Deion Sanders' secret weapon at Colorado: the son who no longer plays football

The three sons of Deion Sanders are expected to play big roles this year for the football team at Colorado, including one who is expected to be the starting quarterback and another who plays defensive back.

But it’s the other son, the oldest, who may have had the biggest impact so far on the program his father is trying to build with the Buffaloes in Boulder.

His name is Deion Sanders Jr. Though he doesn’t play football anymore, Sanders Jr. instead is using a video camera and various social media channels to do something that no other college football program is doing quite like this. He’s building an audience for Colorado football, one video at a time, with daily behind-the-scenes access to players, coaches and the celebrity life of his dad, CU's new head coach.

“We try to flood the market,” Sanders Sr. said about the strategy on one of his son’s videos from January.

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BOLD STATEMENT:Deion Sanders wins with huge first recruiting class at Colorado

It’s worked. This content – along with Sanders’ big personality – have helped dramatically increase the size of the Buffs’ audience since their arrival in early December. Count the eyeballs:

► Subscriptions to Sanders Jr.’s YouTube channel, Well Off Media, have rocketed to about 250,000, up from about 80,000 in late November, when Sanders Sr. was head coach at Jackson State in Mississippi. One video of their first team meeting at Colorado in December has been viewed 4.2 million times.

► The total aggregate following for the Colorado football program’s individual and team social media accounts also has increased by 500% since Sanders’ hiring at CU in early December, said Jim Cavale, founder of INFLCR, a content software platform used by athletes to build their social media presence.

Why does this matter?

More eyeballs lead to more interest from fans, businesses and recruits.

Colorado finished 1-11 last year – its 15th losing season in the past 17 years. But the number of businesses and other registrants that are looking to pay Colorado football players for the use of their names, images and likenesses (NIL) has increased 258% since Sanders’ arrival, according to Cavale, whose company helped launch the Buffs NIL Exchange last year.

Colorado also just landed a Top 25 class of newcomers for 2023. Next year’s recruiting class is ranked 13th in the nation, according to 247Sports.

Those recruits have been watching, along with their parents.

Sanders Jr. knows this because they told him when they visited campus recently with their sons.

“Ninety-nine percent of them of them told me, 'Hey man, we watch the videos every day,’” Sanders Jr. said in an interview with USA TODAY Sports. “You could have the best product on Earth, but if people don’t know about it, you’re not going to sell it. It’s showing how good of a product it is. It’s showing how great Boulder actually is.”

In this case, they’re doing it as a running reality show of sorts, headlined by Sanders Sr., a former two-sport superstar and celebrity pitchman for Aflac insurance and Oikos yogurt.

That is what sets Colorado apart from other college programs that also are pushing more personalized content on social media. It’s sort of like making movies. Any Hollywood studio can do it, but can they make one with an A-list actor that is compelling enough to draw a big audience?

Few other college football coaches are as famous as Sanders, also known as Coach Prime. Some don’t even have Instagram accounts, unlike Sanders Sr., whose account of 3.2 million followers also is handled by Sanders Jr.

Others aren’t allowing video coverage of them to this degree in private settings.  

“The level of access that Deion (Sr.) is providing is unprecedented,” Cavale said. “And it’s not just access. It’s him in the content showing vulnerability.”

What videos show

Among other things, Sanders Jr. and his colleagues have shown Sanders Sr. eating at restaurants in Boulder, socializing in the campus cafeteria, going out for a pedicure and giving a tour of the CU facilities to the rapper Lil Wayne – a video that got more than 900,000 views.

CU players also are featured in offseason workouts, lifting weights and flinging footballs, all against a backdrop of the natural beauty of the flatirons near campus.

In one video dated Feb. 14, Sanders Jr., 29, follows his father, 55, on a walking tour of Folsom Field. They climbed to the highest row in the back of the end zone where Sanders seemed awed by the setting of his new job.

“Wow,” Sanders Sr. said as he scanned his surroundings. “Wow.”

It got 200,000 views as of Tuesday. Another video showed Sanders Sr. behind the scenes in Arizona at the site of the recent Super Bowl, where he socialized with former sports stars Allen Iverson and Derek Jeter – a clip that got 270,000 views.

These are spontaneous interactions, too, not scripted or planned, Sanders Jr. said.

“It’s literally capturing moments,” he said.

