Tom Brady called up Shedeur Sanders following the 2025 NFL Draft, during which he landed in the fifth round. While most agree that he has talent above his draft stock, it’s clear teams [had reservations](https://steelersdepot.com/2025/05/browns-insider-stunned-by-cleveland-drafting-shedeur-sanders-suggests-he-could-wind-up-on-practice-squad/) about drafting him. Having taken the field with his new team for the first time this past week, he now has his first taste of the NFL.
That includes Sanders’ first meeting with reporters as an NFL player, which featured as his second question an inquiry about what he took away from his conversation with Brady. “My story is gonna be similar”, he said, [via Jordan Schultz](https://x.com/Schultz_Report/status/1921234669720244456). “I was a late-round draft pick, but we’re here now, so none of that stuff matters”.
As the draft approached, the possibility of Sanders not going in the first round seemed to grow. Yet when he lasted all the way until Day 3, it came to overshadow every other draft story. That Sanders went to a team that drafted another quarterback ahead of him only adds another layer to the mix.
During the Browns’ rookie minicamp, third-rounder Dillon Gabriel took his snaps ahead of Shedeur Sanders. Under normal circumstances, nobody would have batted an eye, but this is Shedeur Sanders. Of course, it elicited a question to HC Kevin Stefanski, who had to advise reporters not to read into the pecking order.
Sanders, the son of Hall of Fame CB Deion Sanders, does everything in the spotlight. Whether it’s wanted or not, it’s always there. And now the spotlight is on the Browns, and all of his teammates. If he fails, the organization will be blamed for not developing him. Though, of course, others will gladly accept the schadenfreude.
But for Sanders, it’s just going about the work. He begins his career as a fifth-round pick, but still plan to have a Tom Brady-like career. “It’s day by day”, he said of his first practices, via the team’s media department. “I just find something I want to perfect and just perfect it to the best of my abilities and that’s all I really focus on, just being there, just being a leader, being a great teammate, doing what I need to do whenever it is”.
He added that his job “isn’t to prove people wrong. It’s to prove myself right”. In order to achieve the latter, however, Shedeur Sanders will also have to manage the former. If any NFL team believed he was a first-round talent, he would have been a first-round draft pick. That’s simple enough.
Just like the NFL had no idea who Tom Brady would turn out to be in his dad-bod-esque draft photo. The difference is, of course, everybody knows who Shedeur Sanders is. Nobody overlooked him, or didn’t know his tape or what he is about. This isn’t a matter of oversight.