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The Shedeur Sanders Slide in the 2025 NFL Draft Is Legendary But Also Easy to Explain

Photo of Scott Kacsmar Scott Kacsmar29/04/2025 - 10:03 am
INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA - FEBRUARY 28: Shedeur Sanders #QB13 of Colorado speaks at the podium during the 2025 NFL Combine at the Indiana Convention Center on February 28, 2025 in Indianapolis, Indiana.
(Photo by Brooke Sutton/Getty Images)

The NFL is used to drafts being unpredictable, and the TV coverage can sometimes fixate on one player when they slide down the draft board, a la Aaron Rodgers in 2005. But what happened in the 2025 NFL Draft was historic in watching Shedeur Sanders, a projected top 10 pick, nosedive to the fifth round, where the Cleveland Browns seemingly took him out of pity.

Maybe they just wanted Mel Kiper to pipe down as the ESPN draft guru went on an embarrassing 3-day temper tantrum about Sanders repeatedly getting passed over by all 32 NFL teams:

Everyone seems to have a theory about why Sanders ended up as the 144th pick in the draft, essentially an afterthought, as the fifth round is where quarterback careers go to die in the NFL. People have blamed everything from a leaguewide blackball conspiracy, a personal vendetta against the Sanders family, to racism, to Shedeur blowing his interviews and not showing up for athletic testing.

The simple truth: Shedeur Sanders’ meteoric rise came on the back of his father Deion’s good name and the attention he brought to Colorado the last two seasons. But it’s his father’s brash personality that did his son few other favors, serving as his agent and giving him unrealistic draft expectations, and no one wanted to deal with this kind of drama for a player the NFL universally deemed to be no more than backup quality or a developmental starter at best. Hence, a fifth-round pick.

Live by the sword, die by the sword.

The family name that put Shedeur on the map also knocked him down every team’s draft board. Let’s look at the historical context for the slide, which we hinted would happen, and the undeniable proof that the league simply rejected the manufactured hype.

Shedeur Sanders NFL Draft

The Historic Slide for Shedeur Sanders

To this point, the only thing legendary about Shedeur Sanders’ football career is his draft slide.

Sure, there have been some notable draft slides over the years. But even those players usually still went in the first round or the top 40 picks at worst. We’re talking about players such as the following:

  • 1983: In the famed class that saw six quarterbacks go in the first round, Dan Marino fell out of the top 10 to No. 27 (Miami) after some rumors of drug use (marijuana) at parties.
  • 1998: Wide receiver Randy Moss was deserving of a top-five pick, but off-field issues caused him to fall to No. 21 to Minnesota.
  • 2005: Aaron Rodgers could have been the No. 1 overall pick but had to wait until No. 24 when Green Bay ended his nightmare of spending hours in the green room with his family.
  • 2013: Geno Smith could have been the first quarterback off the board in a weak class, but he went No. 39 overall to the Jets.
  • 2014: Johnny Manziel could have been a top 10 pick, but his substance abuse concerns dropped him to No. 22 (Browns), and he was, in fact, a major NFL bust.
  • 2018: Lamar Jackson had top 10 potential, but he was unfairly criticized for his passing, questioned about moving to receiver, before the Ravens wisely used the No. 32 pick on him to close the first round.
  • 2023: Some had Will Levis going No. 4 to the Colts on the day of the draft only for him to go No. 33 to the Titans in the second round.

(For what it’s worth, four of those players turned out to be legends and the other three were not good for the teams that drafted them.)

One of the only slides comparable to Sanders is what happened to LSU offensive tackle La’el Collins in 2015. He was likely going to be a high first-round pick, but teams caught whiff of news that he was going to be questioned by Louisiana State police in the shooting death of a pregnant woman he once had a relationship with. Collins wasn’t a suspect, but the news scared off teams, as did the warning from his agent he’d enter the 2016 draft if he went after the third round.

Eventually, the Cowboys signed Collins after he went undrafted. But that’s a very unique scenario. Players will usually slide for serious medical reasons or major character concerns.

But in the case of Shedeur Sanders, he was projected to be a high pick, even in the top five for a while at sportsbooks. Just days before the draft, Sanders still had better than -200 odds to be a top 10 pick.

I wish we had some historic draft odds for first-round prospects, but we have rankings on hundreds of players going back a decade. Granted, NFL mock drafts and consensus big boards involve a lot of groupthink, and there no doubt was a lot of groupthink between scouts and media that led to hyping up Sanders as the No. 2 quarterback in this draft after Cam Ward.

