In anticipation of the 2020 NFL Draft, Marvel has teamed up with the National Football League to produce a set of commemorative artworks that combine upcoming draft picks with iconic comic book covers. The covers feature pro football prospects filling the shoes of Avengers heroes, including Spider-Man, Thor, and Black Panther.

This isn't the first time that Marvel has cross-promoted with the NFL. In the 90s, Marvel Comics produced NFL Superpro, a 12-issue limited series about an aspiring pro football player who was given superpowers by rare souvenirs and used them to fight evil. This short-lived property was the last word on the combination of the two universes until the Walt Disney Company acquired Marvel Entertainment in 2009. Once the two companies were on the same team, Marvel started pairing up with Disney subsidiary ESPN for periodic sports promos to celebrate football milestones, like the variant-cover-styled artworks that commemorated the 150th anniversary of the NCAA by casting the Miami Hurricanes and the Florida Gators' respective mascots as The Incredible Hulk and The Mighty Thor.

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Marvel released the promo images today in anticipation of ESPN's coverage of the 2020 NFL Draft that runs from April 23-25. The players chosen are all first-time draft prospects wearing the colors of their former college teams, creating some fun parallels. With the logos removed, safety Kyle Dugger's Lenoir-Rhyne uniform matches the iconic black Spider-Man costume that first appeared on the cover of Secret Wars #8 (pictured below), the cover Marvel's artists chose to showcase him. In what might be a coincidence or a clever Marvel Cinematic Universe nod, Isaiah Simmons features in a Black Panther cover; the position-swapping athlete played for Clemson, a university located adjacent to Anderson, South Carolina, a town which happens to be the birthplace of Black Panther film star Chadwick Boseman.

Here's the full lineup of ESPN's new athletic Avengers.

Artists Marcio Fiorito and Carlos Lopez's Jalen Hurts, after Olivier Coipel's Thor (2007) #1 cover:

Artists J.L. Giles and Chris Sotomayor's Kyle Dugger, after Mike Zeck's Secret Wars #8 cover:

Artist Joey Vasquez's D'Andre Swift, after Jack Kirby and Syd Shore's Captain America (1968) #109 cover:

Artists Mike McKone and Carlos Lopez's Derrick Brown, after John Romita Jr. and Bob Layton's Iron Man (1968) #106 cover:

Artists Yvel Guchiet, Chris Sotomayor, and Wayne Faucher's Isaiah Simmons, after Brian Stelfreeze's Black Panther (2016) #1:

Superhero comics and football have a lot of thematic overlap; both feature stories of adversity and triumph, showcase the apex of human physical performance and keep fans attached to all-star teams and epic battles. As Marvel superheroes continue to dominate culture thanks to big and small screens worldwide, expect to see more instances of quarterbacks raising the ball like it's Mjolnir.

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Source: Marvel