Has Deion Sanders Checked Out After CU Buffs Latest Loss?

The Colorado Buffaloes dropped another game this past Saturday against Arizona State. And the main topic of conversation is Deion Sanders not having the financial funding from the boosters to recruit top-tier athletes with Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) to be a Big 12 contender.

Coach Prime is facing the reality that when his "Louis luggage" came to Boulder, it was the peak of his tenure. Many of the athletes who were coming to Boulder wanted to play with Shedeur Sanders, Travis Hunter, and Shilo Sanders. Since they have moved on, athletes are running to Boulder to be a part of the program as they once did, or if they do come, they leave after a season because things aren’t what they were perceived.

All the talk about how he wanted to eliminate the losing mentality upon his arrival in Boulder was top priority. Who would have envisioned things being what they are right now? The mentality Coach Prime wanted to eliminate is turning into that very thing he supposedly was eliminating. The Buffs' head coach's body language on the sideline Saturday night watching the team's offensive inability to move the ball downfield had to be gut-wrenching.

The Buffs' offense went 3-and-out on three consecutive drives. They picked up their first down of the game with 7:48 in the second quarter. When the Buffs had two timeouts remaining, down 10-0 before the half, they faced a fourth and 6 on Arizona State's 34-yard line. Instead of making sure Isaac Wilson and the offense were running the right play, Coach Prime did nothing. Wilson was sacked for a 24-yard loss, turning the ball over and Arizona State went into the half down 17-0.

Watching Coach Prime do that to his team showed several things: one, his interest in coaching the Buffs football team isn’t there anymore. The second thing is he’s trying to prove a point to the boosters of Colorado University that if you don’t want to give me the money to recruit a winning team, this is the best you're going to get.

The team currently has $19.5 million allotted to the team for NIL, which is ranked 54th amongst all Power Four programs, but several of those programs have winning teams (i.e. Utah).

If you believe the issue is the Buffs' talent, they have several players on defense that can flat-out play, like Gideon 'ESPN' Lampron, Liona Lefau, Boo Carter, and Santana Hopper, to name a few. The Buffs had a five-star quarterback who can manage an offense and is capable of reading the back end of the defense, with the ability to not put the ball in harm's way.

Wilson has been successful in throwing the ball 21 times a game since he’s been named the starter. But requiring Wilson to throw the ball 30 to 40 times in a game, he hasn’t been as successful.

The Buffs showed early this season they would be successful rushing the ball, and that has literally been nonexistent, with the team losing six out of the seven games.

I’m sure the Buffs fans feel like they have been put on a timeout by their head coach this season, because all the excitement they once had for the team when he first arrived seems to have gone up in smoke. Coach Prime made it clear before the season started that he was hands-on with recruiting this current team that is currently 3-6.

Could this be the third time in four seasons that a Coach Prime-led Colorado team has won a single conference game? Buffs fans have three games to see if it happens for the third time. The Buffs fans deserve better than to be given excuses as to why they aren’t having the success that was promised to come.