Top 10 NFL Players – July 2019

Aug 14, 2019 | Athlete Spotlights

Top 10 NFL Players with the highest social interactions among fans

NFL Season is back! It’s a beautiful time of the year. As you’re preparing your list of which players to draft for your fantasy draft team, Hookit looked into which athletes generated the most fan engagement for the month of July. We have some consistency at the top of our list with Tom Brady, Julian Edelman & Jarvis Landry – they topped the list for the month of June. Some of our top movers this month include Tyrann Mathieu, Derwin James, and JuJu Smith-Schuster.

The Honey Badger stays tenacious on social 

While playing at LSU, Tyrann Mathieu earned the name “The Honey Badger” because of his physically tough style of play against larger opponents. Tyrann Mathieu is a seasoned veteran who signed a big free-agent deal with the Kansas City Chiefs this offseason. The Chiefs fell just short of the Super Bowl last year, but with a newly upgraded defense, expectations are high for the upcoming season. Tyrann has used social media to fuel this fan hype – jumping five spots on our ranking.  He was very active, posting 202 times this month and a lot of it was surrounding his new Chiefs team, but his most engaged post on Instagram was to show off the new Mathieu Players Lounge at LSU. Clearly, his legendary status resonates with the die-hard fans of Louisiana State University. 

Derwin James is loving his second Southern Californian Summer

After his breakout rookie year, Los Angeles Chargers’ Safety, Derwin James, is finding success on and off the field. He seems to be loving life in Southern California and the fans seem to be enjoying it on Instagram, as well. His top video with over 200,000 views  was him draining 3’s at the Lakers practice facility and giving Lebron James a shoutout. He shared a lot of pictures of his intense offseason workout regimen this offseason. His most engaged picture on Instagram was showing off the body type of an All-Pro NFL Safety and all those hard-working hours in the weight room. 

The 20th Season

The GOAT is still on top. Will Tom Brady ever lose on the field and social media? We continue to ask that as he goes into another NFL year at 42 years old. His most liked picture on Instagram was his showing on the first day of camp – which generated over 545k likes! Brady always likes to throw in some comedy to the mix as well. This video of him making fun of his Madden speed generated massive engagement. But that wasn’t his top video of the month. His collaboration  with famous video director Ari Fararooy (@ari_fararooy) got all of his followers hyped for his 20th year. The video has over two million views on Instagram. On Ari’s page, it is his most engaged post as well.

JuJu Smith-Schuster Trends on Twitter 

JuJu is as entertaining as they come. His large Twitter numbers came off of a post where he followed up with a unique promise to a fan. A die-hard Steelers fan got their iconic logo tattooed on his head. JuJu signed it at Training Camp and said he would hook this fan up with some tickets if he got his signature tattooed as well. This post on Twitter really picked up momentum with 4.6 retweets and 62.1K Likes. This type of fan engagement proves that JuJu has one of the largest social followings and is beloved throughout the NFL. 

The Wrap Up

Mainly due to the start of Training Camp, NFL stars saw plenty of engagement throughout the month. That said, it’s an incredibly exciting time now that the long drought of football-less weekends are finally over. July is a popular month for football and the season’s only just getting started. With the rise of social media, the fan experience is only getting better. Be sure to stay tuned for next month’s numbers to see who does a great job of promoting themselves throughout training camp. 

Written by Kyle Miller

Kyle is on our partnership development team here at Hookit. As a millennial, social media is a major element of his lifestyle and he loves bridging that to the wide range of sports he follows. As a graduate of Grand Canyon University, he was also was on the volleyball team at GCU. Kyle became a hockey fan in middle school when NHL became the most competitive video game between his neighborhood friends. In his free time, he enjoys surfing, making art, playing basketball, beach volleyball, practicing yoga, and being a burrito connoisseur.