Each year before the NFL draft, the league partners with New Era to create custom-branded hats—both for teams to give to their incoming class of rookies, as well as for public consumption. And each year, like clockwork, the reactions from fans to said hats tend to be pretty negative.

The release of New Era’s 2025 NFL Draft caps has sparked a surge of comments throughout the football community. While these caps are a feature of the yearly draft, this year’s designs have stirred heated controversy among both fans and analysts.