After all, where exactly does the consensus come from that makes Will Campbell the top-rated left tackle or that Malaki Starks was the only deserving first-round safety? It’s not just stats like you could cite for the Heisman Trophy race that helped Travis Hunter (the two-way threat helps immensely too) and Ashton Jeanty become top-six picks. It’s always easier to use stats for skill players.

But don’t let anyone gaslight you into thinking NFL scouts use college passing stats to determine NFL draft stock. If that were ever true, players like Graham Harrell (Texas Tech) and Colt Brennan (Hawaii) would have been first-round picks. Hell, Bailey Zappe threw for 5,967 yards and 62 touchdowns in one season at Western Kentucky in 2021 and still went in the fourth round. Didn’t we learn this lesson in the ’90s when Andre Ware and David Klingler fooled NFL teams into drafting them way too high as run-and-shoot passers with inflated stats?

Even Gardner Minshew went to Washington State for one year in 2018 and threw for 4,779 yards and 38 touchdowns, winning the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award that Sanders won in 2024. Minshew might even be just as mobile on the field as Sanders, and he was still a sixth-round pick by Jacksonville in 2019.

But we can question the draft community another day. Let’s acknowledge that the consensus rankings usually do a fair job of ranking where the players will be drafted into the NFL.

We have this data going back to 2016 from the NFL Mock Draft Database, which had Shedeur Sanders as the No. 12 prospect in its final consensus big board. He was actually drafted 144th overall in the fifth round by Cleveland, a full 132 picks above his ranking. How does that differential stack up to other top prospects in the last decade?

  • If based on the top 100 prospects in the draft (1,000 players total since 2016), then Sanders is tied for the 13th-largest slide since 2016.
  • Just 7-of-1,000 players were not drafted at all, and there was usually a strong medical reason for that.
  • The largest slide for a drafted player was wide receiver Auden Tate in 2018, who was the No. 83 prospect and drafted No. 253 overall (+170 difference). He had poor athletic testing and was recovering from a separated AC joint.

Sanders joins only two other players who were top 70 prospects who dropped at least 110 spots in the draft relative to ranking:

In 2017, defensive tackle Caleb Brantley was the No. 53 prospect and drafted No. 185 overall (+132). He had pending criminal charges, which cause the slide before Cleveland drafted him. The charges were dropped in May 2017, but the Browns dropped Brantley after one season.

In 2019, Missouri wide receiver Emanuel Hall was the No. 61 prospect and went undrafted. He was thought to be a Day 2 wideout with great measurables, but he was coming off a nagging groin injury, and he didn’t have great college production. He tore his Achilles in 2020 and never had an impact in the NFL.

If we’re doing this based on top 25 prospects (250 players total since 2016), then Sanders (+132) is easily the biggest outlier in the last decade as only four other players dropped 40 spots:

  • Quarterback Malik Willis (+76) was the No. 10 prospect in 2022 but drafted No. 86 overall by the Titans in that putrid quarterback class led off by Kenny Pickett.
  • Offensive tackle Josh Jones (+52) was the No. 20 prospect in 2020 but drafted No. 72 overall by the Cardinals and has been mostly a backup in the NFL.
  • Wide receiver D.K. Metcalf (+43) was the No. 21 prospect in 2019 but drafted No. 64 overall by the Seahawks after a neck injury and some questioning his route tree.
  • Edge rusher Mike Green (+42) was the No. 17 prospect in 2025 but drafted No. 59 overall by the Ravens after some concerns about his off-field past, including multiple allegations of sexual misconduct.

Given he plays quarterback too, Malik Willis is the closest comparison to Sanders, but I don’t recall much hype for him going in the first round in 2022 even if that was a poor quarterback class. But Sanders and Willis are the only top 15 prospects who weren’t drafted in the top 50 picks since 2016.

History of Quarterbacks Sliding in the NFL Draft (2016-25)

Singling out quarterbacks, that position is judged a bit differently because of its importance. You might “reach” on a quarterback more than another position because of how hard and vital it is to find a good one.

