Shedeur Sanders has never taken a class on campus and missing out, according to Coach Prime
Deion Sanders is becoming accustomed to players not having to go to class. It's all part of the evolution for student-athletes in the modern era. The Colorado Buffaloes coach recently went on the record with the Bret Boone Podcast about his first year in Boulder. He admitted a few things have changed since his days as a student-athlete at FSU and said Shedeur was missing out.
"It's so different now," Sanders admitted. "Most of the schooling is online. They go to classes and I'm like, 'You guys are missing the best part of college to walk around and be on campus and build an atmosphere and build relationships on campus with other students outside of football. That's the best part of it.
"But now you have so many kids that are just online. I don't even know if Shedeur has ever taken a class on campus in his college career."
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Coach Prime also talked about NIL and how there needs to be a redefinition between collectives paying for sponsorships and players being directly affected by deals. It's one of the most confusing parts of today's structure in college football. Many people on the outside see athletes in commercials, who are paid an appearance fee to represent the university, and oftentimes, those deals have zero impact on the true value of Name, Image, and Likeness.
“I love that the kids are getting compensated," Sanders said. "But then you gotta ask the question, are they really getting compensated for their name, image, and likeness? We always hear about NIL, but we don’t ever see NIL."
Prime went on to explain the difference between collectives being able to mask booster money that is packaged up for a bidders market. His problem is cutting out a fair market price for the player to negotiate directly.
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"NIL, I don’t mind, but assembling the bag, I got a problem with that,” he said. “I want these kids to get a cut of whatever the NCAA is doing. I want that to happen. But I want to do it right where we have parameters, and we have guidelines, and we have rules that you must abide by. It’s open season right now. I understand, and some of our young men are benefitting, and I’m happy and thankful. Just give us some better guidelines because right now, it ain’t no stopping what’s going on out there.”
Sanders' three sons experienced a once-in-a-lifetime NIL deal with Shilo and Shedeur hitting the runway at the 2024 Louis Vuitton Men's Fall-Winter Collection show. Deion Jr. was also on hand to capture the moment for Well Off Media. It was a slight break for the Sanders brothers with the Buffs in the midst of off-season conditioning.