our jersey number policy...

just curious.. cowboys michael irvin 88, not retired.. broncos terrell davis 30 and rod smith 80 not retired even seen a player wear that number against the niners in preseason...

brent jones was our all time best TE.. why not retire his number too? i just don't get it..
so then why did we put 34, 37, 39, 87, 94, 97 out of commission?? patrick willis and frank gore i can understand, although id only retire numbers of players that made a significant impact on the game like Montana and Rice!

cowboys, raiders and some other teams retire JERSEYS (the players name + their number)



the Niners retire soley NUMBERS (#16, #80, #42....etc) only one that was briefly un-retired was John Brody's (Trent Dilfer wanted to honor him, he's like an in-law or something)

well if someone wore 97 and played lights out, people be talking and comparing him to BY. but since the number is retired and no one has worn it... no one is talking.. like adams is being compared to hearst all the time.. or bryant to irvin..

I'm fine with Bryant Young's number being not worn, same for Justin Smith/Charles Haley, who both wore 94.

Dwight Clark I believe wore 87, not actually retired I don't think anyway, should be IMO. Tough on 84, Brent Jones was a good TE for us, but we're running out of 80s, so one or 2 won't be retired, and 80 will stay retired. I hate TEs with numbers in the 40s.

and also.. why retire justin smiths number? he played 7 years for us.. sure he was a great leader.. but really worth retiring the number?

dwight clark's number was retired relatively in the middle of the dynasty run (late 80's) the Niners hadn't built up the legacy they'd have in the 90's yet, so it was understandable his memorable Catch that launched the dynasty would be honored with his number being retired (he wasn't a bad WR tho IMO...not HOF-worthy, but still lethal for a whiteboi...)

Originally posted by kazak13:
and also.. why retire justin smiths number? he played 7 years for us.. sure he was a great leader.. but really worth retiring the number?

Haley wore it too.Haley is a HOFer and has 5 rings.

Originally posted by kazak13:

just curious.. cowboys michael irvin 88, not retired.. broncos terrell davis 30 and rod smith 80 not retired even seen a player wear that number against the niners in preseason...

brent jones was our all time best TE.. why not retire his number too? i just don't get it..
so then why did we put 34, 37, 39, 87, 94, 97 out of commission?? patrick willis and frank gore i can understand, although id only retire numbers of players that made a significant impact on the game like Montana and Rice!

34=Joe Perry
39=Hugh McElheney

These two were a part of the million dollar back field and really were our identity in the formative years as a franchise. Both are HOFers.

37 is retired for HOF CB Jimmy Johnson

The issue with SF and retiring numbers is that the team has had a lot of good players over the years. I can see a situation in the future where they change to a ring of honor / retired jersey system simply because they have only so many numbers left that they could even theoretically do without. This is partly why they started the team Hall of fame in 2009, but they probably need to clearly emphasize this switch to retiring the retiring of numbers in the next 10-15 years.

are you going to retire every players number that leads the team in certain category? i mean jerry and joe were simply the best.. steve i can understand.. Vernon Davis already made a mark surpassing Brent Jones.. retire his number too? i mean retire just the numbers that made an impact on the game.. I don't see BY ranking top 5 in sacks or tackles? he is not even top 20! sure he was a leader, but when u have a good team u will have great leaders.. he was at the right place at the right time.. just saying..

even frank gore - 20 in rushing all time.. and we probably will retire his number.. i mean if he was top 5 yes!

97 and 94 are not retired.. 21, and 52 aren't either.. they are just not issuing them for another year..

Originally posted by captveg:

37 is retired for HOF CB Jimmy Johnson

The issue with SF and retiring numbers is that the team has had a lot of good players over the years. I can see a situation in the future where they change to a ring of honor / retired jersey system simply because they have only so many numbers left that they could even theoretically do without. This is partly why they started the team Hall of fame in 2009, but they probably need to clearly emphasize this switch to retiring the retiring of numbers in the next 10-15 years.

This is basically what my opinion has been on this, that for a legacy team with so many great players in a sport where jersey numbers are limited by position, just give them busts in the team HOF and throw their names up in a ring of honor, but no need to retire their numbers.

Forget retiring numbers. Whoppty whoop. Just honor that particular player in the team Wall of Fame. Pretty soon numbers will be run out. Eff it give out 21,94,52,76, whatever numbers available

Ideally we could retire 52, 21, 97, 94 but with only 99 numbers and us having the 3rd most retired at 9 you will run out of numbers. You can't have 2 guys with the same number on the final roster. I don't even think it works if one is offense and one is defense. Preseason doesnt matter though. So yeah it would be nice to retire more numbers but you would run out. Especially because each position has a certain number range you can wear.

General rule of thumb for many franchises (not all though) is HoF == jersey retirement