Cam Newton sticks up for Colorado football in sharp rebuke of aggressive talking head

Cam Newton isn't a fan of the shots Paul Finebaum has been taking at the Colorado football program -- and the former Heisman Trophy winner at Auburn sent a warning to Finebaum in the wake of his repeated criticisms of Coach Prime and Co.

"Paul, watch your words," Newton said on the "4th and 1" podcast (h/t Marca). "I see what you tried to do, but you tried it, no chewing gum. If anybody is relevant, if anybody's going to play for the Super Bowl, I think Shedeur Sanders probably said it in a way that he knows a lot of people are going to play their best because a lot of people will be watching that game, that's what he meant.

"This is my issue with reporters, with journalists. 'Where will the accountability be?' Paul Finebaum has been covering sports and making outlandish takes on athletes and programs for years. Just for him to say something crazy like that. And then, if Colorado does make it to the college football playoffs, will he apologize?"

Paul Finebaum said Colorado football success in 2023 was illegitimate

Finebaum may be trying to play nice these days, but the damage is done. The Birmingham-based SEC Network host called Colorado's early success in 2023 illegitimate and stressed that Deion Sanders is a "celebrity coach."

“First of all, he is a celebrity but he’s not a celebrity as a coach. To me, Deion, it’s all about what he did previously and I think that’s why I give him a lot of credit for calling himself Coach Prime. Because that puts the emphasis on being a coach,” Finebaum said on June 10 during the "McElroy and Cubelic in the Morning" radio show from Birmingham (h/t BuffsBeat). “But listen, he is an industry-created coaching celebrity. What happened last year was generational, but it was mostly forced and created, and it was really in many ways illegitimate.”

Finebaum is already an enemy of the Sanders family. And he went so far that it's noticed across the industry.