Enough of the Speculative Fiction Surrounding Shedeur Sanders
Everyone’s got an opinion on this shit, so why can’t I share mine?
There’s been a lot of “talk” surrounding Shedeur Sanders, his brother Shilo, and their father Deion Sanders the last few years. Every opinion has been included under the sun, including whether they should have stayed at Jackson State, if Deion was good enough for a coach at JSU or Colorado, and even the questioning of Shedeur Sander’s coachability due to only being coached by his father.
Now a new set of theories dressed up as facts has arisen:
Is Shedeur Sanders even that good?
Stop. We’ve seen this woven narrative by the media before with LaVar Ball and his sons (Lonzo, LiAngelo, and LaMelo) and recently with LeBron James and his namesake Bronny. To this I ask: What the hell are we doing here? And by “we” I mean the NFL, sports media, and any other culprit who had a hand in what we witnessed last weekend in the 2025 draft.
You can talk about how Tom Brady went in the 6th round in 2000 at the 199th pick, but that “fact” ignores the fact that Shedeur Sanders had way more hype and buzz surrounding him in the NCAA than Brady did at Michigan. Not only was Shedeur projected to be a first round pick, he was an acclaimed top 5 pick. Even ESPN’s Mel Kiper listed Shedeur Sanders as his “top QB in the entire draft” on his big board.
Shedeur Sanders broke records at Jackson St. and at Colorado, putting both programs back on the national stage with his play on the field, and his charisma off of it. Some will argue the charisma off the field is just good marketing, that outweighs actual gameplay. Others called this very charisma “arrogance” that turned off NFL scouts and many other people. I don’t know about you, but I can’t think of one successful quarterback at any level who was humble. Some would argue, it’s even part of the job. If we can invoke Tom Brady as a metric for being a later round pick, we can also use him as a metric for belief in self as simply that.
I won’t deny the power of the Sanders family’s ability to market itself. But I cannot pretend the Sanders kids aren’t good enough, nor will I pretend this is all unprecedented. Before Deion Sr. and Shedeur arrived at Jackson State, Shilo was a freshman playing football at South Carolina for Will Muschamp. Was Deion on that coaching staff? Nope, he was coaching Shedeur and other young men in high school. Shilo utilized the transfer portal, transferring down to buy into his father’s vision at the time. This is not a knock on JSU as an HBCU, even Colorado is below the caliber of play for the South Carolina Gamecocks in the “titanic” conference known as the SEC. It’s part of the reason Jaxson Dart was selected higher, SEC play. For a second though, let’s look at Shadeur’s actual criticisms.
“He’s only played for his father.”
True, but is this really a negative? At Jackson State Shedeur Sanders won SWAC Freshman of the Year, the Jerry Rice Award, SWAC Offensive Player of the Year in just two seasons. Their record? 23–3, before the Sanders brothers (and other teammates) hit the transfer portal.
“When he got to Colorado he went 12–13 in two seasons, and lost a bowl game.”
Also true, but it ignores that in his second season they went 9–4, and the Big 12 added several PAC 12 leftovers, making the conference much more competitive. Had Colorado won 2 more games, they would have been in the college football playoffs, not Arizona State. Shadeur won Big 12 Offensive Player of the Year and the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award, despite this. You know who else won the Unitas? Jayden Daniels, Joe Burrow, Andrew Luck, Colt McCoy, Eli Manning, Carson Palmer, and Peyton Manning (to name a few).
I am not here to argue against Cam Ward being the first pick overall. But I do ask, do people think realistically Cam Ward would have been successful at Jackson State or Colorado, two schools that were virtually irrelevant on the mainstream stage before the Sanders family and their alleged “hubris” showed up? Or better yet, what would Shedeur Sanders’ college career look like if he had the resources of the Miami Hurricanes in the ACC?
In fact, if anyone knows the power of transferring into a Power 5 conference it’s not Shedeur and Shilo Sanders — it’s Cam Ward, who came to Miami (FL) from Washington St. first. Before playing in the Power 5 at Washington State or The U? Ward played for a small Division I Catholic school in San Antonio, University of the Incarnate Word. The talking heads that are anti-transfer portal seem to conveniently leave out Cam Ward’s usage of it. Especially when speculating his prowess over Shedeur Sanders as an NFL starter. Jaxson Dart, also used the portal (though within the power 5) and was mostly a backup at USC.
