“I don’t know if I reached out to him (first), or he reached out to me,” the legendary former CU Buffs quarterback recalled to me by phone a few days ago. “I know (when) I reached out to him, he asked me if was in town. I said, ‘Yes, I’ll come up there.'”

This was late March or early April. The new Buffs athletic director and CU icon spoke for about 45 minutes on campus. Lovo laid out his vision for CU. They talked about Hagan’s legacy in Boulder, on and off the field.

“It went well,” Hagan said. “It was an opportunity to go up there and meet the new guy. He was awesome. It was good.”

It was cathartic, too, at least on Hagan’s end. At 56, still takes on life with a forward lean, still loves kids, still loves teaching. Darian’s heading into his third season as running backs coach at San Diego State, where former CU offensive coordinator Sean Lewis went 9-4 last fall with the Aztecs.

But for a couple years now, Hagan hasn’t exactly been sure where he stood with his alma mater. After two decades with CU football, the Buffs’ great wasn’t retained on the staff by new coach Deion Sanders. The university transitioned him to a non-coaching role when Coach Prime was hired in December 2022. Hagan had felt a little shut out when Sanders’ inner circle took charge and left CU to join Lewis’ staff in December 2023.

When the Buffs retired quarterback Shedeur Sanders’ No. 2 jersey in the spring of 2025, an honor that had bypassed great CU signal-callers such as Hagan and Kordell Stewart, it opened up old wounds again. So Lovo welcoming Hagan back to campus, a year later, Hagan felt, was a refreshing gesture.

“He’s a great dude,” the ex-Buffs QB said of the new Buffs administrator. “He made me feel good about CU.”

And when it comes to mending fences, that’s as good a start as any.

‘There shouldn’t be this contentious relationship between Buffs fans’

As Coach Prime heads into his fourth season in Boulder, CU football alumni remain divided. Not in their love for the Buffs. Not in their appreciation for what Sanders has done to elevate a program into the national conversation after Pac-12 irrelevance for more than a decade threatened to bury it.

It’s a perception thing. With the exception of a statue unveiling for former Buffs football coach Bill McCartney last year, a ceremony that wasn’t open to the public, many Buffs football alums feel as if CU athletics’ official position is that football at Folsom Field didn’t exist prior to Coach Prime. Which is funny, given that the Buffs won eight or more games 13 times from 1985-2005, a feat the current coaching staff has accomplished to date just once.

“Some of these new Buffs fans act as if CU didn’t play football before Coach Prime showed up,” said Brown, who was a second-team All-American linebacker at CU in 1992, when the Buffs went 9-2-1.

“And (yes), maybe CU wasn’t on the radar. But obviously, we’ve won national championships. We were among the top 15 (programs) in wins, all-time … and unfortunately, and with social media, as is often the case, things often turn ugly. So I’d love to see (Lovo) find a way to bring everybody together.

“Because we’re all Buffs fans. There shouldn’t be this contentious relationship between Buffs fans. And if I’ve got criticisms of Coach Prime’s program now, not only am I told I’m a terrible Buffs fan … but also, I’m asked, ‘What did I do for the program for the last 20 years?’ And I’m like, ‘Wow. Let me see. I’ve funded a scholarship. I’ve gone and I’ve talked to the team. I’ve done private coaching with players.’ The list is long. So the massive disconnect (on social media), I think, is unfortunately turning a lot of older fans off and away from the program. And that’s the exact opposite of what we need.”

The decision to retire 2024 Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter’s jersey before he had graduated, or even begun his NFL career, raised the eyebrows for several ex-CU football players from the ’80s, ’90s and ’00s. The jersey retirement for the program’s first Heisman winner, Rashaan Salaam, had taken years to come to fruition before its unveiling in 2017, not long after Salaam took his own life.

“It certainly didn’t help it at all,” Brown said. “Not only from an alumni standpoint, but (with) people within the building. If you can’t get a consensus within the building, that lets you know that it’s not being handled right. I don’t think anybody had any issue with a Heisman winner (Hunter) getting his number retired. But again, how it was handled, the timing of it, the pushing of it out there, even within (CU circles) over there, was not unanimous.”

