
Football families are something so uniquely special to the NFL. The upcoming 2025 NFL Draft will bless the league with the next football family as Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders, son of Hall of Famer Deion Sanders, hears his name called on Draft Day.
As the son of Deion, Shedeur has been in the spotlight for the entirety of his football career. With the spotlight shining bright on him, Shedeur still rose to the occasion, while embracing the heightened media exposure — and in turn making him one of the NCAA’s most polarizing figures.
The Mannings, the Matthews, the Kelces, many mroe, and now the Sanders. With being part of a legendary football lineage comes heightened expectations and scrutiny. Shedeur has embraced this aspect of his early fame and fortune, keeping his head down, and developing into a pro-ready NFL quarterback.
In this article, I’m going to be taking a look at Shedeur Sanders, examining his strengths and weaknesses, and detailing why he is the most pro-ready prospect entering the 2025 NFL Draft, but also why he is far from a sure-thing.
Shedeur Sanders is prepared to lead an NFL offense
Over the last two seasons at Colorado, Shedeur sharpened his skills under the tutelage of offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur. The Colorado playcaller is a former NFL head coach who has implemented a pro-style offense that Shedeur has run to perfection.

Shurmur’s offense asks a lot of its quarterbacks. Sanders is required to read defenses and call protections at a higher level and with greater frequency than the average collegiate quarterback.
His experience in this offense will make Sanders far more prepared to compete at the NFL level than a typical rookie would be. He might not have the highest ceiling in the draft class. However, Sanders has an undeniably high floor as his experience in a pro-style offense should lend itself to a quick and successful start to his professional career.
Sanders was asked to do a lot more than most collegiate quarterbacks from a field-reading perspective, but also from a volume standpoint. He attempted 477 passes in 2024, the most in the Big 12 and the fifth-most among all collegiate quarterbacks. Colorado didn’t have the best rushing attack so they implemented a quick-passing offense that created yards after the catch for the receivers, essentially asking Sanders to conduct their run game as well as an extension of the passing attack.
Rookie quarterbacks usually have to deal with a steep learning curve upon their entry into the NFL. Growing pains are expected, especially as they attempt to read and diagnose disguised coverages and make pre-snap reads. Sanders has been learning how to do that for two years from a former NFL head coach. That gives him an edge over other rookies entering the league.
Sanders has accuracy, decision-making, and timing: The Traits of an Elite NFL QB
His ability to play in a pro-style offense and read defenses directly ties into Sanders’s other top skills: his ball security, decision-making, and accuracy. Sanders seemingly always knows where to go with the football. This trait, combined with an offense that created space and sprung receivers open, manufactured easy passing windows for Sanders to throw into.

