{"id":539239,"date":"2026-03-14T04:31:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T04:31:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/539239\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T04:31:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T04:31:07","slug":"panthers-announce-uniform-number-for-jaelan-phillips","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/539239\/","title":{"rendered":"Panthers announce uniform number for Jaelan Phillips"},"content":{"rendered":"

March 13, 2026, 10:35 p.m. ET<\/p>\n

Outside linebacker Jaelan Phillips secured quite a few numbers this week, as he signed<\/a> a massive four-year, $120 million deal to join the Carolina Panthers<\/a>. But it’s the number he secured on Friday that we’ll really get to know him by.<\/p>\n

As announced earlier this afternoon, Phillips has chosen to wear the No. 5 jersey for Carolina. This will mark his third different uniform number as a pro after donning No. 15 for the Miami Dolphins (2021 to 2025) and No. 50 for the Philadelphia Eagles (2025).<\/p>\n

So, why No. 5?<\/p>\n

Phillips explained, via Darin Gantt<\/a> of Panthers.com, that he liked how the single digit looked on a fan-made graphic he saw during the week. Plus, the 27-year-old felt like a change of scenery warranted a change of numbers.<\/p>\n

“I was 15 at the Dolphins, 50 at the Eagles, I was like I might as well, it’s a new era, man,” he stated. “Let’s do a new number, you know what I mean, a fresh start. So I’m excited.”<\/p>\n

Expert NFL picks: Exclusive betting insights only at USA TODAY.<\/a><\/p>\n

The last Panther to wear No. 5 was running back Rico Dowdle, who just signed a two-year pact with the Pittsburgh Steelers.<\/p>\n

Follow our free agency tracker<\/a> for all the latest moves.<\/p>\n

Follow\u00a0@ThePanthersWire<\/a>\u00a0on Twitter\/X for more Panthers content.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"March 13, 2026, 10:35 p.m. ET Outside linebacker Jaelan Phillips secured quite a few numbers this week, as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539240,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[202558,64,63,593,85,263416,263417,203469,203912,267217,203146,203142,202563,267218,203139,202561],"class_list":["post-539239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-accessfree","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nfl","tag-sports","tag-sstssportsnflpanthers","tag-sstsnpanthers","tag-tagamerican-football","tag-tagcarolina-panthers","tag-tagjaelan-phillips","tag-tagnational-sports","tag-tagnfl","tag-tagoverall-positive","tag-tagrico-dowdle","tag-tagsports-news","tag-typestory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=539239"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539239\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}