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10 Things Buffalo Bills' Damar Hamlin Can't Live Without

There are a few things Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin can't live without. From his Chasing Millions' clothing line that he started in college to endless snacks and his custom Beats headphones, here are the NFL player's essentials. Director: Chris Smith Director of Photography: Dan Richardson Editor: Graham Mooney Creative Producer: Arielle Neblett Line Producer: Jen Santos Production Manager: James Pipitone Production Coordinator: Tania Jones Talent Booker: Paige Keffer, Meredith Judkins Camera Operator: Joe Saccomanno Audio Engineer: Morgan Owczarczak Production Assistant: Sean Caputi Post Production Supervisor: Alexa Deutsch; Rachael Knight Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant Supervising Editor: Rob Lombardi Assistant Editor: Lauren Worona

Released on 11/20/2023

Transcript

What's up, GQ?

I'm Damar Hamlin, and these are my essentials.

[light music]

Okay, so for this essential right here,

it's gonna be my snacks.

[snacks thumping] [Damar laughing]

Them honey buns.

Me and these honey buns, we go way back.

These honey buns are definitely number one.

If you know me, you know.

Reese's Cups, top of the line,

been with me since day one.

Ask my mother.

I call all these right here my trench chips.

If you was there, you would know.

All them corner store runs where Mom Dukes want you

to go get whatever she want off the menu,

and you come back with no change,

this is what you spent it on.

Yes, I love to take care of my body, and you know,

I have a healthy routine of, you know,

everything I'm doing to make sure my body's

where I need to be.

But you know, these snacks have been with me

for the longest time.

[light music]

Okay, so this next essential,

you wanted the most essential to me,

it's for surely my family, and particular,

my little brother.

I actually, let me hit him up right now,

see if he'll answer.

He on his way to football practice,

so I gotta try to catch him quick.

What's up? What's up, bro?

Say what's up.

What's up?

I'm gonna hit you later after practice.

I always wanted a little brother in the crib.

I hated being the only child,

all the attention, all the pressure, all the stress

was always on me.

So I prayed for another sibling.

He was a big part of my decisions early on in his life,

and he still is, and I can't wait 'til, you know,

10 years from now when I'm done playing

and I'm at his games, watching him play, just as a fan.

I can't wait to enjoy that part of my life.

So I got a lot to look forward to.

[light music continues]

Self-care is like super big

and to, you know, having my mind in the right place.

You know what I mean?

We live a high stress level life at this point, you know?

As a athlete, as a entrepreneur,

just having those key moments with yourself, you know,

just getting manicures, getting pedicures,

whatever it may be.

It's just small things to take those stress levels down

within yourself without you even knowing it.

But on top of that, you know,

like daily routine stuff, one thing that I do daily

is I take my vitamins.

On top of that, I got my eye patches.

So kind of you can see a little bit,

I got little bags under my eyes.

That ain't because I'm not getting sleep.

It's just kinda something that's like hereditary

in my family.

The impression I wanna give off is, you know,

I'm alert and I'm ready all the time.

I don't want nobody thinking I'm slipping

or I'm tired and I'm, you know,

whatever the morning may bring.

I start my day out 10 minutes a day

with these things right here.

[light music continues]

All right, yeah, I think that's about 10 minutes.

Them things be gone.

[light music continues]

It might be the smallest one of 'em all,

but it could be one of the most important: a hair tie.

Man, one thing about me

is it's rare when I have my hair down

and in my face like this.

So all day long, I'm like this.

[light music continues]

On top of that, you know,

you can style it some different ways.

You can pick it up.

You can go here, if you trying to get a nice shower

or something, you want it all off of you,

put it up like this.

Just want a little different look for a little time to time.

Bring 'em down.

You switch it up, you know what I mean?

A hair tie, it'll take you some places

that you can't go on your own, so.

[light music continues]

This is that splat.

So this right here is my clothing line.

This is Chasing Millions LLC.

This is me.

