If you’d told people back in February — hell, even Thursday morning — that Shedeur Sanders would still be on the board late Saturday afternoon, they'd have laughed you off the group chat.

A polished, ultra‑accurate passer who put Colorado on his back and still threw for 4,100 yards behind the nation’s worst offensive line? No way he’d slide past the second round — maybe the back end of Round 1 if a quarterback‑needy team panicked.

Yet there we were, five hours into Day 3, and Rich Eisen practically yelling at his desk: “I’m stunned. I’m absolutely stunned that Shedeur Sanders is still on the board.”

The Cleveland Browns finally stopped the freefall at pick No. 144, and by that point, it felt like just about everyone who had been paying attention either let out a sigh of relief or just shook their head in disbelief.

The question that’s been buzzing ever since — how in the world did QB2 on almost every public big board become QB6 in reality? No matter how you slice it, this was one of the wildest quarterback slides we’ve seen in a long, long time.

When 'Trust the Tape' Only Goes So Far

Stats first, because the numbers scream NFL‑ready. In 2024 alone, Sanders completed 74 percent of his throws for 4,134 yards, 37 touchdowns, and just three picks. Stretch it across his full college resume — 50 games, 14,347 yards, 134 TDs, 70 percent accuracy, and two cultures changed — and you’re talking about a catalog most Power Five passers would frame on the wall.

PFF had him No. 2 in their accuracy charting and third nationally in passing grade under pressure. Scouts compared the poise to Brock Purdy, the footwork to Teddy Bridgewater back at Louisville, and the leadership to… well, his father.

Put on the tape and you see a kid comfortable manipulating safeties, throwing with timing, and — here’s the underrated part — taking punishment without panicking. Colorado’s line coughed up 56 sacks, yet Sanders still ranked top‑five in adjusted completion rate on pressured attempts.

The arm isn’t a howitzer, but he can reach every NFL throw outside the numbers. Bottom line, Shedeur looked like exactly the kind of guy you’d expect to hear called on Day 2 — maybe even late Day 1 if the right coach fell in love with his poise, accuracy, and ability to process the game.

So why the tumble? It starts with what he didn’t do.

Where the Pre‑Draft Process Went Sideways

1. No Senior Bowl, No Combine Throwing

Teams love live reps against equal talent. By skipping all but a handful of Pro‑Day passes, Sanders was effectively saying, “Trust the 14,000‑yard resume.” Fair, but front offices prefer as much data as possible.

2. Interview Rumblings

One assistant coach didn’t even bother sugarcoating it:

The worst formal interview I've ever been in in my life. He's so entitled. He takes unnecessary sacks. He never plays on time. He has horrible body language. He blames teammates... But the biggest thing is, he's not that good.

Pretty harsh words, and once that kind of stuff gets out, you better believe it spreads like wildfire. Suddenly, everybody around the league was whispering words like entitled and uncoachable, whether they had met Shedeur personally or not.

And the thing is, it didn’t even really matter if it was true or totally blown out of proportion. When you’re talking about billion-dollar franchises making million-dollar bets on a kid, perception sometimes matters more than the actual facts.

In April, when the clock’s ticking and decisions have to be made fast, a few bad stories can carry more weight than a full season’s worth of clean tape. Fair or not, that’s just the way it goes.

But it's not as if everyone who sat down with Shedeur felt that way. One GM that NFL Network's Tom Pelissero spoke with leading up to the draft thought it was hard not to like the kid: 

Shedeur, man, you've just got to like him. It's the same thing in every building — I don't think you can get a consensus of 100 percent on him. I still think the Giants can take him.

The Giants didn’t end up taking him, sure, but the fact that an NFL GM genuinely thought Shedeur was worth a first-round pick says a lot. It just shows how wildly different opinions on him were behind closed doors. That GM might not have even needed a quarterback — maybe he already had his guy — but the point stands: some people in the league saw first-round talent in Shedeur, even if others didn’t want to touch him until Day 3. That kind of gap in evaluations doesn’t happen often, and when it does, it usually means there’s something deeper going on than just what shows up on tape. 

3. The Brand Factor

Sanders hosted a full-on draft party, streamed it live on social media, showed off his new merchandise lines, and talked about building a “generational empire” like he was already a CEO. And honestly, you can’t even blame him for being confident. The guy built a brand, handled business, and backed it up with his play on the field.

But the NFL is still run by a lot of old-school decision-makers who get uncomfortable the moment a player starts to seem like more than just a player. When a quarterback builds a big brand, posts on social media a lot, or talks openly about business ventures, some execs start thinking he’s more focused on fame than football — even if that’s not really true.

