A counting mistake caused Amon-Ra St. Brown to sport the number 14 for the Detroit Lions.
Amon-Ra St. Brown and the number 14 seem like an iconic pairing at this point. While it wasn’t what the Detroit Lions receiver wore in college, he’s made it look good in the NFL.
But according to a story told on season two of the Netflix docuseries “Quarterback,” St. Brown wasn’t really supposed to ever have that number.
You’ve probably heard about a million times since St. Brown was drafted on Day 3 of the 2021 NFL Draft that the Lions receiver has a full list of every receiver taken before him in that draft class. St. Brown was clearly not happy with sliding into the fourth round, and to this day, he can recite every single receiver—and the college they went to—that was selected before Detroit took him 112th overall.
He actually wanted to take that pettiness to an entirely new level by sporting the jersey number of the amount of receivers taken before him in the draft. Only one problem: his girlfriend at the time miscounted.
Brooklyn Adams retold the story while talking to Christen Harper, Jared Goff’s wife.
“He’ll never admit this, but he asked me to count the amount of receivers (drafted) before him, and that was going to be his number, and I messed up. It’s not 14,” Adams said. “I told him it was 14, and so that’s why he’s 14.”
It turns out she was off by two. A total of 16 receivers were taken ahead of St. Brown, creating what would have been an interesting conundrum, seeing as Goff has worn 16 his entire NFL career.
“I should have chose 16 looking back on it,” St. Brown said on the Netflix show. “But I think Jared looks better in 16 than me.”