I started my clothing line in 2017,

my sophomore year of college.

And this is a piece that I did over the summertime,

the Chasing M's Scatter Hoodie.

And it just got a bunch of different quotes

and different logos of mine,

some that we scrapped awhile ago that we never did,

and some that are our main force.

One of my favorite lines, man, on here is,

You passed me up, now I'm a superstar.

This is my kinda for-profit,

but alongside this, I have a nonprofit that I started

as well, the Chasing M's Foundation.

This past year, we started our CPR tour

where we went to Buffalo twice, Pittsburgh, and Cincinnati,

you know, all in one year.

Short year, very little time to, you know,

really, truly make a difference,

but we're already planning for 2024

and just trying to make it a epic year

as far as just making the CPR awareness so big.

You know, not everybody will be in a situation

that I was in, protected with 1,000, you know,

professionals around, you know.

So many people that's well-equipped for a moment like that.

The clothing means a lot to me,

but the foundation is truly a special place in my heart,

no pun intended.

[light music continues]

And you know I can't go too far without my JGs, man,

my John Geigers.

These right here, something special to me, man.

This is not only a designer.

This is a brother of mine, a truly close friend,

someone that's from the same neighborhood I am.

So you know, he truly understands what it takes

to make it outta McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania.

These are a shoe that I wear anywhere,

and I get compliments on 'em.

If they don't know, they wanna know like, What's that?

[light music continues]

My collab with Beats that I gave my teammates.

They got the three on the side, with love from D. Ham,

three on the side, all white pair that's, you know.

We just rocking the all white, you know?

Music is just a way that you can express yourself

without even saying much.

I kinda always been like a more so quiet kid growing up.

Like I was just more so reserved and to myself,

but you know, I would post music on my story

and that's how I would like express

what I was feeling in the moment or what I was going through

at the time.

To fast forward to now, you know,

having my own Apple Music playlist,

you could truly get my vibe off of listening

to that playlist.

And things that mean something to me from it.

[light music continues]

My most important essential: my daily devotionals

and the man above.

I have this one.

This is Jesus Listens.

It has a, you know, a verse,

a nice little short reading for each day.

You know, and it has some small verses with it.

This is something that, when I came across it,

you know, it changed my life.

It's a book called Move, and it says,

A Guide to Get Up and Go Forward.

And that's pretty much really what it does, you know?

It just, it gives you different ways to operate,

and it gives you action plans

of how to go about your business.

[light music continues]

Q-tips, man, I can't make it

through like a day without these.

If you know me, like I'm always itching my like throat.

I'm scratching my ear.

I don't know what it is, I got bad allergies or something,

but it might be hereditary from my mom.

I'm blaming her.

Nothing gets that spot like a Q-tip,

you know what I'm saying?

So all my friends, they clown me for it.

They laugh at me about it.

They'll hear me making noises, [sighing]

trying to get that spot 'cause I'm going through it.

I'm stressing, like, [laughing] I'm stressing.

By like my closest friends know.

They know like this is one thing that, [laughing]

this is like my weird essential.

This is my weird essential 'cause I need it.

[light music continues]

My next essential:

man, these two things right here are like my life.

So this is my personal number.

This here is like kinda more so businessy.

Just having two phones,

it kinda helps me separate the worlds a little bit

and, you know, to where, you know,

business can be business and personal can be personal.

You won't catch me nowhere without these.

If I don't got my phones on me, something wrong.

For my last essential: my wallet, Louis V,

blue, crocodile joint.

It was a gift from a very special person.

I ain't got no cash in here.

I got some cards, though.

I got my mom's [laughing] credit card on me.

I think I've had it for a very long time.

I don't know why, but I still got my mom's credit card.

So I might have to run her a little tab up.

Thanks for watching.

I really appreciate it.

I hope through my essentials you learned

a little bit more about me.

And forever, keep chasing M's, man,

keeping chasing the millions, let's go.

[light music continues]

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