Report calls Shedeur Sanders NFL Combine behavior “unprofessional”

Shedeur Sanders won over the media at the NFL Scouting Combine but apparently struggled to win over some teams, who have bad-mouthed the Colorado Buffaloes star quarterback to multiple news outlets.

Both NBC’s Matthew Berry and The Ringer’s Todd McShay have shared multi-sourced details of teams calling Sandeers “unprofessional” and some form of uninterested. The new bits come after Sanders had already been publicly criticized by one anonymous quarterback’s coach for his time in Indianapolis.

This reigning Big 12 Offensive Player of the Year is expected to be a top pick in this spring’s NFL Draft. He boasted a top 10 mark nationally in completion percentage (74%), passing yards (4,134) and touchdowns (37) while breaking Colorado school records for passing touchdowns, passing yards, consecutive games with a touchdown pass, quarterback rating and completion percentage.

Though his ‘first job interview’ stepping into the pros hasn’t gone well.

“The two people that I spoke to were in meetings and had these individual meetings that I just laid out to you what they are, who’s in there and why they’re important — teams in the top 10 drafting that need a quarterback,” McShay said on his podcast. “The two people that I spoke to in these positions left the meeting feeling like Shedeur Sanders was not overly concerned with what they thought of him. They had a 15-minute meeting with them, and when they were done, they both said in different ways, different words, that they did not feel like Shedeur Sanders cared all that much about what that organization thought of him.”

Later, McShay also shared language that called Sanders unprofionsal in these interviews.

”It’s not the response you’re looking for from a potential suitor, from somewhere you plan to go play,” he said. “Now, I think it’s also important because people pull clips and have all sorts of things to say (and) it’s very important and hear me when I say this: There was no bad behavior, there was nothing disrespectful said or done, there was no kind of altercation.”

Meanwhile, Berry reported a very similar thing.

“I spoke with two people on two different teams that met with Sanders. And completely independently of each other, they had the exact same things to say. They both said it was a bad meeting and that he came off as unprofessional and disinterested,” Berry writes. “Both also said that after the meeting, they had a lesser opinion of him than prior. These same people both met with Cam Ward as well, and both said they loved Ward, and it was a great meeting.”

“Now, I’m not trying to kill the kid. So, I want to give a bunch of caveats,” Berry keeps going. “These were just two people. Maybe other people in the meeting had a different read. And maybe these were teams that Sanders doesn’t want to go to, so maybe he purposely tanked the meeting. Maybe he just had a bad day. Lord knows I haven’t nailed every interview I ever had. You know how many times I met with ESPN before they eventually bought my website? But, yeah. When talking about the projected top two QB picks this year, every team I spoke to loves Ward. And I didn’t hear a ton of positive about Sanders.”

Berry explains that teams are loving Miami’s Ward and now expect him to be the first quarterback taken, with the conversation shifting to who is the second best quarterback between Sanders and Ole Miss’ Jaxson Dart. Though the team that is drafting second, the Cleveland Browns, apparently like Sanders and are happy with either quarterback.

“Shedeur is a very, very impressive young man,” Browns coach Kevin Stefanski told reporters. “He was raised the right way. Obviously, he’s a heckuva football player, that’s evident off the tape, but really impressed with the person.”

There has been some buzz about Sanders not wanting to go to Cleveland stemming from comments his father Deion Sanders made last March, but the Browns GM said last month he’s not worried about that possibility and it seems that talk has cooled considerably.

Like all quarterbacks about to enter the NFL, Sanders seems to be getting taken apart right now. Teams and the media are looking for holes in his game and wondering where he should land. Some of this is normal; what is not is Sanders being the son of an NFL Hall of Famer who is one of the most famous athletes of all time and is now one of the more popular football coaches in the country. Shedeur grew up both in football and in the spotlight.

Sanders will likely go high in the Draft despite the reports with five of the top seven teams selecting thought to be in the market for a new quarterback.