Deion Sanders sounded retroactively upset that he couldn't convince one of his former Jackson State football players to join him in Boulder, Colorado as he spoke to reporters during Texas Tech game week.
Coach Prime explained that everyone marches to the beat of their own drum, and not everyone likes school; making the esteemed University of Colorado Boulder a tough sell to students who are not engaged in coursework.
“Well, if they don’t like school, they need to go, because I don’t want them affecting our APR,” Sanders said on November 5. “That’s number one. Secondly, if they have a good shot at going to the NFL, but it could increase if they stayed, I’m going to give them that wisdom. I’m going to put them in front of a multitude of scouts and people that (have) the resources to give them the truth about where they stand. But you got to understand, you got to really take in consideration who that person is.
“We had a person at Jackson that could, I promise you, if he would have came here with us, he probably would have been (a) second through fourth round pick, by all means. But he didn’t enjoy school, so he wanted to do his thing. So you really got to understand who a person is. but I’m going to give him the truth, the adulted truth. I’m going to really tell them like it is, but I’m going to try to urge them to go in the right direction. But then, the choice is ultimately up to them. Good question, though, man.”
Deion Sanders continues to prove he's a player-friendly coach at Colorado
Sanders clearly tries to be in tune with his student-athletes' goals and ambitions. He spoke with clarity on the honest reasons not everyone works out at the collegiate level and doesn't go pro when they have the talent to.
He's backed his stars and his castaways when pressed by reporters and otherwise. He's defended players who weren't even on his team.
Sanders is player-friendly at his core. Not every player gets to experience that, though.