Inside the halls of New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium, a horror movie villain appeared. Hours before the New York Giants met the division rival Washington Redskins for a late October game, an upscale Jason Voorhees arrived to haunt the competition in a custom, all-over print Fendi mask, complete with matching bucket hat, jacket, and shirt. Halloween was the occasion, but it was barely more than any given Sunday for star receiver Odell Beckham, Jr.
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The NFL’s highest-paid wide receiver hasn’t let the limelight dim since making an incredible one-handed catch late in his rookie season. Off the pitch, he routinely sports his signature bleached hair, hanging earrings, and the hottest menswear pieces. The NFL’s leading example of youth culture is 30-year-old Beckham, sometimes known as OBJ, whose candor and sincerity inject new life into the otherwise stodgy sport.
“Football’s view of the collective tends to follow the military model of top-down deference to coach and, especially, owner,” Mark Leibovich wrote in “Big Game,” an unwavering look inside the league.
“NFL owners tend to have a greater need to flaunt their place atop the sports hierarchy than owners in other sports. They feel the need, for whatever reason, to reinforce the Tex Schramm ‘You guys are cattle and we’re the ranchers’ sensibility.’”
The NFL is flush with spectacular athletes, but Beckham has set himself apart by becoming not only one of its star players, but also one of the sport’s most marketable faces, a rarity for non-quarterbacks. Beckham’s unrelenting personality has made his every action, from getting dressed to addressing the media, just as memorable as his acrobatic displays on the field.
Because of his bravado, he is a frequent target of criticism and belongs to a select group of NFL players who can genuinely sell shoes.
With the ideal balance of talent and charisma needed to sell sneakers, the NBA talent pool is always being replenished. In football, breaking the same ground is far more difficult. Only 17 NFL players have received their own pair of shoes in the last 30 years.
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With the Nike SF AF-1 Mid “OBJ,” a tactical take on the Air Force 1 in an NYC taxi colorway, Beckham joined the likes of Bo Jackson, Deion Sanders and Randy Moss. In basketball, a signature shoe is a sign that you’ve made it. In football, it shows you’ve transcended the sport.
“Being popular in the NFL is such a difficult proposition,” GQ style features writer Cam Wolf said in a phone interview. “Walking down the street, he would not be able to get past crowds of people like Deandre Hopkins and Antonio Brown, who are both big fashion guys but are much more anonymous. You have to be a much more diehard fan to know what their faces look like.”
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The NBA tunnel has become another runway as basketball players, from real stars to role players, compete each night for the most memorable costume. NFL players only have one game per week and one normal day to make a big fashion statement. Beckham is the lone player making the most of the chance. Cam Newton is also a risk-taker, but his taste is terribly off. Although Tom Brady is the center of attention, his understated, traditional manner deflects rather than attracts attention.
Beckham isn’t stylish in the sense of putting together disparate pieces into a cohesive, aesthetically pleasing outfit. Victor Cruz, Beckham’s former teammate and predecessor as the NFL’s style king, was much better at that. The crown’s new bearer simply knows what he likes and can afford to max out his indulgences.
Fashion today is centered on highly covetable pieces, and Beckham is aspirational style incarnate, stacking the most Instagrammable items – often all from the same collection – on top of each other. He still has room to grow but being “in the know” makes him a hot commodity.
“There’s a passion there that makes getting dressed come naturally for him,” Wolf said. “I don’t think it’s forced. He’s always dressed sort of wackily.”
As far as American professional sports leagues go, the NFL still dominates in terms of revenue and viewership, but its forecast is spiraling. The league needs to empower more of its strong personalities, or it’s only a matter of time before the upwardly growing NBA overtakes it. As far as the zeitgeist is concerned, that shift has already been made.
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