Deion Sanders Defends His Son, Shedeur, For Not Wanting To Go To Baltimore & Back Up Lamar Jackson “For 10 More Years”

Coach Prime gave some inside information as to why his son and former Colorado quarterback, Shedeur Sanders, didn’t want to get drafted to the Baltimore Ravens.

Have you ever heard so much noise around a quarterback that was drafted in the fifth round and is currently third-string on their roster? A lot of it can be attributed to the last name that Shedeur carries, though the college quarterback did have an impressive couple of seasons as a Colorado Buffalo before going pro.

But the “going pro” process didn’t go as smoothly as the Sanders family – and specifically Shedeur – was hoping. At one point, the young quarterback was projected to be a top 10 pick in the NFL Draft. Instead, Shedeur Sanders waited until the fifth round of the draft and went 144th overall to the Cleveland Browns.

That was the draft story that first surrounded Shedeur Sanders, until a week or so ago, when it was revealed that Shedeur Sanders was turning down teams that were interested in picking him earlier in the draft.

Adam Schefter first reported that the Ravens were planning to select Sanders in the fifth round of the 2025 NFL Draft, but decided not to when Shedeur made it known that he didn’t want to back up Lamar Jackson. Instead, the quarterback out of Colorado went a couple of picks later to the Cleveland Browns.

Pretty interesting stuff.

Evidently, Sanders wanted to go somewhere that he’d have a shot to start, and Baltimore – who has the talented Lamar Jackson at QB – didn’t seem like that place. Now, Shedeur is in Cleveland, and though he’s currently third on the quarterback depth chart behind Joe Flacco and Dillon Gabriel, his father Deion thinks that Shedeur will soon get a chance to start.

As he explained on the New Heights podcast:

“You gotta be ready when it’s time. But when it’s time, you gonna know. And it’s coming up. You know, I got a prediction I ain’t telling nobody. I got a feeling when it’s gonna go down… it’s gonna go down this year. He’s gonna get a shot.”

I’ll go ahead and categorize that as a bold take.

And while Deion was speaking about his son’s potential shot at quarterbacking the Cleveland Browns, he touched on how he believes the media blew the whole “Shedeur didn’t want to go to Baltimore” story out of proportion. Coach Prime also shared that there was another team in the mix that Shedeur preferred not to land on:

“They made a big deal out of (that story). Philly called on us draft day. They didn’t mention that. I just let the cat out of the bag. Baltimore and the Browns (also called). I played for Baltimore so me and Ozzie Newsome are cool. We understood that whole conversation, and he wanted to talk to Shedeur as well as he wanted to talk to me.

I put Shedeur on the phone, and Shedeur – I don’t want to say how it went – but how in the world can somebody fault him for saying or thinking, ‘Why would I go back up Lamar for ten more years?’ I’ve never sat on the bench and said, ‘Well I learned a lot today.'”