Giants rookie Abdul Carter finally chooses his jersey number after team history made it tougher than expected

Abdul Carter finally has his jersey number.

NFL Network's Ian Rapoport reports that the third overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft will be wearing No. 51 this season.

This comes after Carter struggled to find a jersey number due to all the history with the Giants. 

He initially wanted to wear No. 56, but that was worn by Lawrence Taylor who did not want to unretire that number. 

“I know he would love to wear that number. But, hey, I think it’s retired. Get another number. I don’t care if it’s double zero, and then make it famous," Taylor told the New York Post.

Carter then switched his attention to No. 11, which he wore at Penn State. However, that was the retired number of former New York quarterback Phil Simms. At first, Simms said that Carter could wear it, but his family stepped in and said no.  

“I knew they threw a fit. I think it’s going to the point where literally there was like, they were shedding tears. I’m not trying to embarrass my mom or my sister, but that’s how important it was to them,” Simms said on “PFT Live with Mike Florio”. “And on top of that, the blowback off of that and the amount of people that came to my dad, ‘Don’t give your number up, don’t do that,’ I think he was a little taken aback by that. Ultimately, he’s not going to do it, he got outvoted by his family, specifically his daughter and his wife, but that’s where it stands right now.”