Deion Sanders sounds off on perception recruits choose Colorado to get paid

Colorado head coach Deion Sanders came under fire for the way he constructed the Buffaloes roster during his first season in Boulder.

Sanders leaned heavily on the transfer portal to overhaul a CU roster that went 1-11 the season before he arrived, bringing in 70 new players — 57 of them transfers — as he began to put his stamp on the program.

Now that the Buffaloes have lost seven of their last eight games, many have wondered if Colorado has become a destination school for recruits and transfers given Sanders’ celebrity or the possibility of landing a lucrative NIL deal. Quarterback Shedeur Sanders and cornerback Travis Hunter have NIL valuations of $4.4 million and $2.1 million, respectively, per On3.

“We're not an ATM,” Sanders said during his weekly news conference. “That's not going to happen here. If you come to Colorado to play football for me and the Colorado Buffaloes [it's] because you really want to play football and receive a wonderful education and all the business stuff is going to be handled on the back end if that's the case. We are not an ATM. You're not coming here to get rich unless you really come here with a plan to go to the NFL and get your degree.”

While Colorado was likely appealing to some of the top players in the 2024 and 2025 recruiting classes, that luster has likely dissipated with the Buffaloes' poor end to the season.

But Sanders reiterated that just because the on-field results haven’t been pretty lately, it’s not making a dent in things for him on the recruiting trail. However, the recruiting rankings say otherwise.