With that in mind, here are the 20 quarterbacks who slid at least 20 spots in their draft position relative to their ranking since 2016. Notice the lack of any success in this table and consider that just maybe the NFL is going to be right about Sanders not being a franchise quarterback:

Year Player Prospect Rk Draft# Diff.
2023 Will Levis 6 33 27
2019 Drew Lock 12 42 30
2018 Kyle Lauletta 73 108 35
2017 Davis Webb 51 87 36
2023 Hendon Hooker 31 68 37
2018 Mason Rudolph 39 76 37
2019 Will Grier 58 100 42
2022 Desmond Ridder 31 74 43
2020 Jacob Eason 71 122 51
2025 Jalen Milroe 40 92 52
2016 Cardale Jones 85 139 54
2022 Matt Corral 36 94 58
2016 Connor Cook 38 100 62
2020 Jake Fromm 96 167 71
2024 Spencer Rattler 76 150 74
2022 Malik Willis 10 86 76
2017 Nathan Peterman 86 171 85
2022 Sam Howell 46 144 98
2025 Shedeur Sanders 12 144 132
2022 Carson Strong 78 N/A 185+

Carson Strong is the only quarterback on this list who went undrafted as knee injuries left him immobile, ending his playing career early. Most of these quarterbacks never had much of a shot to be a starter, but for those who did, Sam Howell was a mistake-prone mess in Washington, and Seattle actually just traded him to Minnesota after drafting Jalen Milroe (Alabama) in the third round, as he makes this list as well for 2025.

But Nathan Peterman was another notable disaster of a quarterback in the NFL, Will Levis was terrible enough to get the Titans to draft Cam Ward No. 1 this year, and Desmond Ridder was a disappointment in Atlanta.

Between this list and the general failure of all fifth-round quarterbacks in the NFL in the last 30 years, the odds are very stacked against Sanders ever developing into a good player.

What if he was just overrated to begin with like you could say for Levis, Willis, and Drew Lock from that table? Remember, it’s not like the 2025 quarterback class was being hyped as a great one. Maybe it’ll be like the 2019 draft where Cam Ward is your Kyler Murray (No. 1 pick and best quarterback), Sanders is the Gardner Minshew (decent for a late-round pick), Jaxson Dart is the Daniel Jones (poor Giants), and Tyler Shough is the Drew Lock (forgettable).

The history of the NFL draft is proof that you can say these teams get things wrong on quarterbacks all the time. But it’s hard to argue with that table. If you extend it to players who slid 8+ spots, then you might be looking at a 1-for-26 success rate, with the lone success being Lamar Jackson in 2018.

Jackson’s slide also may have been rooted in thinly-veiled racism, as you’d have to be viewing things with a prejudiced eye to say the quarterback who averaged over 275 passing yards per game in 2016-17 needed to switch his position to wide receiver. That old trope should have left one’s brain after Michael Vick came around two decades earlier.

No one ever insisted that Sanders should change his position to defensive back, which his father played so well that he was a first-ballot Hall of Famer. That was just half of Travis Hunter’s role at Colorado, and let’s not forget Hunter was viewed as the best wide receiver in this class, so he helped inflate Sanders’ stats as a passer, too. But it’s not like anyone ever thought Shedeur would make for a good NFL corner because of his dad.

Apparently, 32 NFL teams have serious doubts he’ll make a good starting quarterback too.

Blame Deion Sanders for Why Shedeur Sanders Fell in the Draft

There are a lot of factors for why Shedeur slipped so historically in this draft, but it still boils down to expectations and the cost of doing business. He was built up to be a better prospect than he really was, and once teams knew that, they determined he wasn’t worth the trouble of investing a high pick if he’s just going to be a backup.

BOULDER, CO - SEPTEMBER 16: Colorado Buffaloes head coach Deion Sanders takes the field for warmups before the Rocky Mountain Showdown against the Colorado State Rams at Folsom Field September 16, 2023.
(Photo by Andy Cross/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images)

It’s not much different than why Colin Kaepernick didn’t get a fair shake at another NFL job after his national anthem stance in 2017 evoked strong words from President Donald Trump (“Get that son of a bitch off the field!”), or why Tim Tebow’s career ended abruptly. Teams hate distractions, and the last thing you want from your backup quarterback is to be a distraction.

Interestingly enough, Shedeur’s first-round slide led to President Trump posting that he should be picked immediately and asking if NFL owners are “stupid” for not drafting him. That’s how big this story got so quickly.

It’s Not Racism in the Modern NFL

But one thing we shouldn’t be blaming this on is racism. That’s about the dumbest argument to come out of this draft in a league where Cam Ward, Caleb Williams, and Bryce Young were the last three No. 1 picks. Don’t forget they were followed closely by C.J. Stroud, Anthony Richardson, and Jayden Daniels. Patrick Mahomes is the face of the NFL, Jalen Hurts is the reigning Super Bowl MVP, and Lamar Jackson almost won his third MVP.

This isn’t 1955, 1985, or even 2005/2015 anymore. There are more Black starting quarterbacks leading teams in the NFL than ever before. It may have been funny to joke about the New York Giants’ aversion to a Black QB1 over the team’s long history, but that joke kind of expired once the team signed Russell Wilson and Jameis Winston this year. Drafting Jaxson Dart over Sanders is just a preference as many teams had Dart on par or higher than Sanders.

