The Shedeur Sanders NFL Draft saga is finally over, and now the focus shifts to his attempt to become the starting quarterback for the Cleveland Browns—even if that goal currently seems far out of reach. At the moment, Sanders is buried on the depth chart.
“The Cleveland Browns headliner is their 4th QB on the roster who will get the least amount of reps and opportunity in the group. That’s a set up for dysfunction. That’s the Browns,” Robert Griffin III wrote.
Sanders’ path to the Browns wasn’t easy. He had to wait all three days of the draft to hear his name called. To make matters worse, he was prank called on the second night of the draft. The process was so rocky that some NFL insiders accused him of deliberately underperforming during pre-draft workouts.
“At some of those [combine] meetings with certain teams that maybe Shedeur Sanders didn’t really want to go to... I was told that he more or less sandbagged in those interviews... I don’t know if he didn’t take them seriously, what it was, but he did not give it his all in some of those interviews,” Jonathan Jones reported.
Over the weekend, NFL rookies attended the NFLPA Rookie Premiere, where they had the chance to access their official jerseys for the first time. Sanders was invited and ran into his good friend, Cam Ward. Ward asked Sanders for a jersey swap, but the former Colorado Buffalo declined.
“Nah. I gotta sell it bruh. I gotta have some type of money. S**t, I’m already down,” Sanders told Ward.
He then walked off without making the swap—passing on the chance to own a jersey from the No. 1 overall pick and good friend, who’s already being referred to as one of the least talked-about first picks in NFL history.
Sanders could have kept the jersey as a personal keepsake or saved it for a future game-day swap if they eventually face off in the NFL. But for now, he shot his friend down.