Losing team’s T-shirts won’t go to waste

Call it the Schrödinger’s Hat paradox. Right now, thousands of caps, T-shirts, sweatshirts and face masks proclaiming the Los Angeles Rams the next Super Bowl champion are sitting in boxes. A parallel pile of merchandise celebrates the victory of the Cincinnati Bengals.

If the Rams take home the Lombardi Trophy on Sunday, all that Bengals gear instantly becomes unsellable, at least in the eyes of the NFL. If the Bengals best the Rams in their own house, the Rams kit will transform into wearable lies as soon as the whistle blows. A cat’s life might not be at stake, as in the quantum mechanics thought experiment, but it does present a conundrum for sports retailers.

Either way, Good360 is expecting a shipment this week.

Since 2015, the Virginia-based nonprofit organization has been handling the losing team’s Super Bowl swag, doing the same for the NFC and AFC finals and the World Series.

The NFL specifically asks Good360 to send the stuff abroad, but some inevitably finds its way back; a T-shirt celebrating the Bengals as the champions of 1989’s Super Bowl XXIII, which they lost to the 49ers, is currently listed on eBay for $10,000.