Seven-time Super Bowl champion and Las Vegas Raiders minority owner Tom Brady said he was surprised to see former University of Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders fall to the fifth-round of the 2025 NFL Draft as he had no role in the team's draft evaluation process.

Brady, who is a minority owner of the Las Vegas Raiders and has served as a mentor to Sanders, the son of Pro Football Hall of Famer and Colorado coach Deion Sanders, claimed he had no part "of any evaluation process" during the latest episode of Logan Paul's Impaulsive podcast this week.

“I mean … it’s a good question," Brady said when asked why Sanders fell to the Cleveland Browns at No. 144 overall. "I wasn’t a part of any evaluation process."

“Skip Bayless says otherwise,” Impaulsive co-host Mike Majlak interjected, referencing the analyst's claim that Brady had a role in the Raiders' draft decisions.

“I know,” Brady replied. “That’s the problem with media is everyone can just say whatever the f**k they want.”

Brady, who went on to become the most decorated quarterback in NFL history despite falling to No. 199 overall in the 2000 NFL Draft, confirmed that he reached out to Sanders after the latter's draft fall.

“I actually texted Shedeur ’cause I know him very well. And I said, ‘Dude, whatever happens, wherever you go, that’s your first day. Day 2 matters more than the draft,'” Brady said. “I was 199. So, who could speak on it better than me, what that really means? Use it as motivation. You’re gonna get your chances. Go take advantage of it.”

Sanders will wear No. 12, the same number Brady wore throughout his 23-year career, the Browns announced on Tuesday (May 6). The former Colorado standout was reported to have "sandbagged" interviews with teams he was less interested in prior to the 2025 NFL Draft, which led to him falling to the fifth-round, rather than his first-round projection, CBS Sports' Jonathan Jones reported last month.

“At some of those [combine] meetings with certain teams that maybe Shedeur Sanders didn’t really want to go to … I was told that he more or less sandbagged in those interviews,” Jones said.

“I don’t know if he didn’t take them seriously, what it was, but he did not give it his all in some of those interviews,” he added. “Rubbed some teams the wrong way.”

Sanders' father had previously implied that he had specific teams in mind for Shedeur and his other son, Shilo, who also played for the Buffaloes and eventually signed with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as an undrafted free agent. The Pro Football Hall of Famer teased that he and Shedeur would take similar action to former New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning and his father, former NFL quarterback Archie Manning, when they expressed their desire for Eli to not play for the then-San Diego Chargers prior to the 2004 NFL Draft.

“I know where I want them to go,” Deion said. “There’s certain cities where it ain’t going to happen … It’s going to be an Eli. We ain’t doing that.”

Manning was, in fact, selected by the Chargers at No. 1 overall in the 2004 NFL Draft, but traded to the Giants for Philip Rivers, who was selected at No. 4 overall, as well as other picks. Shedeur, however, was passed by all 32 teams for four rounds before being taken by the Browns at No. 144 overall in the fifth-round of the 2025 NFL Draft on April 26, two rounds after Cleveland had already selected former Oregon quarterback Dillon Gabriel.

Our American Stories