The Number Is Not the Name: Jayden Daniels, LSU, and NIL Rights

Key Takeaways

• NIL rights do not establish jersey-number ownership. The Jayden Daniels–LSU dispute highlights limits on athletes’ rights to control former jersey numbers.
• Commercial use creates greater legal exposure. Universities face potential contractual, right-of-publicity, and false-endorsement claims when merchandise or promotions identify former athletes without authorization.
• NIL agreements require clear post-eligibility terms. Athletic departments should define licensing duration, merchandise rights, and jersey-number restrictions to reduce disputes and financial exposure.

Last month, Washington Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels sent a cease-and-desist letter to the LSU athletic director demanding that LSU immediately cease and desist from any further “use, display, publication, distribution, promotion, commercialization, or other exploitation” of Daniels’ name, image, and likeness.¹ The trigger was LSU’s decision to give Daniels’ former No. 5 jersey to sophomore cornerback DJ Pickett, a former five-star recruit who previously wore No. 3.

The letter cited Daniels’ Name, Image, and Likeness (“NIL”) agreement with LSU, which reportedly authorized the school to use his name, image, and likeness for 180 days after his final collegiate game. Since Daniels left LSU after the 2023 season, that window would have closed around May 2024. Daniels played at LSU from 2022 to 2023, won the Heisman Trophy in 2023, and was the second overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft. His family says they had “every reason to believe” the number would remain part of his legacy and felt “profoundly disrespected” by LSU’s decision.² However, there is no evidence that LSU ever stated that it would retire the No. 5 jersey.

The question is: does Daniels have any legal basis to claim ownership of the No. 5 jersey number?

NIL Does Not Include Number Ownership

NIL protects the commercial use of an athlete’s identity. It does not, as a general matter, turn a player’s jersey number into personal property. The NCAA describes an NIL deal as an agreement under which an athlete receives compensation for allowing a person, brand, or company to use the athlete’s name, image, or likeness. That concept reaches identifiable uses of the athlete’s persona, including endorsements, appearances, promotions, and branded content. It does not itself allocate ownership of team uniforms or roster numbers.

Louisiana’s NIL statute follows the same basic structure. La. R.S. 17:3703 permits an intercollegiate athlete to earn compensation for use of the athlete’s NIL, while preserving the institution’s authority over its facilities, trademarks, logos, colors, and other institutional assets. The statute also generally requires an athlete to obtain the school’s express permission before using the school’s licensed marks or logos in an NIL activity.

LSU’s uniform system, including the decision whether to retire or reissue a number, is ordinarily part of the school’s athletic and branding operation. The fact that Daniels made No. 5 famous at LSU does not mean he acquired an exclusive legal right to the number. A school’s decision to leave a number unused can reflect respect for a player, fan sentiment, or internal traditions. It does not necessarily create a license, property right, or enforceable promise.

The reported facts also cut against any claim of implied retirement. LSU apparently never retired No. 5, and its published policy permits active athletes to wear retired numbers at a head coach’s discretion. If a player could prevent future assignment of a number merely because it was associated with him, the result would be a de facto retirement regime created by NIL law rather than institutional policy, and schools would be left with very few numbers to assign to current players.

When Does a Jersey Number Trigger Right-of-Publicity or NIL Claims?

The better question is not whether No. 5 belongs to Daniels, but whether LSU’s particular use of No. 5, alone or in combination with other features, identifies Daniels to consumers and commercially exploits that identity.

That distinction appears in college-sports publicity cases. In Hart v. Electronic Arts, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit permitted a former Rutgers quarterback’s right-of-publicity claim based on a video-game avatar that replicated a cluster of identifying facts, including the player’s team, position, physical features, hometown, class year, and his No. 13 jersey number.

That decision does not hold that an athlete owns a jersey number. On the contrary, it shows why a number is usually only one fact in the identifiability analysis. LSU placing another player in a No. 5 jersey, without Daniels’ name, image, statistics, biographical details, or a suggestion that Daniels endorses the use, would be a difficult right-of-publicity claim. Fans will likely associate the current player with the number rather than a past player who wore No. 5.

The analysis changes if LSU sells or promotes merchandise using “Daniels” and No. 5, uses Daniels’ image in current advertising, or packages No. 5 with enough other information to invoke Daniels’ identity. In those settings, the number may help make an otherwise ambiguous use unmistakably Daniels-related.

NIL Licensing Risks After an Athlete Leaves a University

If Daniels’ NIL agreement contained a licensing provision, and LSU continued to sell a Daniels No. 5 jersey after that license expired, the strongest theory may be breach of contract, supplemented by a right-of-publicity or false-endorsement claim where the product implies Daniels’ current approval. If the merchandise instead uses only LSU marks and a generic No. 5, the claim becomes more fact dependent.

How the Jayden Daniels–LSU Dispute Could Impact Future NIL Agreements

The Daniels-LSU dispute illustrates an important boundary in the NIL era. A player’s commercial identity can be valuable long after eligibility ends, particularly where the player is a recent Heisman winner and NFL starter. But NIL law protects identity, not every symbol that fans associate with the athlete.

On the currently reported facts, LSU’s decision to reissue No. 5 is likely more of a relationship and brand-management issue than a standalone NIL or legal violation. The legally consequential inquiry is whether LSU’s post-license commercial activity uses Jayden Daniels’ identity, whether directly or through a sufficiently identifying combination of attributes, and whether the school retained the contractual right to do so.

What Universities Should Address in NIL Agreements

For practitioners advising athletes, NIL collectives, or institutions, the lesson from the Daniels dispute is to draft the NIL agreement with the end of the relationship in mind. Scope, duration, post-eligibility usage rights, and even jersey-number provisions, all belong on the table during negotiations. That way, you do not have to wait until a cease-and-desist letter lands on the athletic director’s desk to deal with an issue.

[1] Schlabach, “Daniels Sends Cease and Desist to LSU After Pickett Given No. 5,” August 2026.

[2] Id.