Deion Sanders has moved aggressively in the college coaching ranks, rising from an HBCU school in Jackson State to a D1 Power 5 school in Colorado. However, that doesn’t mean he’s ready to make the next big jump to the NFL.
During a recent interview on the Dan Patrick Show, sanders threw cold water on the notion that returning to the NFL as a coach could be in his future.
“I don’t think I’m built for the NFL,” he said.
Deion Sanders says being an NFL Head Coach is not for him… Would that be different if it were a package deal with Shedeur and Shilo though? pic.twitter.com/vpGNvpsmPL
— Dan Patrick Show (@dpshow) November 7, 2023
“I appreciate the game so much, and I respect the game so much for what the game has consistently done for me for a multitude of years that when I see a guy getting paid millions of dollars, and he has no respect for the game and does not want to excel and exceed expectations in the game, I’m going to have a true problem,” Sanders added.
“I’m the kind of coach that would go out there with 53 [players] and come back after halftime with about 32. I can’t do it. I’m too brutally honest, and I want to win that much. I need everybody that respects the game. Oftentimes, money clouds that judgment. It’s happening in college football — money clouds that love and passion for the game.”
Now, in the NIL era, Sanders could find himself coaching a millionaire who doesn’t respect the game in college as well. Maybe not at this early stage of NIL, but certainly in the next few years.
It’s also questionable how “in demand” Sanders will be for an NFL job. Since bursting on the major college football scene and going 3-0magainst bad football teams that had little-to-no tape on Colorado, Sanders’ young charges have lost four out of their last five and haven’t looked particularly impressive in any of those losses or even the win, for that matter.
So, to some degree, it’s silly to speculate whether Sanders is “built” for the NFL when he has yet to prove he’s even built for the Pac-12.
When asked whether he would be open to a “package deal” NFL opportunity that included him and his sons going to a team, Sanders said he hadn’t thought about that.
Head coach Deion Sanders of the Colorado Buffaloes celebrates with quarterback Shedeur Sanders #2 after a fourth-quarter touchdown against the Colorado State Rams at Folsom Field on September 16, 2023, in Boulder, Colorado. (Dustin Bradford/Getty Images)
“I don’t know,” Sanders said. “I haven’t thought about it. I’m trying to win a game — I haven’t thought down the street that far. I haven’t thought like that.”
Good, because until he and his sons start winning more games, that won’t happen.