Deion Sanders couldn't believe Travis Hunter wasn't nominated for the Jim Thorpe Award. During an impassioned rant on November 26, Coach Prime offered Colorado's leading Heisman candidate his award as he chastised the voters for getting it wrong.
“How is Travis Hunter snubbed by the Thorpe Award?” Sanders said at his weekly news conference in Boulder (h/t Denver Sports 104.3). “You can have my award. You can have it back. Matter of fact, I’m going to give him mine. I ain’t using it. It’s just sitting up there collecting dust. So Travis can have my Thorpe Award, because if this ain’t the most idiotic thing in college football, that he’s not a finalist for the Jim Thorpe Award and he is, I would say arguably, but I don’t think it’s really an argument about this young man being the best defensive back in college football.
“He rarely gets thrown at. They just messed up all the integrity of the award and he can have mine. Whoever’s voting down there, whoever’s bringing it home, thank you. Because I don’t even want mine now. God bless you.”
Hunter is all but certain to win the Heisman, so it's puzzling to see him left off an award list for one of the two positions he plays. If he's up for the sport's best player overall, you'd think he'd be considered one of the country's best corners.
History was going to look back at Hunter as a Heisman winner and top NFL draft pick anyway. Still, voters may have shown a bit of the anti-Deion bias that had Buffs fans worried heading into awards season.