Von Miller gets permission from family of Rams legend Elroy Hirsch to wear No. 40
Von Miller wore No. 58 during his prolific tenure with the Denver Broncos, but he's throwing it back to his college days now that he's been traded to the Los Angeles Rams. But before he could wear the No. 40 that he donned during his time at Texas A&M, Miller first got permission from the family of Hall of Famer Elroy "Crazy Legs" Hirsch.
Hirsch was drafted by the Cleveland Rams in the 1945 NFL Draft, but started his career with the Chicago Rockets of the All-America Football Conference. In 1949, he signed with the Rams who had relocated to Los Angeles in 1946. Hirsch played end (an offensive skill position at the time) for the Rams and was a three-time Pro Bowler who set a single-season receiving record that stood for nearly two decades.
He later became the Rams' general manager and was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame at a player in 1968. Hirsch died in 2004 at 80 years old.
Miller, 32, wasn't allowed to wear No. 40 when he first joined the Broncos in 2011. In 2015, the NFL gave linebackers the right to wear numbers in forties and that range was expanded in April 2021, when the NFL approved a rule change allowing linebackers to wear numbers 1-59.
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