Another Cardinals player switches their jersey number

Isaiah Simmons is the latest member of the Arizona Cardinals to join the single-digit club.

On Tuesday, the Arizona Cardinals announced on the team’s official Facebook page that linebacker Isaiah Simmons, the 2020 first-round draft pick out of Clemson, is getting a new number on his jersey.

That’s right, the revolution continues with the single digits being snatched up faster than a prickly pear margarita on a Friday night.

Simmons is going from the rarely-used No. 48 on his Cardinals uniform to the lonely No. 9. Unfortunately, for the Arizona fans who bought the No. 48 jerseys, this change does not qualify for the NFL’s Jersey Assurance program, as Simmons stayed on the same team but changed his number.

Isaiah Simmons now one of seven Arizona Cardinals with a single-digit jersey number

So what made Simmons switch his uniform number? Well, it was probably the fact that he wore the No. 11 in college, but both 10 (DeAndre Hopkins) and 11 (Larry Fitzgerald) are basically off-limits at this point.

Simmons joins Kyler Murray (No. 1), Chase Edmonds (No. 2), Budda Baker (No. 3), Andy Lee (No. 4), James Conner(No. 6), and Byron Murphy (No. 7) in the single-digit club this year. The only jersey number off-limits is Larry Wilson’s No. 8, which has been retired and in the Cardinals’ Ring of Honor for years.

Simmons started with the No. 48 jersey last season, and he was the first notable Arizona player to wear that number since Nathan Hodel, a long snapper that was part of the Cardinals’ Super Bowl XLIII team, wore it from 2002 to 2008.

The Arizona linebacker’s new number doesn’t have great memories attached to it either. The No. 9 jersey was last worn by Sam Bradford in 2018, and the only other notable Cardinals player to ever wear the No. 9 on their uniform is Jim McMahon when he spent the 1994 season in the desert.

At this point, this trend is here to stay. It matches what happens at the college level, and having played football myself, you do get attached to a number after a certain amount of time. When your last name’s on the back, there’s nothing like seeing your jersey underneath the lights.

Let’s hope that Simmons is used out on the field at least nine more times next season than he was in 2020.