Inside Deion Sanders’ unprecedented roster flip: ‘We have plans to go another way’

Travis Gray thought he had Sunday off. The day after Colorado football’s nationally televised, snowy spring game showcase, the offensive lineman was eating lunch at Olive Garden. He had a meeting with coach Deion Sanders scheduled for 3 p.m. Monday — until his phone buzzed with a text message from offensive line coach Bill O’Boyle.

That meeting had been moved up. It started in 30 minutes. An apologetic O’Boyle was waiting in the lobby of the team facility. As they made their way toward Sanders’ office, O’Boyle told him what was happening.

“He’s walking with me and said, ‘Hey buddy, you’re going to get cut today. I’m sorry to tell you this. I didn’t want you to hear it from Coach Prime. I wanted you to hear it from my mouth. I didn’t want to cut you, but we had to cut five offensive linemen, and you were the last one,’” Gray told The Athletic on Tuesday evening.

When Gray walked into Sanders’ office, his head was down. Then he looked up.

“I was like, ‘Oh, God.’ I saw the mean mug in his face,” Gray said. “He told me, ‘You’re 6-foot-8, 320 pounds. I know in my heart of hearts a school is going to pick you up in the portal when you enter. Make your weaknesses your strengths and keep progressing. I hope you have a great future, it just won’t be here at the University of Colorado.’”

Gray was disappointed. The Aurora, Colo. native’s father, Lamarr Gray, was an outside linebacker on Colorado’s 1990 national championship team. His dream of following in his father’s footsteps was over after just a year on campus.

Thank you Buff Nation!! @SixZeroAcademy pic.twitter.com/uu8Uu2TGNh

— Travis Gray (@TravisRGray) April 25, 2023

Most of the 23 Colorado players who entered the transfer portal or announced plans to on Monday and Tuesday were told to do so, players say.

Defensive coordinator Charles Kelly called safety Jeremy Mack Jr., who made 48 tackles last year and worked with the first-team defense for much of the spring, into a meeting with Sanders, too.

“Coach Prime just told me up front, ‘We have plans to go another way. You competed. You did everything we wanted you to this spring, and you fought,’” Mack told The Athletic on Monday. “That was my first meeting with Coach Prime since I’ve been here.”

Since arriving at Colorado in December from Jackson State to much fanfare and intrigue, Sanders warned roster turnover was coming for a program that went 1-11 last season.

“I’m bringing my luggage with me, and it’s Louis,” the Pro Football Hall of Famer famously told his team in their first meeting, referencing the luxury brand Louis Vuitton as a way of announcing better players would be joining the program. “I want y’all to get ready to go ahead and jump in that portal. … The more you jump in, the more room you make.”

In the transfer portal era, pushing players out has never been easier or more common, but no one has done it in terms of sheer volume like Sanders. A total of 51 Buffaloes have entered or said they plan to since the portal first opened in December – 46 since Sanders took over Dec. 2. No other program has lost more than 29 players.

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As in any coaching change, there’s no single reason why players depart. Some do it of their own volition, some less so.

Montana Lemonious-Craig starred in Saturday’s spring game, but he entered the portal Monday. He’s “one of the few kids who wasn’t pushed out” of the program, said Malik James, a private coach of Lemonious-Craig, who didn’t explain the receiver’s decision to enter the portal. “He loves Coach Prime and the program.”

Over the weekend, Sanders reiterated that Colorado would be making room for incoming transfers who Sanders has been chasing.

“You all know that we’re gonna move on from some of the team members, and we’re gonna reload and get some kids that we really identify with,” Sanders said after Saturday’s spring game. “So this process is gonna be quick, it’s gonna be fast, but we’re gonna get it done.”

“We’ve got to make some decisions,” Sanders continued. “That’s gonna be on me now.”

The Athletic reached out to dozens of Colorado’s transfers and spoke with five players who departed the program — three who left before Saturday and two who were cut on Sunday — to get a clearer picture of how the roster turnover has played out inside the Buffaloes program.

Mack may have been caught off guard, but for other players, it was clear where Sanders and his staff were investing their efforts. A line emerged, players said, between the returning players and newcomers.

“None of the new coaches would talk to the old players and treat us the same as the people they brought in,” said tight end Zach Courtney, who entered the transfer portal April 19. “The new guys wouldn’t be picked on as much in film. Coaches would tell them to just do better, but if it was an old player, they’d keep going off on what you did wrong and keep yelling about it.”

Eight Jackson State transfers were on Colorado’s spring roster. One is Sanders’ son, Shedeur Sanders, who Sanders introduced as the starting quarterback at his introductory news conference. Another is Travis Hunter, the nation’s top-ranked recruit in the Class of 2022.

That duo helped Sanders, in his first college coaching job, rack up a 27-6 record in three seasons at the Historically Black College and University, highlighted by a 23-3 record in his final two seasons. Sanders’ on-field success and recruiting prowess reeling in prospects like Hunter and a host of Power 5 transfers turned him into a desirable candidate on the coaching carousel.

So far, the Buffaloes have accepted 29 incoming transfers, some of whom practiced this spring, and more are expected to arrive this summer. College football recently eliminated the cap on 25 signees in a single class, allowing new coaches to flip a roster faster than ever.

