Shedeur Sanders gets his flowers from analyst after historic debut

The Heisman hype has begun for Colorado football quarterback Shedeur Sanders — who, like the rest of his Buffs teammates, was written off ahead of the season because analysts didn’t like the way his father, Coach Prime, was going about building up CU’s roster.

FanSided’s Wayne Gregoire pointed out that all of the knocks on Sanders, which surely couldn’t have come from his 70:14 touchdown-interception ratio at Jackson State, were all completely unfounded.

No Elite arm strength? No touch on finesse passes? None of that showed up on tape in Week 1 as Sanders looked like the 2023 Heisman favorite on the field,” Gregoire wrote. “It’s still September, and there’s a lot of football left to play. Maybe this was a fluke or a flash in the pan, but he didn’t do this against Middle Tennessee State (yes that is a shot at Alabama). He shredded a top-ranked NCAA secondary like they were a high school JV team. Calling him a Heisman favorite is not hyperbole, and neither is calling him a top quarterback prospect in the 2024 NFL Draft.”

Shedeur Sanders was always going to defy expectations for Colorado football

Any bearish analysis on Sanders, Travis Hunter, and the other Jackson State/FCS transfers ahead of the 2023 season showed just how antiquated the national media’s outlook on college football truly is.

Never before has there been more parity in the sport due to the NIL era, and in the last few years, HBCUs have seen their coverage skyrocket; helping those schools get to a level similar to any Group of Five conference. Sanders’ dominant performances in Jackson, Mississippi were not a product of underrecruited opposing defenses, but rather an indication that Coach Prime’s son has the tools to step onto a Division I football field and make the most spectacular plays of anyone on it along with Hunter.

Writing off a player because of where he came from, despite both on-field success and an attitude clearly befitting of a gamer, is regressive in the sport. A lot of media outlets set the business back holding things against Deion Sanders that have nothing to do with the product on the field.

Sanders was always going to defy the expectations of him heading into the 2023 season. It just didn’t seem plausible it’d be by this much this soon.