Others do this differently

In some respects, this almost makes Sanders Sr. the prototype coach for the social media and NIL age of college football, even though he hasn’t coached a game yet for CU.

“I’ve always thought that there could be this perfect combo one day, where you have somebody who already has influence because of their career as an athlete who is now a coach and has captured their influence and put money and time into their social, like Deion has with his son,” Cavale said.

By contrast, some powerhouse programs such as Alabama might not feel the need to be as active and accessible on social media. Their championships sell themselves without it. Other coaches also prefer to delegate social media content to staff instead of actively engaging with it. But the essence of recruiting is still trying to appeal to young people. And it helps to meet them where they are online.

“Alabama has a good social account and a good content team, but (coach Nick) Saban is not going to be in the videos,” Cavale said. “You don’t hear from  Saban on a daily basis. You can’t understand what the program is like behind closed doors from watching social because he doesn’t allow that.”

It’s worked for him anyway, but times are changing.

How it affects NIL

In 2021, the NCAA for the first time allowed college athletes to earn income from their NILs. Sanders Sr. still recently downplayed that as a recruiting attraction at CU.

“If you’re here for NIL, or to be rich, we’re not the school for you,” he said Feb. 1.

But that’s not to say he’s against his players earning extra money when they can. And the bigger the audience, the more they can potentially make, which also boosts recruiting. Sanders Jr. notes that on-field performance will drive a player’s visibility, but “you can be a star off the field, too.”

“It helps with recruiting because everyone watches it,” Sanders Jr. said. “These kids with NIL, they want to start their own brands, too, because the more you’re seen …  that puts more money in the athletes’ pockets, which a lot of them are worried about today.”

Some are stars already, to a certain degree, with the help of Sanders Jr. and Darius Sanders, who is not related to Deion Sanders but is a friend of the family who helps with social media content and videos. They help boost the social accounts of some Colorado players, including cornerback Travis Hunter, the nation’s No. 1 high school recruit in 2022. Hunter has 136,000 subscribers on YouTube and 560,000 followers on Instagram, where he has promoted Celsius energy drink, one of his NIL sponsors.

Hunter and quarterback Shedeur Sanders, the coach's youngest son, rank third and fourth nationally in annual NIL valuations of at least $1.6 million, according to on3.com's college football rankings.

“There are specific players I highlight more because they’re comfortable,” Deion Sanders Jr. said. “They have more swagger with the camera. They’ll dance. That’s what people want to see, versus just sitting there. You have to show good content, along with what’s good for the brand.”

Sanders Jr. is careful about that. He does not work for the university. He works for himself, with his father as his partner. And his father has standards.

How it started

Also known by his nickname "Bucky," Sanders Jr. is a former football player from SMU in Dallas who also developed recording skills as a rap artist and videographer. He previously made football highlight tapes of his brothers in high school and then took it to another level when his dad and brothers went to Jackson State. 

“When I first got to Jackson State, they weren’t not just going let me sit here on the sidelines – so let me start recording, let me start doing something,” Sanders Jr. “That stuff just took off, but I was doing it for myself, posting it on my Instagram. I wasn’t even thinking about YouTube.”

His dad noticed his skills and soon asked him to run his social media accounts. It wasn’t an automatic yes at first.

“I called my sister (Deiondra) and said, `You know how it is working with daddy,’” Sanders Jr. said.

Early on, his father was “involved with everything,” but the son soon learned what the father wanted.

“Each person you’re working for, you’ve got to understand what they like and what they don’t like,” Sanders Jr. said. “It was a learning process (to understand) what his vision is and throwing your spice on top of it and then just running with it. He expects greatness in everything.”

The goal could be summarized with one of Coach Prime’s favorite recent sayings: “I ain’t hard to find.”

He’s intentionally easy to find and follow with interest on social media. Asked about his “strong social media presence” recently at a speaking engagement, Sanders Sr. explained how it worked.

“I got a strong son over there that does my social media,” Sanders Sr. said. “How you doing son?”

The son was busy, working and filming it with his camera, as usual.

"In this family, you’re not just going to be around – you have to work," Sanders Jr. said. "I’m not here to be his son. If I was just his son, I could have stayed in Dallas. The only reason I’m out here is because I'm here to work. I’m here to add to the brand. I’m here to add to the goal."

Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. E-mail: bschrotenb@usatoday.com