Football season is underway, and many golf shops are highlighting their local NFL team and other member favorites with displays full of colorful apparel and accompanying props. At Orangebrook Golf Club in Hollywood, Florida, for example, PGA Director of Golf Kenny Szuch sells team logoed polos, tees, sweatshirts, towels and golf bags each season, along with a variety of Wilson NFL team footballs.
“We sell dozens during football season - especially any northern NFL team such as the Jets, Giants, Steelers, Eagles, etc. - with all of our fans from those areas spending time in the Hollywood area,” he says.
The connection between golf and the NFL is nothing new. In 1989, NFL Properties signed legendary golfer and style icon Payne Stewart to wear league apparel on the golf course – a sponsorship that lasted through much of his career. During the season, his outfits would be in the team colors of the NFL franchise nearest the PGA Tour stop that week. If the tour event was near Chicago, he’d wear orange and blue in honor of the Bears; if it was near Atlanta, he would wear red and black for the Falcons. And so on.
Most famously, when Stewart rallied to tie Scott Simpson on the final hole of the 1991 US Open at Hazeltine National, forcing a Monday playoff, he was sporting his aqua, orange and white Miami Dolphins outfit. Stewart won the playoff the next day, earning his first PGA major title. There is another memorable photo of Stewart watching his drive during the 1992 Franklin Fund Shootout in a red, white and blue NFL logoed outfit, as well as others where he wore royal blue and yellow in honor of the Los Angeles Rams; red, gold and white for the Kansas City Chiefs; and dark green, gold and white for the Green Bay Packers.
Beautiful colors are once again brought to life in the new Payne Stewart Collection, which launched its first line at the 2024 US Open at Pinehurst – 25 years after Stewart won his third major there just months before his untimely death. While the brand has no direct connection to the NFL, golf shops can certainly find crisp color combinations that represent their local teams in pieces like the Team Stripe polo in tartan red, white and two shades of blue (a dark blue called “dusk” and bright “major blue”), which can be merchandised with a solid white or dusk Victory quarter-zip, or the Championship Sunday Scissor Cut Wind Vest in dusk, major blue or white.
What a way to celebrate your favorite NFL team as well as the legacy of one of golf’s greatest legends!