Players have until April 30 to enter the transfer portal, but teams can continue to add players to their roster after the deadline.

The five players The Athletic spoke with relayed one consistent reality for players Sanders inherited: He spent little to no time coaching or speaking with them.

“I felt like he was more of a motivational speaker. He gives good advice, but he didn’t really talk to me once,” Courtney said. “I never really got to experience his coaching.”

“No relationship with him at all. I said what’s up to him a few times,” said Gray, who practiced with the second team before an injury during a scrimmage forced him to miss two days of spring practice. “I’m not sure he knew the names of half the kids he got rid of. He was worried about who he brought in. If you were on the 1-11 team, it seemed like he didn’t really care about us at all. He already said he was going to get rid of 25-30 of us, and that’s exactly what he did.”

Defensive back Simeon Harris, who entered the transfer portal April 17 after making 21 tackles as a true freshman in 2022, said he accepted how it was to play for the new coach.

“It was fun. He wants what he wants. He’s old-school and down to earth, and he’s going to be honest with you,” Harris said. “I didn’t really talk to him much, but you say what’s up in the elevator, say good morning, things like that.”

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Two players said they experienced what they viewed as favoritism toward the newcomers and noted that while many of the new players who transferred in meshed well with the team, most who arrived from Jackson State kept to themselves.

Sanders elected to make players earn their jersey numbers in spring practice, with newcomer Jimmy Horn Jr., a transfer receiver from USF, being the first player to be given his.

“Everything you do around here will be earned. We ain’t giving you nothing,” Sanders told the team, according to a video posted to YouTube this spring. “So you gotta go get it, and you gotta take it.”

Cameras are common in the facility at practice, documenting the program for an upcoming reality show and a variety of YouTube channels that cover the program and players within it.

Added one player who is transferring and asked not to be identified so that he wouldn’t have trouble finding a new school: “Wherever the camera’s at, that’s where Deion is.”

Harris and Mack both noted they loved playing for Kelly, Sanders’ defensive coordinator who came to Colorado after four seasons working under Nick Saban at Alabama.

For his part, Sanders continued to speak publicly about the expected overhaul of the roster during spring practice this month.

“What you see is not what you’re gonna see,” he said April 15 of the spring game.

He also noted: “We’re not upset that anybody jumped in the portal and left. And we’re elated about the young men that we have coming in because they’re difference-makers. They’re truly difference-makers.”

Did players like Mack have the option to stay and not transfer?

“I guess not,” Mack said. “At the end of the day, I knew I did everything I could in my control to play ball. I just took it how I have to take it. It was out of my control.”

A recent NCAA rule change allows first-year coaches to cut players from the roster as long as they also honor their scholarships even though they’re no longer part of the football program. Asked about the rule, a Colorado spokesman said the university plans to honor all NCAA rules and bylaws.

Gray said he was offered a chance to keep his scholarship and not play football and hadn’t heard from any teammates who had not been given that offer.

“All the players who entered the transfer portal, we want to play football,” Gray said.

Last year, USC coach Lincoln Riley used the rule to drop 10 scholarship players from the roster as he attempted a quick remake of the program.

The 46 transfers since Sanders’ arrival are a mix of players who contributed at varying levels. Some played little or none at all in their time in Boulder.

Others like running back Deion Smith and receiver Jordyn Tyson, both of whom entered the portal on Monday, led the team in rushing and receiving in 2022, respectively.

Lemonious-Craig caught a 98-yard touchdown in the spring game and led the team with 23 receptions last year, totaling 359 yards and three scores. Nikko Reed, the team’s best cornerback a season ago, left the team and entered the portal last week.

Casey Roddick, one of the team’s leaders last season and its best offensive lineman, landed at Florida State and joined the Seminoles before spring after starting 30 games and playing in 42 for the Buffaloes. Cornerback Kaylin Moore started 14 games and committed to Cal after entering the transfer portal.

Other Buffaloes have landed at Boise State (WR Chase Perry), Charlotte (OL Austin Johnson) and Southern Illinois (OL Noah Fenske). A trio of quarterbacks — J.T. Shrout, Owen McCown and Maddox Kopp — ended up signing with Arkansas State, UTSA and Miami (Ohio), respectively.

But the majority of those who have left Colorado have yet to find new homes. Some could be searching for a while. Others, like Lemonious-Craig, had offers from major schools like Auburn, Penn State and Arkansas pour in almost immediately.

The transfer portal has given players more freedom of movement than ever, and the players who left Colorado will have immediate eligibility.

“He was a businessman,” Mack said of Sanders.

And the rule changes that benefit first-year coaches mean the cold reality that college football is a business hits home for more players more swiftly than ever before.

“For the new players, this spring was pretty electrifying,” Courtney said. “But for older guys, people really didn’t feel like we were wanted there. It was droopy. Sad.”

Said Gray: “We believed in him and his methods, and even though he told us he was bringing his Louis with him and suggested we all transfer, we all still stuck with him until we all got cut on Sunday. He’s trying to do his own thing and make his own team. It’ll be a whole new team, and I hope he has what he’s looking for.”

(Photo: Matthew Stockman / Getty Images)