Hagan, who was 28-5-2 as a Buffs starter and quarterbacked CU to a national runner-up spot in ’89 and to the program’s last national title in ’90, admitted to feeling hurt last year with the Hunter/Shedeur number retirements.

“Am I bitter or (anything) that my jersey’s not been retired?” Hagan reflected. “No. I’m not bitter at all. It would have been a nice gesture, but that doesn’t define who I am as a person. But, definitely, it would be awesome to walk in that stadium and see my name on a wall with other retired numbers.”

How can Lovo repair Buffs bridges that were recently burned? Former CU wide receiver and offensive coordinator says the Buffs A.D. would be wise to include more ’80s and ’90s football alumni in decisions such as retiring numbers going forward. And to more legacy tributes beyond a statue that’s tucked into one quiet corner of a practice field.

“I would tell (Lovo), it’s not about damage control at this point,” said Chiaverini, . “It’s about doing right by the guys who’ve earned the right to be up there.

“To me, there are deserving players like (Eric) Bieniemy and (Alfred) Williams and Hagan — the list goes on and on. Countless All-Americans that were on 10-win and 11-win teams that, as an alum of CU, they need to (do it) the right way. Alums should be involved in this conversation. They should be included in this conversation. Nothing against Travis or Shedeur. They’re both great players in CU history. I’m a fan of them both. And I’m actually a fan of Deion. My thing is … I think there’s got to be some transparency in the voting process.”

‘You can’t erase that history’

Hagan said he was told that former Buffs greats had to be All-Americans or national award winners.  That they had to wait a decade to be recognized.

He’s still waiting.

“What makes me feel good is, a lot of people say, ‘Man, I wish they would do the right thing and retire my number,'” Hagan laughed. “People tell me that all the time, but I’m not bringing up the subject.

“But I’m definitely for a committee to get these things right. (And) not just for myself — for Eric Bieniemy, Alfred Williams, Kanavis McGhee, Kordell Stewart. Somehow, they’ve got to get it right. And do it the right way. I think that would appease a lot of people.”

Former Buffs want more outreach, not less. Hagan walked away from his meeting with Lovo feeling that the new caretaker of CU athletics gets it, at least. And that meant a lot, given the previous 20 months.

“I can’t speak for everyone. I can speak for myself,” Hagan said. “I’m a little biased. But at the same time, that’s my alma mater, I love my alma mater, I want to see them do well.

“But I think what (Lovo) needs to do is galvanize some things to make the guys (who played at CU) feel special. Make them feel like what we did is still relevant. We accomplished some great things there, that I think, at some point, need to be recognized and (revisited) again. Because the things that we accomplished, you can’t erase that history.”

But when legalized sports betting debuted in Colorado in 2020, another tradition took hold at those Lot W tailgates: sports gambling. Now, when the family assembles before the home games, they discuss parlays and point spreads almost as much as they talk about Bo Nix and Sean Payton.

On a warm January day, while partying outside their late-model Winnebago painted with blue-and-orange stripes, they figured out the wagers they planned to put on the Broncos’ final regular-season game, against the , and other NFL matchups.

They weren’t alone. Sports betting and fantasy football dominated conversations throughout the parking lots as tailgaters speculated how much they might win.

The gameday bets — putting a little money on the line — are all part of the fun of football Sundays, said Joe Canales, a family friend who joined the tailgate.

“We all get excited when somebody wins,” he said.

Legalized sports betting is changing the face of sports and fandom in Colorado as people wager billions annually on games and on the athletes who play them. In the six years since voters approved Proposition DD, the state’s gamblers have wagered more than $30.6 billion on sports, averaging $425 million a month.

For years, sports betting was taboo within the professional leagues as commissioners and team owners kept gambling at arm’s length for fear of scandal. Now, leagues and teams promote their partnerships with gambling companies. Fans watching games on TV are inundated with sports-betting ads, and those in the stands can see gambling companies’ names painted on courts and fields.

