Even Before The Game, Joe Burrow Looks Like The Super Bowl’s Biggest Winner

Some NFL stars sit back and let their play do the talking. Joe Burrow is loud—at least when it comes to his fashion sense.

Iridescent suits and brightly colored sweats. T-shirts featuring his teammates’ faces. SpongeBob SquarePants-themed pocket squares. Literal rose-colored glasses.

Yet it was the jewelry he wore after last month’s AFC championship game that made the biggest statement. Asked by a reporter if the diamonds in his $25,000 necklace were real, Burrow smiled and said, “I make too much money to have fake ones.”

Forbes can confirm that: On top of the four-year, $36.2 million contract he signed with the Cincinnati Bengals in 2020, which paid him $24.5 million in salary and bonus last season and $2.3 million this season, the 25-year-old quarterback collects an estimated $2 million annually from endorsements, appearances, licensing and memorabilia, before deducting taxes and agents’ fees.

But with the Bengals set to play for a championship in Sunday’s Super Bowl against the Los Angeles Rams, in just Burrow’s second year in the NFL, marketing experts say a much bigger payday awaits.

Burrow already works with brands including Cash App, Fanatics, Nike and Lordstown Motors, an Ohio-based electric truck maker. But relative to what might be expected for a No. 1 overall draft pick who won a national championship and a Heisman Trophy at LSU while playing the game’s marquee position, he has flown a bit under the radar to this point. The knee injury that ended his rookie season after ten games deserves some of the blame, but his team has had just as much to do with it.

The Bengals’ history of mediocrity, with 15 playoff appearances in 54 seasons, has confined their games mostly to regional broadcasts. Despite Burrow’s 2021 breakout on the field, with 4,611 yards and 34 touchdowns through the air, he has played in just one Monday night game and two Thursday night games across his two seasons, with zero regular-season appearances on a Sunday night broadcast. That has limited his national exposure, and his home market hasn’t helped, with Cincinnati ranking 44th among the country’s metropolitan areas by population.

When he has found himself in the spotlight, he’s shown an effortless cool, whether joking about the pre-draft criticism that his hands were too small or embracing his multitude of nicknames, from Joe Shiesty to Joe Brrr to Joe Burreaux. That matters to brands targeting young men—a tough demographic to reach, says Lisa Delpy Neirotti, an associate professor of sports management at George Washington University.

Burrow has also shown a willingness to weigh in on causes like the Black Lives Matter movement. While social responsibility once came in sixth or seventh on brands’ list of questions for potential ambassadors, it is now first or second, says Joe Favorito, a veteran marketing consultant and lecturer at Columbia University.

But all of that—positive or negative—is secondary to his on-field results. “Brands want to be associated with winners, with champions,” says Eugene Lee, a senior vice president at Vanguard Sports Group who hasn’t worked with Burrow but has represented dozens of NFL players.

That’s where the Super Bowl comes in. With Tom Brady and Ben Roethlisberger announcing their retirements this year, following Eli Manning, Drew Brees and Philip Rivers out of the league, brands are likely searching for the next sure bet at quarterback. If Burrow can impress on this stage and then prove it wasn’t a fluke, he won’t have to worry about the size of his home market, the same way Aaron Rodgers has broken through with an estimated $11 million in annual off-field earnings out of tiny Green Bay, Wisconsin. All those concerns for his marketability will melt away.

Except one, that is.

Favorito says there’s no question Burrow has jumped into the top five NFL players on advertisers’ wish lists. But he—like others in the industry—questions whether the young quarterback is ready to make the commitment to become a marketing star.

“Managing that side of the business takes work,” Favorito says. “It’s a job, like it is performing on the field.”

Burrow has a reputation for being extremely selective with the products he chooses to endorse. That’s generally a good thing; it keeps his rates high and his mind on winning. But for him to really capitalize on the opportunity in front of him, he’ll have to apply himself more, starting with social media—the biggest driver in modern marketing deals, Lee says.

Burrow entered the season with 530,000 followers across Instagram and Twitter but closed January with over 3 million, a 484% growth rate that was the best of any NFL player, according to data from sponsorship analytics platform Hookit. That took him to 17th among active NFL players in total followers, and his engagement rate of 13.3% was the fourth-best mark for players with at least 500,000 fans, four times the league average.

“Engagement is the most important measurement these days,” Delpy Neirotti says, “because so many of them are relying now on influencers and digital marketing versus any other marketing.”

But Burrow hasn’t been very active, posting only 13 times during the season between Instagram and Twitter.

As the offers come in, Burrow does need to be sure he picks the right brands, the experts say. The key is authenticity—products or categories he actually cares about. Cryptocurrency and fintech companies are throwing money around, Favorito notes, but given Burrow’s interest in fashion, an apparel or athleisure partnership might make more sense, giving him better content for his social feeds for brands that are smarter than ever about their sponsorship ROIs.

Burrow clearly recognizes the money to be made: He said before his rookie year that he planned to live off his endorsement money and let his playing-salary paychecks accrue in his bank account. And he has an obvious role model—if he wants one—in Brady, the quarterback he has drawn comparisons to for his early on-field success.

For most of his career, Brady, like Burrow to this point, put his business on the backburner so he could focus on football. But when he did make that commitment late in his career, his earnings exploded, to an NFL-record $45 million off the field this season.

Burrow doesn’t have to aim quite so high, or to rush into anything. Balancing the two careers is tough in a brutal sport like football, Favorito notes, and if Burrow continues to win, the offers won’t vanish after this Super Bowl. Still, there’s no denying the opportunity ahead of him.

“I think the future is very, very bright,” Lee says, “and if I were Joe Burrow, I’d be wearing sunglasses off the field.”