What Ward, Sanders, and Dart all have in common are zero trips to the college football playoff as starters, and a collective L to Travis Hunter for the Heisman Trophy. So why is it really that Sanders fell so late, after being projected as high as a top 5 pick?
We’ve heard it all: some say he turned off teams by saying don’t draft him if you aren’t looking for a franchise changing generational talent at QB. I don’t really see an issue with this level of confidence. Even if wrong, you want this level of self-belief especially when scouting future talent. It’s not like Deion Sanders demanded a trade, like Archie Manning did when he forced the San Diego Chargers to trade Eli Manning to the New York Giants, or even Joe Bryant demanding the Charlotte Hornets trade Kobe Bryant to the Lakers. But for whatever reason, Deion Sanders is too involved.
The truth is, it’s so much more than that. It’s bigger than a bad interview with the New York Giants. The New Orleans Saints and Pittsburgh Steelers need quarterbacks, and they also overlooked Sanders. Even the Browns took another QB before taking Shedeur in the 5th round. For those who say that they just did not want to deal with the father, I think it’s important to be clear that Deion Sanders is more like LeBron James than LaVar Ball, as both Coach Prime and LeBron have full time sports jobs with responsibilities keeping them busy.
If college football is as much of a grind as former Alabama head coaching legend Nick Saban claims, portal or no portal Deion Sanders is going to be busy with his next challenge, winning without his sons at Colorado. Will Coach Prime speak out if asked? Undoubtedly. But like LaVar Ball, he won’t be behind the coaches calling the shots. He will be in the stands, as a fan of his sons.
Shedeur Sanders has no conflicts off the field (Jameis Winston), he isn’t known for partying too much (Johnny Manziel), and has no allegations of incel or misogynistic behavior (Tyreke Hill) in an era where Gen Z men have been described as increasingly susceptible to propaganda. He’s just a rich Black young man in America, who isn’t afraid to be himself. He isn’t like Michael Irvin’s son who tries to portray an image that he’s not. He’s a wealthy Black kid who just finished a college football career, in the wild wild west early stages of NIL. Of course he would flex a watch, the NIL creates a more professionalized image than we’ve ever seen.
This is all selective outrage, full stop. The same people who don’t make a fuss when the Miami Hurricanes (Cam Ward’s team) flex their chains on the sidelines are mad at Shedeur Sanders for an icy watch. Of course he plays in it. He doesn’t covet it like a rapper new to money, he’s already rich. He can buy another. The Hurricanes aren’t called arrogant despite their flashiness that got them as far as the Colorado Buffaloes this season — a bowl game that nobody cares about, that they also lost.
Like Bronny James, and like the Ball brothers, the Sanders children are hated because they are young Black men in America who come from wealth. In fact, none of them needed to be professional athletes. They were already rich kids from the suburbs, and that’s what makes them an itch for the media and white America. These pundits will quickly hide their hands when it comes to Elon Musk essentially being an oligargh in our modern democracy, but show their entire cards when dealing with young Black athletes. The irony and hypocricy is not lost.
This is why people are throwing around the potentiality of a possible NFL collusion. It doesn’t hurt their argument when Shedeur Sanders gets prank called about being drafted by Atlanta Falcons Defensive Coordinator Jeff Ulrich’s son Jax Ulrich. While I won’t blame Jeff Ulrich or the Falcons, it’s hard to not help but think the NFL sent a message to the Sanders family last weekend. When the Manning family makes demands, they’re just looking out for their family legacy. But when the Sanders family does it, they’re pompous, arrogant, and we end up with a slew of comments from sports media analysts that begins to feel questionably racist if you know the history surrounding Black QBs...
Shedeur Sanders was not a first round pick, but neither was Tom Brady, Jalen Hurts, or Russell Wilson. The good news is, they’ve all won a Super Bowl, and like Sanders, none of them won the Heisman Trophy. The Cleveland Browns also have been on a flat-out famine for a generational franchise changing quarterback. If Shadeur Sanders is right about himself, and can replicate the success of the previously mentioned SB champions, perhaps he can silence his haters and make the 31 teams who overlooked him live in regret.
Should this happen, he’ll be a whole lot richer, and America will just have to get over it. Enough of the speculative fiction, let’s wait and see what he does in Cleveland.
Correction: An early form of this article stated Aaron Rodgers was also not a first round pick, and had won the Super Bowl. Rodgers was drafted 24th overall in the 2005 NFL Draft.
