SEATTLE, Washington — He had a name, a face, a jersey, and — for the better part of a year — the trust of more than two dozen women across four states. What he did not have, as it turned out, was a contract with the San Francisco 49ers.

Daejon Love, 35, was arrested along with an 18-year-old accomplice, Taylor Jamie Chan, at the Boise airport in August, federal prosecutors say, on charges of wire fraud in a scheme that, according to USA Today’s reporting, netted more than $1.3 million from at least 26 women who believed they were courting a member of the NFC’s most storied franchise.

The details, as they have emerged, read less like a crime report than like a scouting film. Love did not merely claim to play; he performed. He built a persona, sustained it across months and time zones, and — in the words of one of the women interviewed by investigators — “made you believe that the person you were texting was the person you were going to meet.” The 49ers, it should be noted, were not involved in any of this. They have, as a franchise, been described by the victims as “the only ones who never once called.”

"He had a ring," one woman said, later. "I just assumed it was the Super Bowl ring."

The scheme’s architecture is what has sports fraud analysts scratching their heads. This was not a one-off. It was a pipeline — a romance, a persona, and a number, repeated with the consistency of a two-minute drill. The victims were not, in the parlance of the genre, “scammed so much.” They were scammed with a level of production value that would make an actual franchise front office jealous.

THE 49ERS PERSONA, AT A GLANCE

  • Persona: 49ers player
  • Accomplice: One, age 18
  • Victims: 26+
  • States: Four
  • Take: $1.3 million
  • Actual 49ers involvement: Zero
  • Jersey: A rental

The 49ers, for their part, have said little. They have, however, in the way that franchises do in moments like these, issued a statement expressing “disappointment” and reaffirming their “commitment to the integrity of the game.” The statement did not mention the $1.3 million. The statement did not mention the 26 women. The statement did mention, in the same breath, that the team was “proud of its legacy,” which is, in the end, the only thing a franchise is contractually required to be proud of.

At press time, Love was in custody, Chan was in custody, and the 49ers were, as always, busy being a 49ers. The women, for their part, had something rarer than a refund: a story. And as one of them put it, in a tone that was very much not disappointed, “I would have believed it if he’d been the quarterback.”