Shedeur Sanders’ humiliating tumble from a projected first-round pick in last month’s NFL Draft to the Cleveland Browns with the 144th selection led his fiercely proud father Deion to cry for just the second time in his adult life.
As a sources close to the Sanders family told FanDuel podcaster Skip Bayless, the 57-year-old Hall-of-Fame cornerback and Colorado head coach had not cried since his previously revealed suicide attempt in 1997. The two-sport star’s first marriage was coming to an end as he was attempting an MLB comeback with the Cincinnati Reds; and in the midst of his depression, Deion drove his car off a steep cliff, only to survive without any life-threatening injuries.
Since then, the elder Sanders has dedicated himself to his Christian faith and focused on raising his children, several of whom he coached when they played high school football in the Dallas area. Shedeur and his brother Shilo both went on to play for ‘Coach Prime’ at Jackson State and Colorado before declaring for the NFL Draft, where Shilo would go unselected. (He has since signed with Tampa as an undrafted free agent)
As always, Deion remained his sons’ biggest cheerleader throughout the pre-draft process. But when the Buffaloes coach told podcaster and former ESPN star Dan Patrick that there were ‘a lot of teams’ Shedeur didn’t want to play for, NFL insiders decided to teach ‘Deion and his son a lesson,’ according to Bayless.
‘He wouldn’t name the teams, but he said he would help navigate his son to the best fit for his son at the top of the draft,’ Bayless said before referencing a similar situation with retired New Orleans Saints quarterback Archie Manning and his highly touted son, Eli, before the 2004 NFL Draft.
‘So yeah, Deion indicated he’d go Archie Manning on the draft,’ Bayless said, recalling the elder Manning’s efforts to prevent the Chargers from taking his son with the top pick. ‘Remember Archie once navigated Eli out of San Diego to New York and the Giants. I still believe, as I said before, that that interview, those statements, were what most turned the NFL against Shedeur and Deion.
Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders, front, walks off the field after Browns rookie minicamp
Deion Sanders talks to his quarterback and son, Sheduer, during a 2024 game against Utah
Bayless, a former Cowboys beat writer, has fiercely defended Deion and Shedeur Sanders
‘That Deion dared to compare himself and his situation to the beloved first family of football, the Mannings, that’s when I believe the NFL pretty much said in colluding unison: ”Oh yeah, watch this Deion.”’
Bayless claims he isn’t alone in this belief. In fact, he thinks Deion realized this during the draft, which is why he found himself crying over Shedeur’s tumble from Day 1 to Day 3.
‘That’s why Deion cried after the draft because he realized he’d just talked too much, too positively much, about his son’s potential greatness; that he, Deion, inspired too much jealousy and too much resentment and that that he helped put his son through a three-day ringer of shame.
‘I mean he is Deion Sanders, Neon Deion, Coach Prime, anything he says will hit with 10 tons more impact than any other coach in this country,’ Bayless continued. ‘I’m talking college or pro coach. Deion knows that for a fact, so he cried over what his son had to endure over those three days, two nights and a day.’
Bayless then turned his focus back to an earlier topic: His belief that Las Vegas Raiders minority owner and Shedeur mentor Tom Brady told his team’s front office not to draft his former pupil.
The former sixth-round pick has denied having anything to do with the Raiders’ draft plans, but Bayless rejected that claim while calling Brady a ‘two-faced hypocrite.’
‘Now I’m hoping Shedeur Sanders proves Tom Brady almost as wrong as Brady proved everyone who failed to draft him until the sixth round,’ said Bayless.
