NFL Insiders reveal how bad Shedeur Sanders pre-draft process went, impact on draft slide

Shedeur Sanders saw himself take an unprecedented slide from first-rounder on day one to fifth-rounder on day three during the 2025 NFL Draft. For that to happen, a lot of things had to go against him, namely the pre-draft process for him around the NFL.

‘Get Up’ went in this morning on what went wrong for teams when it came to Sanders in their reaction to him being the 144th overall pick this weekend by the Browns. Dan Graziano was the first to point to that pre-draft process as the only separation he made with the other quarterbacks was negative considering he didn’t work out in any of the settings and he, per reports, did not interview well with franchises, which all then only hurt him as the selections continued on.

“I think the answer it tied to the process you’re referring to. The pre-draft process did him no favors,” Graziano said. “He didn’t do the things, he didn’t, you know, workout at the combine. He didn’t do things that, that people want guys to do when you’re trying to determine is this guy worth taking? He was not viewed by the league as an elite quarterback prospect. I think only Cam Ward among the quarterbacks in this class was. So, to separate yourself from Jaxson Dart, who the Giants liked better, or Tyler Shough, who the Saints liked better, you have to do some things and Shedeur Sanders, during the pre-draft process from everything I’ve been told, didn’t help himself too much.”

“He had some positive experiences in interviews with teams but he also had some ones that didn’t go very well at all. And I think there was a sense, you know, people looking back at Deion in the fall saying, ‘We’re gonna pull an Eli‘ and, like, is he trying to steer himself away from certain teams?” Graziano thought. “It was just a lot going on. And I think, by the time we get to the third round and teams are thinking about backup quarterbacks, now you have, well, if we bring him in as our backup quarterback, is there going to be a whole circus around it? Nobody wants that with their backup quarterback.”

Mike Tannenbaum, a former general manager, felt the same in his opinion on what happened with Sanders. Teams didn’t feel he was a good enough prospect on the field to justify what they didn’t like about him off the field, whether with the workouts or interviews, during this pre-draft.

“When your ability is not beyond reproach, the pre-draft process matters,” said Tannenbaum. “One is the objective competition. So, when you look at the other quarterbacks that were drafted before Shedeur Sanders, they all competed in some way (at the combine/pre-draft bowl). Now, this is not outcome-determinative. There are plenty of other quarterbacks that didn’t do a lot, be it run a 40, participate at the combine…So, if you’re the Giants and you’re looking at competition, and you’re looking at one guy that’s doing everything and one guy that’s doing nothing?”

“The other part, which is probably even more important, is the pre-draft process is an interview process,” Tannenbaum said. “In fairness, I was not in these interviews with Shedeur Sanders. But it is reasonable to conclude, in talking to many others, that he had some interviews that were very bumpy and, when that happens and your ability isn’t an A, that’s what’s going to happen.”

Finally, Peter Schrager felt the same about it being several things, including the impact of the media focus, working against Sanders. It only worked even harder against him then once the draft unfolded and it became a selection of him through the lens of a backup than as a starter.

“Look, I think this is a combination of things. To your point, you can do that stuff. And, Caleb Williams last year met with one team, refused any other interviews, did not work at the combine, did not do anything and said I’m only interviewing with the Bears, don’t even bother talking to me and he went first overall. You have to be a Caleb Williams-style of quarterback in that it is a bar none, first-round prospect,” Schrager said. “I think the media is complicit in this as well. We, we also thought that, that Shedeur Sanders was a first-round prospect and every mock draft you looked at up until the draft had Shedeur Sanders as a first-round mock pick. So, I think this is a bigger picture story of, where did it all go wrong? This is one of the first prospects that was targeted as a first-round pick the day of the draft to go in the fifth round.”

“I also think, just talking to NFL teams, you can have an unorthodox style of pre-draft and you can have no agent and you can say things like, ‘I’m going to come in there and, the second I come in there, I’m going to change your culture’ and, if you’re the starting quarterback, and the first overall pick or a first-round pick, you’re ready to run through a wall. To be a backup quarterback, that stuff might actually hurt you in a way that other quarterbacks who come in and say, ‘I’m just here to work. I want to help the starter’ who might have a bigger advantage in that process,” added Schrager.

It’s obvious that something didn’t go right for Sanders from the end of his college career to start of his professional one over the past four months when it came to teams in the NFL. That won’t soon be forgotten as he now tries to move on from it on the field instead in Cleveland.

“I think it was an accumulation of things that started with, he wasn’t viewed as an elite prospect and then he didn’t do anything in the months leading up to the draft to really help himself,” said Graziano.

“I am absolutely stunned that he went in the fifth round,” Tannenbaum said. “But, at the end of the day, teams have the right to make decisions based on the pre-draft process. These are job interviews.”