The Super Bowl has yet to happen, so the world may not fully understand what lies ahead of us once #DraftSZN begins and the discussion surrounding Shedeur Sanders — a controversial prospect with a controversial father — starts to really get underway. It’s going to be fun, even if it perhaps ends up being a little tedious at some point. 

But it’s not boring right now! The aforementioned father, Deion Sanders, has been on camera a few times over the course of Super Bowl week and has already managed to make quite a few waves with comments about where his son could end up playing and how high he could end up getting drafted. 

Deion and Shedeur scoffed at the idea he could fall as far as No. 9 in the draft to the Saints on Thursday night, and in a visit to “The Dan Patrick Show” set on Friday at Radio Row, Deion (with help from some artfully crafted questions from DP) made it known he has some teams on his “do not draft me” list for his coveted quarterback of a son.

Asked by Patrick if there were any teams he wouldn’t want Shedeur to play for, Deion said there are “a lot of teams” that fit the bill. 

“There’s a lot of teams I preferred he didn’t play for. That’s like saying, ‘Aren’t there teams you don’t want to watch?’ That you hit the clicker,” Deion said. “You darn skippy! You right. There’s teams I didn’t want to play for. So why would I want my kids … come on, man, I’m a dad. I’m a real dad that has a lot of information about the NFL.

“I know some folks who know some folks … who know some folks, in the NFL. And I know what’s behind the curtain. So definitely I’m going to lead them in the right direction.”

All bluster aside, Deion is obviously extremely connected in the coaching world with his gig at Colorado and extremely connected in the NFL world, being a Hall of Fame cornerback in his own right who also worked at NFL Network for a long time. And his answer to how he plans to “navigate” the situation with questionable teams was a good one, too — Deion said he would simply meet with those teams in private, rather than put them “on front street.”

“I would meet with them behind closed doors. I would not call them out or put them on front street and talk about their organization,” Sanders replied. “Because people work too hard for a guy like me ignorantly saying something wrong.

“I would meet with them privately and talk about my concerns so we can have an understanding.”

If you’re a team hoping to potentially draft Sanders, you like hearing that. The worst possible situation would be Deion putting a bunch of bad teams at the top of the draft on blast. Starting things off with a new ownership group and a new coaching staff and a new roster by putting everyone on, ahem, front street is not what you want your potential high first-round pick’s dad doing. 

But make no mistake: this has the possibility to be an Eli Manning-style situation for the Sanders Family, where if Deion doesn’t think the landing spot is right for Shedeur, he could very conceivably threaten to not let him play or pull some shenanigans. The new CBA prevents that from happening for the most part, but I wouldn’t rule anything out with Deion.

The real question, as asked by DP, is whether or not Deion has met with any teams so far.

“Yes,” according to Sanders. 

Patrick’s follow up — “How many?” — elicited a dodgy response from Deion.

“Ummm a few,” Sanders hesitated. “I just want to know why. If you don’t get your wise answers, you’re going to always be curious in life. I like to get my wise answer. Because this is my guy. These are my kids.”

It’s not hard to pinpoint what teams Sanders might have spoken with. The Titans (No. 1 overall), Browns (No. 2), Giants (No. 3), the Raiders (No. 6), Jets (No. 7) and Saints (No. 9) are all obvious landing spots, all of whom have their own levels of dysfunction. 

Those obvious inflection points in a draft where the top-10 is filled with QB-needy inflection points is going to make for a fun lead up to the 2025 NFL Draft. 

Shedeur Sanders NFL Draft 2025 scouting report: NFL landing spots, pro comparison, prospect ranking, accolades

Josh Edwards