Everything you said may be formally correct in terms of how the game mechanics work, but let's be honest: from any real-world perspective, this is completely absurd and illogical.
Think about it for a second. What exactly is a basketball team's merchandise store supposed to primarily sell, if not jerseys? Jerseys ARE the core of any team's merchandise business. Walk into any NBA team store and the overwhelming majority of the floor space is jerseys and jersey-adjacent apparel. The idea that "Jersey Sales" and the "Merchandise Store" are two completely separate, unrelated line items makes zero sense outside of a spreadsheet.
Same goes for the ranking logic: my highest-paid, presumably most popular player sells fewer jerseys because he doesn't qualify for some league ranking? Fans don't check eligibility criteria before buying a jersey — they buy the jersey of the star they come to see. Popularity drives sales, not technical qualification for a stats leaderboard.
I get that it's a game and the mechanics are what they are, so thanks for clarifying how it actually works. But whoever designed this system clearly never thought about how merchandising works in the real world.
Lord of All the Beasts, Fishes & Hoes in the Milky Way aka Drip God from Vienna