Boomer Esiason even said it bluntly on air, claiming certain owners literally yanked Sanders off their draft boards:

I’m telling you right now — and I know this after talking to three different personnel people in the NFL this weekend — they didn’t even have him on their board. They took him off, and they took him off because the owner said, ‘Take him off.'

It didn’t matter that Sanders put up numbers better than just about every quarterback taken ahead of him. By the time draft weekend came around, teams weren’t just evaluating quarterbacks anymore. They were evaluating who would make the fewest waves Monday morning when the PR team opened Twitter.

4. Deion’s Long Shadow

Coach Prime’s magnetism sells tickets, fills stadiums, and lights up TV ratings — but it also makes a lot of hierarchy‑minded GMs and head coaches sweat bullets. Deion’s not just a football coach; he’s a brand, a force of nature, and somebody who doesn’t exactly keep his opinions to himself. Last year, he even joked that the only way he’d ever coach in the NFL was if it meant coaching his sons. Funny at the time, sure — but some decision-makers took that and ran with it.

Suddenly, it wasn’t just about drafting a quarterback. It was about the fear of what might come with him: Would Deion be showing up at practice? Would he be sounding off on social media every time Shedeur didn’t start? Would he eventually start lobbying for coaching changes if things didn’t go well? Maybe even want the job himself?

It sounds crazy when you say it out loud, but NFL front offices are allergic to anything they can’t control — and Deion, by nature, is uncontrollable. For some teams, that made Shedeur feel like more of a package deal than just a standalone prospect, and it scared them right off.

Draft‑Day Dominoes: How Five Passers Jumped the Line

Shedeur Sanders wasn’t the first quarterback off the board. Or the second. Or even fifth. He was QB6. But when you look at who those five were, it paints a clearer picture of just how much perception shaped this draft.

Cameron Ward went first overall to the Titans — no shock there. He had skyrocketed up boards late in the cycle, especially after a dominant year at Miami, where he threw for over 4,300 yards and 39 touchdowns while adding four more on the ground. The tools were never in question, and Tennessee made him their franchise guy.

Jaxson Dart was next, taken at No. 25 by the Giants after they traded back into the first round. Many thought that pick might be Shedeur, but New York opted for the Ole Miss product, who had quietly put together a really efficient season — nearly 4,300 yards passing, a 69% completion rate, and solid mobility with almost 500 yards rushing.

Next to go was Tyler Shough to the Saints at No. 40 overall. That one turned heads. Shough’s bounced around a few programs, most recently finishing up at Louisville, but his 2024 season was solid: 3,195 yards, 23 touchdowns, and just six picks. He’s a big-bodied, strong-armed pocket passer — the type old-school scouts still gravitate toward.

Jalen Milroe landed with Seattle at No. 92, despite the Seahawks already paying Sam Darnold big money in free agency. But Milroe’s dual-threat ability and raw potential were just too intriguing to pass up. Twenty rushing touchdowns at Alabama will do that, even if the passing tape was a little uneven.

Then came Dillon Gabriel — the one that stung. Cleveland grabbed him at No. 94, which turned a lot of heads because most of us watching thought Shedeur had to be next. Gabriel had just come off a strong season at Oregon, throwing for nearly 3,900 yards and completing nearly 73% of his passes. But even with that production, almost no one had him above Sanders pre-draft. 

The Browns taking both Gabriel and Sanders within 50 picks before the seventh round is something we haven't seen in a long time — not since 1989, when the Packers drafted Anthony Dilweg in the third round and Jeff Graham in the fourth. Dilweg managed to stick around for a couple of seasons and made seven starts, while Graham never even played in an NFL game.

It’s a reminder that doubling up at quarterback early isn’t exactly common, and when it happens, it’s a real roll of the dice. 

Pat McAfee didn’t mince words on Monday morning, talking with Ian Rapoport about Tom Pelissero's quote from an anonymous assistant coach:

I wonder if he thought it was confidence he was showing. That’s why I wish that report would have come out a little earlier, so then maybe we can correct course a little bit. And maybe there’s a chance to call and say, ‘Hey, I did not mean to come across that way.’ But instead, we’re sitting on stories. We're sitting on stories. I didn't know that’s what you journalists do. That’s unbelievable.