Now, it is reasonable that there’s an element of classism to this draft. Despite being a 0-star recruit, Cam Ward went No. 1 and didn’t come from a rich family the way Shedeur grew up. Shedeur also has millions in NIL money from Colorado, which he let Ward hear about in a video that went viral, where he also drops a line that he didn’t have a running game in college:

They’ve reportedly known each other for years. But their other viral video shows Shedeur wanting to make a song while Ward continues repeating that he’s a football player who wants to be known for playing football.

Call it petty or robotic, but this strikes a chord for many people who want their face of the franchise to be all about the game instead of someone who is trying to push their brand first. Shedeur did not attend the draft and opted for a private party in Texas in a custom-built draft room showing his “Legendary” brand everywhere.

One of the worst things you could do is draft someone who is good at football but maybe doesn’t love it. This stuff matters to teams, and it was an area of concern with Shedeur because of his upbringing.

It’s Not a Double Standard Over Personality Traits

The supposed double standard people want to point out is that Baker Mayfield was embraced as a No. 1 overall pick in 2018 despite his cocky personality from college while Sanders was reviled for his attitude.  

Sanders has legitimate leadership questions with the way he’s handled himself in the past, including the flexing of a watch at a game, seemingly calling out his offensive line after a loss, showing up a ball boy, and other clips you can easily find on social media. There are also the reports from anonymous sources that his pre-draft interviews were among the worst ever seen.

But it’s been said that Hannibal Lecter would get drafted in the NFL if he could run a 4.28 at the combine. Teams are willing to overlook a lot of character concerns for the right talent, and that’s still evident in 2025 when the aforementioned Mike Green was drafted No. 59 by the Ravens, a team currently dealing with Justin Tucker’s sexual misconduct allegations.

The Browns also know all about such matters after trading for the villainous Deshaun Watson in 2022. The irony is this franchise did away with Mayfield because they were looking for “an adult” in the locker room. Yet they hitched their wagon to someone with two dozen accusers of sexual misconduct in Watson.

But NFL teams have proven over time they will put up with a lot of baggage if the player is good enough on the field. Sanders probably wouldn’t even be in Cleveland right now had Watson been any good the last three seasons.

It’s the Sense of Entitlement from Growing Up as Deion Sanders’ Son

So, the main issue is really neither skin color nor personality in this case. But what’s the actual difference between Mayfield and Sanders? Mayfield didn’t have a rich, successful, Hall of Fame dad who is in the business of coaching football and knows how to work the media.

Someone who could tweet to his millions of followers his disgust with how the team is handling his son or go on a popular podcast and blast that team publicly.

That’s the baggage teams don’t want to deal with. When ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky breaks down Shedeur’s tape in a fair and balanced way, Deion decided to take to X/Twitter hours before the draft to call him a “hater” for it.

That’s not hate. Orlovsky, who is no stranger to hyperbole at times, was just doing his job.

Now imagine if you’re a coach like Brian Daboll (Giants), Mike Tomlin (Steelers), or just starting out like Kellen Moore (Saints) on one of those quarterback-needy teams. Do you want Deion Sanders blowing up your phone when the team’s 0-3 and things aren’t going well with veterans Russell Wilson, Derek Carr, and Aaron Rodgers starting the games?

PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA - DECEMBER 24: Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin on the field after defeating the Las Vegas Raiders at Acrisure Stadium on December 24, 2022 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
(Photo by Gaelen Morse/Getty Images)

“When are you going to play my son? Maybe I ought to come take your job next season and show you how it’s done.”

Five years ago, this would have sounded preposterous. But since then, Sanders has joined the college football coaching ranks, making his son his starting quarterback in the 2021 season at Jackson State. The team was 23-3 over the next two seasons before Deion took his sons, Travis Hunter, and some of his other best players with him to Colorado.

In 2023, the Buffaloes got off to a surprising 3-0 start, keyed by an upset win over ranked TCU in the opening game. That put Sanders, his son, and Hunter on the map nationally, but it didn’t last as the team finished 4-9. Even that win over TCU didn’t look as good as the Horned Frogs finished 5-7. In fact, every Colorado win in 2023 was against a team that was 5-7 or 3-9.

When someone pressed Coach Prime on X/Twitter in May 2024 about his son showing off for a 4-win season, that didn’t stop Deion from saying his son would be a top 5 pick in the 2025 NFL Draft. You can’t shake the confidence in the Sanders family.

