Malik Nabers is already number 1 in the hearts and minds of many Giants fans.
And now the Post has learned that he will be the first Giant to wear No. 1 since the late Hall of Famer and Giant tight end/defensive end Ray Flaherty became the first professional football player to have his number retired in 1935.
And now The Post has learned that he will be the first Giant to wear No. 1 since the late Giants Hall of Fame defensive end Ray Flaherty became the first professional football player to stop wearing his number in 1935.
Nabers, the Giants’ first-round draft pick, wore No. 8 at LSU and switched to No. 9 in Giants training camp. Before John Mara got the green light from the Flaherty family, Nabers — who knew about every retired single number (including Tuffy Leemans’ No. 4 and Mel Hein’s No. 7) in Giants history — began exploring other options, but to no avail. Drew Lock wears No. 2 and Jamie Gillian wears No. 6. Jersey No. 8, of course, is given to Daniel Jones.
“Only because it would be quite difficult to take the jersey out of circulation again,” Nabers told the Post.
But if something could be done, Nabers told Mara, “No. 1 would be fine.”
But hope remained for No. 1.
“We just waited to see what the family would say,” Nabers said.
Ray Flaherty Jr. officially gave Mara and the franchise his blessing on Wednesday. The franchise intends to retire his father’s No. 1 once Nabers’ career with the Giants ends. “Re-retired, if you will,” Flaherty Jr. told The Post.
Nabers had asked GM Joe Schoen and Brian Daboll at the beginning of training camp whether it would be possible to switch to a new number.
“After thinking about it a little bit, my feeling was that we would only allow this to happen if the Flaherty family was OK with it,” Mara told the Post. “I think that’s very generous on their part, and Malik understands that this comes with a certain responsibility and how he has to conduct himself and represent the organization and the Flaherty family. He did a great job of that, he called them immediately to thank them.”
Nabers called Flaherty Jr. on Wednesday before practice.
“I said, ‘I’m really grateful to be able to wear your dad’s retired jersey. I will wear it with honor. I will do my best when I’m out there on the field to properly represent all of you,'” Nabers said.
Flaherty Jr. was happy about the call.
“He seems like a nice young man,” he said. “After he called, I feel really good.”
Schoen came to Nabers’ locker on Wednesday before training and told him: “We’re going upstairs.”
“I thought to myself, ‘Okay, what for?'” said Nabers. “Secretly, I was a little scared because I didn’t know why I was going into the boss’s office.”
Mara asked him what he wanted to do with his number.
“I was like, ‘They said no to No. 1 because I heard they said no the first time,'” Nabers said. “He was like, ‘Do you still want 1?’ I was like, ‘If the family doesn’t want me to wear it, I’m not going to keep pressuring the family to let me wear 1.’ He was like, ‘Nah, they said yes.’
“It was great fun when he told me.”
Flaherty has two sons and a daughter.
“Originally we did a poll and we didn’t know much about Malik,” Flaherty Jr. said. “Maybe someone was still alive from that era when my dad played, but people were so small they wouldn’t remember. John Mara made a pretty good argument that it was a good way to get his name back out there.”
Mara is excited about what he saw from the No. 6 pick in the draft.
“He has some unique skills … he’s definitely someone who stands out on the practice field, and he’s very noticeable in the game as well,” Mara said.
Flaherty Jr. supports this emotion.
“Very athletic … some of his catches are really great,” he said. “A wide receiver can step in right away and make a difference. I think he’s going to have a great career — and I hope he does.”
Nabers said he has never worn No. 1 at any level.
“This is the first time,” he said. Current NFL players who wear No. 1 include Ja’Marr Chase, Jalen Hurts and Kyler Murray.
Other Hall of Famers who wore the number 1 include Jimmy Conzelman, Paddy Driscoll, Benny Friedman, Curly Lambeau, Warren Moon, Fritz Pollard and Jim Thorpe.
Flaherty joined the Giants in 1929, left in 1930 to coach the Gonzaga basketball team, and returned to the Giants, where he was selected to the All-Pro first team three times.
Flaherty led the NFL in pass catches, receiving yards, receiving touchdowns, yards per reception and yards per game in 1932. It was Flaherty who suggested to Giants head coach Steve Owen that sneakers would provide better grip on the frozen Polo Grounds. Owen sent his friend Abe Cohen, a tailor who assisted on the Giants’ sidelines, to Manhattan College to get the sneakers, and the Giants scored 27 points in the fourth quarter against the George Halas Bears to win the famous “Sneakers Game” for the NFL championship.
Mara’s late HOF father Wellington was at the game as an 18-year-old.
“I remember him telling me that George Halas’ reaction was, ‘Just step on their toes,'” Mara said, laughing.
“They did that at Gonzaga, where he played college football,” Flaherty Jr. said.
Flaherty became head coach of the Boston Redskins in 1936 and won four division titles and two league titles when the team moved to Washington. He is credited with inventing the screen pass and the two-platoon substitution system. He was 90 when he died in Hayden, Idaho, in 1994.
“It’s a nice story because it might remind people why No. 1 retired in the first place, and they’ll learn a little bit about Ray Flaherty,” Mara said. “It’s a nice story for us that can educate people about who he was.”