And like it or not, he had a point. Somewhere along the way, the conversation around Shedeur shifted. It wasn’t about the 14,347 yards, the 134 touchdowns, the fact that he got sacked 56 times in 2024 and still completed nearly 75% of his passes. It was about "vibes." About personality. About outside noise.

A Nationwide Head‑Scratch

Social feeds and talk shows lit up faster than a free-agency frenzy, and the takes came flying from all directions:

• Rich Eisen couldn’t believe what was happening while he was on the NFL Network set: “The number of times somebody got picked, late third, early fourth, and I just peripherally see my analysts kind of look at each other, like, really, that kid got drafted?"

• Nick Saban, settling in nicely to his media role, even weighed in, saying, "I feel bad for Shedeur, because I really do think if you look at Shedeur and you say, 'When he's in the pocket and he throws the ball on time,' he is one of the most accurate passers in this draft. And he could be an exceptionally good quarterback if he did that. He played with not so good offensive line, so therefore he became a scrambler, which was not his forte, and he made some mistakes and took too many sacks. And maybe people hold that against him, but I like the guy as a drop-back passer."

• Mel Kiper Jr. wasn’t shy either: “He’s my QB1. Tape hasn’t changed.” Kiper was one of the few who stuck by his evaluation even as Shedeur kept sliding.

• Kyle Brandt of NFL Network didn’t hold back about the love-hate relationship some teams had with Shedeur, saying, "No teams loved Shedeur in the draft. Nobody loved him as a player. If anyone loved him, they would have drafted him way earlier."

• Stephen A. Smith took it a step further: “Clearly, it’s not about talent anymore — it’s about something else. And I’m going to tell you, I spent a large amount of the last 24 hours thinking about nothing more than I was thinking about collusion. Because how in the hell does 32 teams in the National Football League pass on a quarterback that was universally recognized as one of the top three quarterbacks in the country entering this draft? And 32 teams passed on him not once, not twice, not three times, but four different times they passed on him. How the hell does that happen?”

Draft broadcast ratings actually spiked on Day 3 — an extra 800,000 viewers compared to 2024 — largely because fans were glued to the TV wondering how far Sanders would fall and who would finally pull the trigger. Drama sells, especially when it’s unfolding in real time, and Sanders' wait turned into one of the most talked-about storylines of the entire weekend.

The Landing Spot: Crowded, but Not Closed

Cleveland’s quarterback room is absolutely packed, and it’s one of the more complicated groups in the league right now. At the top of the depth chart, you’ve got Deshaun Watson — the $230-million man whose last two seasons ended with major injuries, first a shoulder tear and then an Achilles rupture, and will miss the entire season.

With him out, the presumed starter for now is Joe Flacco, who turned into a bit of a folk hero in Cleveland by stepping in and making magic. Still, the guy’s 40 years old now, and it’s hard to bank on him carrying a full season’s workload.

Kenny Pickett is in the mix, too, after flaming out in Pittsburgh and getting a Super Bowl ring as a backup to Jalen Hurts. Then there’s Dillon Gabriel, a third-round rookie with plenty of college production but real questions about whether his arm strength can hold up against NFL speed.

It’s a crowded group, sure — but it’s far from locked in stone, and that’s where a guy like Shedeur Sanders might just find an opening.

Flacco’s the mentor, Pickett’s on a prove‑it track, and Gabriel’s a rookie too, trying to prove he belongs just like Shedeur. That leaves a lane for him to win hearts in the building the old‑fashioned way — out‑throw everyone Monday through Friday.

Remember: A locker room will shout for the guy who gives them the best chance to win. If Sanders slings it in August joint practices, word reaches Kevin Stefanski fast. Fifth‑rounder or not, practice reps are democratic.

What Happens Next Matters More

The Browns’ decision to grab both Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders on Day 3 might end up being one of the sneakier moves of the entire draft. Cleveland didn't just bring in one young passer to compete — they essentially doubled their lottery tickets without spending much in terms of draft capital. Worst case, maybe one becomes a valuable backup or a trade chip down the line. Best case? They might have found a legitimate future starter for the price of a backup guard.

The broader themes coming out of Sanders' shocking fall tell us a lot about where the NFL is today. Front offices still say "trust the tape" with one breath and then let whispers about personality completely derail evaluations with the next. Analytics and old-school scouting still haven’t fully learned to coexist — because if they had, a player with Shedeur’s production, efficiency, and poise wouldn’t have lasted past pick 64, let alone 144.

It’ll be a fascinating case study over the next few years. But make no mistake: if the Browns end up hitting on one of these guys, it’ll make a whole lot of teams look foolish.