Bettors often care more about individual athletes’ performances than about their hometown teams as they wager on how many three-point shots a basketball player will make or how many touchdowns a quarterback might throw, multiple people told The Denver Post. Athletes feel the pressure, whether it’s because they receive angry messages on social media from people who lose money or from gamblers seeking an edge from inside information.

Legalized gambling is also threatening the integrity of sports, with fans fearing athletes, coaches and referees may alter calls or plays to influence the outcomes of bets. Just before the NCAA’s March Madness basketball tournament kicked off, Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Connecticut, that found a majority of Americans — almost 60% — believe sports betting affects the integrity of college basketball.

“It����ap ruining the relationship between a player and their sport, and it����ap ruining the relationship between fandom and the athletes,” said Montee Ball, a former Broncos running back who leads the , which focuses on athletes’ mental health.

All of that is forcing coaches and administrators to incorporate gambling and mental health awareness into athletes’ training, with education now starting as early as high school for athletes in Colorado.

In the past six years, sports betting scandals have rocked professional and college leagues, ensnaring Colorado athletes such as hometown basketball legend Chauncey Billups, who was implicated last fall as an unnamed co-conspirator in a rigged NBA betting scheme.

This story, which examines how gambling is changing sports, is the third in The Post’s series about legalized sports betting’s impact on Colorado. The first story looked at an alarming rise in gambling addiction, while the second installment covered how sports wagering’s tax revenue benefits water projects in Colorado.

Sports betting has existed in America as long as athletes have laced up their high-top sneakers. In the past, gamblers sought bookies in secret to place bets, collect winnings and pay debts. Gamblers turned to offshore sportsbooks once the internet became accessible.

Now, sports fans place bets from their phones, often in the middle of games, thanks to a that overturned the , allowing states to set their own laws regulating sports betting. Colorado acted quickly, putting the question to a ballot referendum in November 2019; voters allowed sportsbooks to open for business in May 2020.

And, almost as quickly, Denver’s professional sports teams announced business deals with gambling companies.

An evolving relationship

Just a little more than a decade ago, the was so antagonistic toward sports gambling that the league’s commissioner threatened to suspend Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo over his plans to attend that was being organized by a company he owned.

The NFL prohibited players from participating in any event sponsored by a gambling-related company, and the league so narrowly defined gambling that fantasy football was included, even though those games pit people against each other rather than the house, which keeps the profits.

Players are still not allowed to bet on the NFL, play daily fantasy games or visit sportsbooks during football season. But the league and team owners have embraced sports betting.

Denver’s major sports teams are reluctant to talk about those new business relationships, with every professional team as well as the University of Colorado Boulder and its football coach Deion Sanders declining The Post’s interview requests.

The Broncos and the Colorado Rockies sent prepared statements via email, declaring that they follow the rules while protecting their players and the games’ integrity.

“In compliance with the NFL’s gambling policy, all members of our organization undergo comprehensive training on the subject,” the statement from Broncos spokesman Patrick Smyth said. “For players, this includes mandatory in-person education as well as in-season communication and other resources from the team and league.”

The Broncos inked their first business deal with sports-betting app in June 2020 — one month after Colorado’s sportsbooks opened for business.  The team also partnered that summer with , which opened a now-shuttered luxury lounge inside the stadium, and . Today, BetMGM is the team’s lone sports-betting partner.

The Colorado Rockies partner with Denver-based , allowing the company to have a sign on the outfield wall.

also partners with bet365 as a sponsor for the and . That , which allows bet365’s logo to be placed under the Avalanche’s ice and on the Nuggets’ baseline, is in place through the 2028-2029 season.

Courtney Brunious, an assistant professor at the , said he was not surprised Denver’s teams did not want to talk about their business relationships with gambling companies.

“There’s still a certain stigma attached to it,” said Brunious, who teaches sports business. “It’s still — I don’t want to say an uneasy relationship — but it’s an ongoing and evolving partnership. It’s not necessarily something they want to put a spotlight on.”

The gambling companies are eager to associate with professional sports because it puts their names in front of enthusiastic fans, Brunious said. The teams benefit from sports gambling because people who bet money on games are more likely to watch them on television, boosting coveted audience numbers.

The sure thing, Brunious said, is that those relationships will not dissolve. There’s too much money at stake.

