Colorado's Travis Hunter, Shedeur Sanders explain how they make each other better

Last year at Jackson State, Travis Hunter and Shedeur Sanders developed a unique chemistry. Hunter played both offense and defense, meaning he got to see Sanders’ skillset from both sides of the ball and provide feedback from multiple perspectives.

Now at Colorado, the two are still striving to make each other better.

Hunter and Sanders were two of the high-profile additions Deion Sanders made from the transfer portal. Hunter was the biggest, though, checking in as the No. 1 transfer to hit the portal in the On3 Transfer Portal Rankings. But he credited Sanders for making him better by pushing him on defense.

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That helped improve their chemistry on offense, as well.

“Just him coming and attacking me, seeing my weaknesses on defense,” Hunter said of how Sanders makes him better. “He knows I’ve got a problem with that back-shoulder ball, so in practice, he’ll attack it and attack it. It’s basically him working against me and I’m working against him to figure out what I need to do and what type of good quarterback is going to come at me. When he comes at me in practice, I’ve got something to fix.

“On offense, I just know out of my break, the ball is coming. I can’t take extra steps, I can’t be to hard on my breaks. I’ve got to be focused.”

But Sanders doesn’t just push Hunter. It works both ways, as Hunter’s ability to wreak havoc on defense forces Sanders to become a better quarterback. That leads to productive conversations between the two to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it.

“[Hunter is] a great DB, so he knows what a DB’s thinking,” Sanders said. “I do, too. It’s just the IQ level that we both have when we get on the field and just get in sync. There’s definitely situations on the field where we mess up just in practice, but it’s definitely worth a conversation. What I’ve seen, what he’s seen, what we thought together. Then, we just come up with a solution for the problem that just happened.”

Last year at Jackson State, Sanders threw for 3,732 yards and 40 touchdowns to help lead the Tigers to a 12-1 record, including an 8-0 mark in SWAC play. Hunter had a solid year on both sides of the ball, hauling in 18 receptions for 190 yards and four touchdowns on offense while contributing 19 tackles and two interceptions on defense.

Hunter and Sanders are capitalizing on their on-field success in big ways, as well. They come in at No. 5 and No. 6, respectively, in the On3 NIL 100 with impressive On3 NIL Valuations. Hunter has an NIL Valuation of $1.7M and Sanders is close behind him with an NIL Valuation of $1.5M.

The On3 NIL Valuation is the industry’s leading index that sets the standard market NIL value for high school and college athletes. The On3 NIL Valuation calculates the optimized NIL opportunity for athletes relative to the overall NIL market and projects out to as long as 12 months into the future.