College Teams Should Rethink Retiring Numbers

'Give People Their Flowers'

I’ll admit I have more of a traditional view when it comes to the criteria of retiring a player’s number—championships, all-American selections, all-time records, etc.—so the decision to retire No. 2 at Colorado made me scratch my head.

Sanders, along with Coach Prime and Hunter, deserves credit for helping to return the Colorado program back to prominence and providing a much needed culture change, but it’s not enough to retire his number. The lone argument that has made the most sense came from Coach Prime himself.

“Give people their flowers while they can enjoy them and they can smell them,” Deion said after the Buffaloes’ Spring Game.

Colorado had previously only retired four jersey numbers in its 135-year football history: No. 24 Byron White, No. 67 Joe Romig, No. 11 Bobby Anderson and No. 19 Rashaan Salaam, who received his honor posthumously. Like Salaam, who won the Heisman in 1994, it was recently announced that national championship-winning coach Bill McCartney would have a statue erected at Folsom Field, who died on Jan. 10. Clearly, Coach Prime has a point and there are plenty of Colorado legends that are deserving of having their numbers retired. Unfortunately the school has lagged behind in doing so.

Schools should absolutely honor their legends and honor them while they are still around to see it. But instead of retiring numbers, schools wanting to celebrate their tradition should stick to Hall of Fames and Rings of Honor. Both of these methods are easily determined by whatever criteria one wants to use. Another tradition that can be used to highlight a specific number is by passing that number down each season to a deserving player.

If a school is set on retiring numbers, there’s no reason to jump to that sort of honor for a player who has only just run out of eligibility. While I applaud Coach Prime’s initiative to recognize players or coaches before they are gone, schools should not be in a rush to permanently retire numbers.

Lighting a Fire

Although much of the backlash Sanders has received during and after the NFL Draft is of his own doing, according to reports, retiring his number ultimately was a disservice and added to the immense scrutiny and pressure he was already facing being, not only the son of a coach, but being the son of a Hall of Fame, generational talent. There’s no doubt Coach Prime is proud of his son and wanted to celebrate his accomplishments, like all fathers, but it became part of the narrative and might have contributed to Sanders’ slide to the fifth round.

Despite all that, Sanders has his entire NFL career ahead of him and he should use the situation he has found himself in as fuel for the fire to prove all the naysayers wrong. He has been served a healthy serving of humble pie, but he has the rare opportunity to rewrite his own story by overcoming the immense scrutiny. By putting in the work and dedication it takes to become a starting quarterback for an NFL franchise, Sanders’ jersey retirement might one day be considered the beginning of a spectacular career.