Hard to spin what proud father and NFL great Deion Sanders meant, exactly, when he said this week that his son, Cleveland Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders is surrounded by “dysfunction” in his life in the league. Maybe that is not a swipe at the Browns organization–maybe elder Sanders meant the media environment that his son complains about so frequently, maybe he meant the pace at which Shedeur Sanders’ PR groups moves, maybe he meant something else altogether. But the fact is, Sanders has said that most of his life is surrounded by football these days, and if Deion says that is dysfunctional, it would seem to be a reflection on the Browns.
Shedeur Sanders, of course, was the Browns’ starting quarterback to end his 2025 rookie season. He’d been a fifth-round pick by Cleveland the previous April, having slid out of a projected top-two-rounds spot all the way to Day Three. He got seven starts last season, earned the right to battle with Deshaun Watson for the QB1 job, but lost out. He made his first start in Week 9 against the Saints, when Watson was dealing with concussion issues.
Shedeur Sanders Spoke to Deion Sanders After Game
Deion Sanders, in an interview back in Colorado this week, was asked about Shedeur and his first Browns start of the season, in which he threw for 297 yards and two touchdowns but came up short on the final play of the game–a two-point conversion–and lost, 23-22.
Deion Sanders said: “I was happy. Not with the first half, I wanted him to get a little more loose, push the ball down the field a little bit more. And luckily, they had to do what they had to do and it allowed him to exude what he’s capable of doing. I am proud of him. We talked right after the game, like father to son. And that’s what I like. We’ll talk a little football about what transpired and what I saw because he always wants to know what I see. But talking as a father to your son is tremendous in those moments. Because that’s like before the press conference, it reminds you of those little things.“
Browns Crowded Quarterback Room an Issue?
But then the conversation shifted toward Sanders’ time with the Browns more generally. Sanders is in a four-man quarterback room, a rarity in the NFL. Also, there was controversy last week about his response to a question about the Saints defense, and some combination of that likely caught Deion Sanders’ attention.
He said: “He has matured so much and he has grown so much in the last year or so, that I am really, really proud of him. Because he has never dealt with circumstances– we’ve always dealt with chatter, with the last name Sanders, you’re always going to deal with chatter. We’ve dealt with chatter from youth all the way up. But the level of dysfunction that permeates around him is, it’s crazy, But for him, the rock steady, and finding him balance, it’s wonderful to see him mature.”
Shedeur Sanders’ Browns Season ‘Permeated by Dysfunction’: Deion Sanders