Full Breakdown
Josh Allen Tops NFL Merchandise Sales for 2025-26 Season
6/9/2026, 10:12:48 PM
Allen Leads NFL Merchandise Sales
Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen topped the NFL Players Association’s Top-50 Player Sales list for the league year March 1 2025–Feb 28 2026, recording the most officially licensed NFL merchandise sold.
Ranking Methodology
The list ranks players by sales of licensed products—including jerseys, t-shirts, bobbleheads, backpacks, figurines, wall decals, dog treats—through over 85 partner companies. It reflects direct consumer purchases and excludes personal endorsement or sponsorship income, differing from the NFLPA’s group-licensing income metric.
Top Sellers and Notable Rankings
Allen ranked #1, followed by Patriots quarterback Drake Maye (#2), Eagles running back Saquon Barkley (#3), Seahawks wide receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba (#4) and Commanders quarterback Jayden Daniels (#5). Packers linebacker Micah Parsons led defensive players. Browns rookie Shedeur Sanders placed #31 in merchandise sales but earned $17.7 million in group-licensing income, the highest for a rookie.
NFLPA Perspective
Ben Ruiz, VP of consumer products and strategy for NFL Player’s Inc., said the ranking is “more consumer-driven,” noting it captures license-product, marketing and autograph deals. He highlighted Caleb Williams’s strong fourth-quarter sales and the NFLPA’s toy collaborations with Hasbro on *Guess Who* and *Bop It*, projecting toys as a growth segment.
Ranking Limitations
The methodology omits endorsement and sponsorship earnings, so a player’s broader commercial value may be under-represented. Sanders’s $17.7 million group-licensing income did not translate into a top-30 merchandise rank, illustrating this limitation.
Discrepancies in Income Measures
Sources note a gap between group-licensing income and merchandise rankings, as seen with Sanders’s high licensing earnings versus his 31st-place merchandise position. The NFLPA report also lacks exact sales volumes for any player.
Emerging Prospects and Toy Market Growth
Ruiz cited rookie quarterback Fernando Mendoza, Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart, running back Cam Skattebo, defensive end Myles Garrett and the rising popularity of Caleb Williams as potential top sellers. The union expects toy-related merchandise to capture a larger sales share in future league years.
Verbatim Quotes
- “This is more consumer-driven,” — Ben Ruiz, VP of Consumer Products and Strategy, NFL Player’s Inc.
- “The LM-2 includes license product deals but also includes marketing and autograph deals. This list is ‘a fan walks into a store and buys a product and goes home with it.’” — Ben Ruiz
- “Caleb Williams was one of our strongest sellers the last quarter of the season and helped break him into the top 10 overall and that helped with our friends over at EA of who would be the face of Madden going forward,” — Ben Ruiz
- “I have not seen many rookies come in with the amount of interest from partners that we’ve seen from Fernando for this point,” — Ben Ruiz
- “While people are showing up to the stores in droves the past few years to buy trading cards, buyers have been asking, ‘How do I get those buyers into other parts of my store?’ And toys has been the answer so far.” — Ben Ruiz