He has excellent timing and mechanics that allow Sanders to throw to his receivers with accuracy and efficiency. This is evidenced by his nation-leading 74.0% completion rate in 2024 and career 71.8% completion rate which set an all-time career FBS/Division 1 record. Sanders knows where to go with the football and consistently puts the ball on the money and on time.
Sanders has above-average, but not elite arm talent. Some might view that as a limitation in his game, however, his film indicates that Sanders has an understanding of when to use touch, when to use velocity, and the ability to throw with each at a high level. Touch passes are Sanders’s money balls. He can layer throws over defenders and drop them into buckets downfield. His passes are easy to catch and hit their targets with pinpoint accuracy — especially when throwing downfield.
Considering the volume of passes he attempted, it’s remarkable that Sanders threw only 10 interceptions and was credited with only nine Turnover Worthy Plays by PFF in 2024. His 1.5% Turnover Worthy Play rate is easily the best in the draft class.
He doesn’t possess any elite physical traits, nor does he have plus-athleticism. But the 6-foot-2 Buffaloes signal-caller has enough size to hang in an NFL pocket and has the field vision to pick defenses apart with proper coaching.
Sanders throws downfield with pure efficiency
In 2024, 15.6% of Sanders’s passes had a depth of 20+ air yards. He completed 34 of those 75 passing attempts (45.3%) for 1,184 yards, 14 touchdowns, and only one interception. Pro Football Focus credited him with 0 Turnover Worthy Plays on 20+ yard passing attempts, indicating that the lone interception was more the fault of his intended target.
Per PFF, Sanders had a 90.5 Passing Grade on throws from every depth in 2024, which accounts for his general accuracy and decision-making. They credited him with 26 Big Time Throws and only nine Turnover Worthy Plays with an elite 81.8% adjusted completion rate.
Clean footwork and married lower-body and upper-body mechanics allow Sanders to get the ball out on time and accurately. His accuracy and ability to hit receivers in stride create run-after-the-catch opportunities that could be maximized at the next level in a West Coast passing offense. Sanders can thrive in a quick-passing offense. An offensive scheme that asks Sanders to hold onto the ball, scan deep, and wait for receivers to get open would be a disservice to his game. Whichever team drafts Sanders should utilize a quick pass attack that utilizes the screen and intermediate passing game as an extension of their rushing attack.
Does Sanders have enough athleticism for the modern NFL?
The pocket passer is a dying breed in the NFL. Nearly all of the league’s top quarterbacks have an aspect of mobility to their game. The best quarterbacks do win from the pocket, however, the truly elite signal-callers possess the ability to extend plays with their legs and make plays both from within and outside of the pocket.

Sanders is limited athletically. He is not going to threaten defenses as a runner and, while he does have enough mobility to maneuver within and escape the pocket, that is not his best trait. Sanders finished the 2024 season with -50 rushing yards, although, he did rush for four touchdowns. Shurmur didn’t call many quarterback-designed runs for Sanders, nor should his playcaller at the next level. His legs won’t be a weapon, but they shouldn’t handcuff him either.
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Top Weakness: Sanders needs to improve his play under pressure
Sanders also has a bad habit of relying on athleticism he doesn’t have to extend plays from broken pockets. At times, he holds onto the ball too long (4.14 seconds average time to throw while under pressure), inviting pressure and taking sacks (20.2% pressure-to-sack rate). He has a tendency to drift back in the pocket, likely stemming from a lack of trust in his offensive line (faced pressure on 36.1% of his dropbacks), which often does more to create pressure than avoid it.

When the play breaks down and pressure surrounds Sanders, he doesn’t always seem to know where his escape lanes are. This causes him to run into pressure at times, rather than running away from it. When he does find that escape lane, though, Sanders has demonstrated the ability to make throws on the run and throw accurately while off platform. The ability to make plays off-script is there, but Sanders often gets in his own way, preventing those opportunities from arising.
Sanders is the NFL Draft’s most pro-ready quarterback, but he is no sure-thing
There is a lot to like about Sanders as a prospect, especially for an offense that wants to prioritize pocket passing and quick route concepts. He has run a pro-style offense at a high level, conducted that offense in both facets of the game, and developed into a refined passer with accuracy at all three levels, touch, and arm talent that stacks up with the NFL.
Sanders has flaws in his profile, such as his underwhelming and at times erratic play under pressure, as well as his lack of experience facing top competition. But in an offensive scheme that protects him from pressure, Sanders could have his skill set maximized. Whichever team drafts him, though, should be careful not to drop Sanders into pressure-heavy situations, nor should they expect him to be a consistent improviser when plays break down.
Whether or not Sanders is a first-round graded prospect will be up to debate. But due to the nature of the quarterback position, and the nature of the 2025 NFL Draft class, he will go in the first round, likely inside the top-10 selections. He is not as refined of a prospect as some of the top quarterbacks from the 2024 class, nor does he have the limitless upside that teams want to bank on early in the draft. However, Shedeur has a refined skill set, valuable experience in a complex offensive scheme, and that Sanders Pedigree. Tracking Sanders at the NFL level will be fun as there is certainly a high-upside professional quarterback to be developed within his skill set.