Deion Sanders stirs up even more chaos and tarnishes Colorado football with his cult of personality

When I moved to Fort Myers, Florida, in 2000 to write down a three-day-a-week sports column, I quickly realized that town’s most famous athlete had a difficult relationship with his hometown and the local media.

Deion Sanders was born and raised on this city, once considered The Most Divided Country in Americawhere a train station separated whites from blacks until the Nineteen Seventies. Returning to town while playing at Florida State within the mid-Eighties, Sanders was arrested at a shopping center for allegedly attempting to steal. He was arrested again in Fort Myers — in 1996, while playing for the Dallas Cowboys — for trespassing and fishing in a non-public lake on the airport.

In general, he never trusted town authorities, the police or the media.

That’s the default position for black men on this country, comprehensible given American history. When you’re a superb generational talent with a track record to match your extraordinary athleticism and you grow up poor amid the standard racism of the Deep South, your skepticism can grow. While Sanders has develop into a marketing marvel and one of the best corporate salesman since leaving Tallahassee, the sport stays an us-versus-them proposition.

You are either with him or your enemy; there isn’t any in between.

Colorado, which opens its season Thursday night, went all-in by hiring Sanders as its head football coach, putting him in the motive force’s seat and strapping him in. The destination could also be uncertain, but there’s no mistaking who’s driving the bus. And Sanders desires to run over a neighborhood sportswriter he clearly can’t stand.

“After a series of ongoing, personal attacks on the football program, and Coach Prime in particular, the CU Athletic Department, in conjunction with the football program, has decided not to answer questions from Denver Post columnist Sean Keeler at football-related events,” the athletic department said in a press release. he said in a press release last week.

Keeler clearly doesn’t like Sanders, whom he has referred to in various columns as “Deposition Deion,” “Bruce Lee BS” and “false prophet.” Colorado’s football program has also been discredited, called “Planet Prime,” “Deion Kool-Aid” and “a circus.”

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These takes could also be exaggerated depending in your perspective. Fans of New York teams and athletes have seen worse within the Big Apple tabloids. But Keeler’s criticism is just not unique. Sanders’ brash and boastful personal style has, over time, created hordes of critics, culmination last 12 months in his first season at Colorado. He rebuilt this system in his own flashy image and was the talk of the faculty football world because the Buffaloes won three of their first 4 games. But the haters had the ultimate word as CU lost its final six games to complete 4-8.

Sanders’ sensitive side with the media got here to the fore in 1992, when he tried to make history by playing in an NFL and MLB game on the identical day. Baseball commentator Tim McCarver criticized the choice, and Sanders aggressively threw ice water at him within the Atlanta Braves locker room. His petty nature resurfaced in 2021, when he coached Jackson State and a neighborhood reporter was banned after the story concerning the assault allegations against the brand new recruit. Now Colorado is taking orders from Sanders in his relationship with Keeler.

“Keeler remains permitted to attend football-related activities as an accredited media representative, and other Denver Post reporters may ask questions of football program personnel made available to the media, including coaches, players and staff,” the college said in a press release.

Colorado needlessly rushed to Sanders’ defense, as if he were too weak to handle Keeler on his own. Sanders can answer or decline to reply anyone’s questions as he sees fit. Media members who use insults, especially “false prophet,” understand the danger of getting the cold shoulder in return. Sanders will be polite and skilled—or rude and vulgar—and still give Keeler nothing. The athletic department didn’t need to get entangled.

Coaches don’t need to like every thing that’s written or said about them. But they do select what kind of leader they need to be and what kind of behavior they need to model for the young individuals who look up to them. Being touchy and vindictive is just not the type of example I would like to set, but that’s who I’m. Sanders is just not the primary to lean into bullying when in power, but his response is unlucky nonetheless.

Winning would help. The more a coach wins, the larger an asshole he will be. Fans and school officials don’t care which reporters will ask questions if Sanders starts gathering the Ws. Colorado is blissful to simply accept the notion that “Prime Planet” is fully effective if it results in championships and playoff berths.

Otherwise, it’s just going to be an even greater mess to deal with, due to Coach Prime bringing national attention to Colorado.

You get what you pay for.