. 60 after Tommy Nobis, nor No. 31 since William Andrews. 

To get a type of numbers previously worn by a Falcons nice, a participant’s greatest wager is to have a heightened stature inside the group of someday being thought-about legend themself. However, that is not a hard-and-fast rule, it could seem. There are members of Atlanta’s Ring of Honor which have seen their numbers worn after they’ve known as it a profession. For instance, Cordarrelle Patterson wears Roddy White’s No. 84 and Duron Harrison wears No. 21, previously sported by Deion Sanders. 

As for Bartkowski’s No. 10, Scott Campbell was the final Falcon to put on it, from 1986-1990, and it has been sidelined since. Whereas Gage has blossomed right into a dependable piece inside the Falcons offense, his present standing could not have him on the monitor to correctly tackle such an necessary mantle within the group’s eyes.