Despite the 4-9 finish, the culture change that Sanders speaks of in Colorado was underway. The team improved, finished 9-4, Hunter won the Heisman, and Colorado lost its only game against a ranked opponent, 36-14 to No. 17 BYU, in the Alamo Bowl.

That means in two years at Colorado, Shedeur was 13-12 as a starter with no signature wins, and it’s clear that NFL teams thought Hunter was the supreme talent on that roster. Yet, Sanders still got his jersey number retired at the school along with Hunter, which had many crying nepotism and that it only happened because his dad is the coach.

Yeah, that’s kind of the point here. Everything Sanders has can be traced back to his dad, including this draft slide. Because not only is Sanders a threat to NFL coaches after he entertained leaving Colorado to coach in the NFL, he’s been serving as the agent for his sons. He even said that he’d only go coach an NFL team if they draft both of his sons, Shedeur and cornerback Shilo.

As an agent, Sanders failed his sons so badly that Shilo even ended up “firing” his dad over the weekend and hired an agent (shark Drew Rosenhaus) before he signed his undrafted free agent contract with Tampa Bay.

Deion Alienated NFL Teams

Leading up to the draft process, Deion was on TV saying he expects his son to be drafted no lower than the No. 4 pick, and that there were certain franchises (he’d only name in private) that he would refuse to let his sons play for. He even evoked the Eli Manning decision, a nod to the 2004 draft-day trade where the Chargers had to send Eli to the Giants after they used the No. 1 pick on him to the chagrin of Archie Manning.

When Deion is saying he’s eliminating some teams from taking his sons in the NFL, why would you be surprised that several teams weren’t even looking at drafting Shedeur?

Then on top of that, Sanders withheld his son from participating in many of the pre-draft events, including the Senior Bowl and the athletic testing at the NFL scouting combine. Again, that adds to the case of him looking entitled even though his athletic testing isn’t up to a high standard, as you might expect from the son of an all-time great corner who also played in the MLB.

But you can also make the argument that other top prospects skip those event,s too. Yeah, that’s because they usually have great information from their agents (not their father) about what their draft prospects realistically are. With Deion serving as Shedeur’s agent, was he feeding him good info about his draft prospects, or would he never present his son as anything but a top-five pick because that’s not in the Sanders DNA? Did he purposely mislead him?

It sure didn’t take long after going in the fifth round for Shedeur to admit he’d do some things differently before the draft:

When you consider the list of teams seeking a starting quarterback in this draft was small, the way Deion handled his son’s pre-draft process likely made it even shorter. The Giants and Saints sought other options, and so did the Browns initially when you consider they spent that third-round pick on Dillon Gabriel from Oregon.

Even though Tom Brady has been like a mentor to Shedeur, it’s telling that the Raiders repeatedly passed on him, too. Do you think Pete Carroll, the oldest coach in the league, wants to worry about Deion coming for his job in a year or two?

It’s unnecessary drama, the last thing NFL teams need during the season when they’re trying to win enough games to make the playoffs and compete for a Super Bowl.

INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA - FEBRUARY 28: Shedeur Sanders #QB13 of Colorado speaks at the podium during the 2025 NFL Combine at the Indiana Convention Center on February 28, 2025 in Indianapolis, Indiana.
(Photo by Brooke Sutton/Getty Images)

Conclusion: He’s Still in the League

Once the league put a backup grade on Shedeur, that was it for his chances of going on Day 1 or Day 2 of this draft. He may even be lucky that he didn’t go later than he did as teams will usually wait until the sixth or seventh round to get their backup quarterback instead of wasting a fifth-round pick where you can maybe find a safety, running back, reserve defensive tackle, or off-ball linebacker who can play significant snaps.

In an ideal situation, the backup quarterback never leaves the bench, giving them limited value. They’re the “break glass in case of emergency” players on a team. When that’s what your value is deemed to be, it’s hard for any team to willingly bring on the media circus that is going to follow with the Sanders family.

We’re kind of already seeing it start with the sportsbooks giving Sanders the second-best odds of Cleveland’s five quarterbacks to start the first game in 2025, and his jersey is apparently selling well among the rookies in this class.

But Sanders is a player in the NFL. He will get his shot to prove all 32 teams were wrong by making him wait like they did. His reality is likely somewhere in the middle. He wasn’t a legitimate first-round prospect, but he still should have gone in the third round of this draft, maybe even with the 94th pick that the Browns used on Gabriel.

At the end of the day, it’s his father who helped him get his foot in the door in the world of football, but it’s also his father’s overbearing presence that made him wait until the fifth round to get drafted.

A good name is better than riches.

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Photo of Scott Kacsmar Scott Kacsmar29/04/2025 - 10:03 am