Deion Sanders Named Sports Illustrated Sportsperson Of Year
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00:00 Deion Sanders has a lot of nicknames. Primetime, Neon Deion, the head coach of
00:05 the Colorado Buffaloes, but he just earned one more. Sports Illustrated
00:09 Sportsperson of the Year. How deserved is this for Deion? Well, he's a fascinating
00:14 character and he always has been. Yeah. And the other thing that he always has been, I
00:18 think Matt Ruhle at Nebraska said this before their game. He, and he was, Matt Ruhle
00:22 was very careful to not say something incendiary because that's a bad, I was,
00:26 later in the year it didn't quite work out for the Buffaloes, but he still
00:29 turned around a bad program and made it a fascinating and solid program. And got a
00:33 lot of eyeballs as he did it. Revenue, T-shirts, NIL money, ticket prices, which were the
00:40 easiest ticket to get last year, this year, hardest ticket to get in college
00:43 football. Right. What Ruhle said was, I'm not surprised that they're doing
00:49 well. Everything Deion Sanders has ever tried, he's done well. And it's true.
00:53 Yeah. Football, baseball. Yeah. The late, great Gil Brandt once told me when he
01:00 went to scout Deion at Florida State, he said he just, he was watching him run
01:05 track, I believe, and he said he could play pro basketball. First of all, because
01:09 of his magnetic personality would draw the attention of our gang at Sports
01:16 Illustrated. Yeah. And even though over the years, you know, he's a friend of the
01:19 show. Yes, he is. But, you know, I've had my... We've had the pleasure of interviewing him.
01:23 We have. And over the years, I've had the pleasure, and sometimes because of the nature of my
01:27 job and his job, there's been conflict, but he's never not been fascinating. Yeah.
01:33 He keeps it real. Yeah. And Sports Illustrated, Sportsperson of the Year, is
01:39 in part an honor of Deion Sanders' ability to be fascinating. Love it.
01:45 [BLANK_AUDIO]