Deion Sanders adds this future Hall of Fame coach to his fan club

Nick Saban obviously knows Deion Sanders. Unless Aflac uses some incredible green screen technology, the two have shot at least one commercial together.

With that said, liking someone off the field and respective a competitor (or coach) on it is a completely different thing. These head coaches are competitors at the highest level and you can bet that it would take a lot to impress Saban. 

He's seen a lot since stepping onto the scene as head coach at Toledo in 1990, and one would imagine his seven national titles and 287-70-1 overall record would make it easy for him to scoff at a coach who has started 3-0.

"Those are rookie numbers, you've got to pump them up," one could imagine Saban telling Coach Prime. 

That's apparently not the case, though, because Saban recently expressed a ton of respect toward Sanders during an SEC media call.

“I haven’t been able to see them a lot. Saw a little bit of the game last week against Colorado State, but I have a tremendous amount of respect for Deion Sanders. First, he’s a great person and he’s done a great job of marketing the program to create a lot of national interest, but I see their team playing well on the field," Saban said, per On3.

“They play with discipline, they do a good job of executing,” Saban continued. “They’ve been able to score points. They’re decent on defense. All those things to me are indicators that he’s a really good coach. I’ve always thought that and he’s always been successful whether it was Jackson State, high school or now in Colorado, his teams have always been well-coached.”

Saban is right, Sanders has proven to be a winner everywhere. We're talking about a guy who won two Super Bowls and also made a World Series appearance thanks to his nine season MLB career. 

Think about that. He played in the MLB and NFL at the same time, and he wasn't just a face on the team. Sanders was an eight-time Pro Bowler and six-time first-team All-Pro.

He's been successful everywhere he's been with everything he's done, so is anybody surprised that Colorado is 3-0, ranked nationally, and arguably the biggest story in sports?

It doesn't sound like Saban is.