“It’s not going away,” he said. “It����ap going to require adjustments to make sure all parties are protected as much as possible.”

The sports teams and betting companies are entwined with each other’s success.

Every decision a team makes is analyzed by gamblers and can move a betting line up or down, changing the fortunes of those who wager and those who make money off of it.

When the Los Angeles Rams on June 1 traded for reigning defensive player of the year Myles Garrett, that team became Las Vegas oddsmakers’ favorite to win the next Super Bowl. Meanwhile, the odds for Garrett’s former team, the Cleveland Browns, dropped to 200-to-1 from 115-to-1, according to a news release from Circa Sports.

Peter Jackson, the chief executive officer of , FanDuel’s parent company, explained in a February how “player narratives” impact his company’s revenue. When the NFL’s most popular players are not in the playoffs, the fans bet less money, he said.

“There was one player we had on our books over the course of the year that had more money bet on him in the course of the season than the Pats did,” Jackson said, without naming the player. “This player stuff is super important, and when we don’t have those key players making the playoffs or the Super Bowl, it really does impact player engagement and betting volumes.”

Pressure and harassment

Players are well aware that fans’ interest in their performance is more intense when money is on the line.

They already face performance anxiety because players are super competitive and want to win, said Ball, who played for the Broncos during the 2013 and 2014 seasons. Professional athletes also know that an injury or a bad game can cost them playing time and shorten their careers. Now, they also have pressure from fans who want to win money by betting on whether they throw a touchdown pass or catch an interception.

“The athletes can’t escape it,” Ball said. “They shouldn’t have to turn everything off because John is screaming on Twitter, ‘I hope you tear your ACL.’ ”

Athletes in all sports are reporting an increase in harassment since sports betting became legal.

Nuggets guard Bruce Brown brought it up on Oct. 23 in the wake of an NBA sports-betting scandal, telling reporters, “Obviously, after every game, we get DMs about not hitting people’s parlays. There’s been games where I’ve been called every name in the book, just because I didn’t hit a three or two. I mean, that����ap just the state of the game we’re in, since sports betting got legal. So I mean, just kind of deal with it. Not think about it. Don’t check your DMs after games.”

Cory Fox, senior vice president of public policy and sustainability at FanDuel, said the company banishes gamblers from its app if they are caught harassing athletes. The other legalized sports books have similar policies.

“First and foremost, we find the harassment of athletes abhorrent,” Fox said.

In June 2025, FanDuel who heckled Gabby Thomas, an Olympic gold medalist in track. The fan, who goes by “Mr100kaday” and describes himself as “The Track and Field Bully,” posted a video of himself hurling insults as Thomas signed autographs and claimed that his heckling caused Thomas to lose the race and allowed him to win a $1,000 parlay bet.

FanDuel is working with sports leagues to develop a process to identify and investigate harassers so they can be banned from the app, Fox said.

“It’s also true there has been an increase in bad behavior,” he said. “This is something we’ve seen globally and it has a lot of factors involved.”

Temptation lurks

There is another dark side to sports gambling — rigged performances.

A major betting scandal rocked the NBA in October when the Terry Rozier, a former Charlotte Hornets point guard, who stands accused of participating in an illegal sports-betting scheme using inside NBA knowledge to defraud sportsbooks and for checking out of a game early to benefit bettors. He has .

And the city of Denver was shocked when Billups, who was then the head coach of the Portland Trail Blazers, was linked to the Rozier scandal as an apparent unindicted co-conspirator. Billups was also for allegedly participating in a Mafia-backed illegal poker scheme to defraud unwitting players during card games. He has also pleaded not guilty.

Other sports-betting scandals involving athletes with Colorado ties:

• Denver Broncos defensive lineman Eyioma Uwazurike was suspended for the 2023 season for gambling on NFL games, including five involving the Broncos
• Colorado Rapids midfielder Max Alves was removed from the team in 2023 in the wake of a match-fixing investigation in his home country of Brazil
• Jontay Porter, the brother of former Nuggets starter Michael Porter Jr., was banned from the NBA in 2024 after he disclosed confidential information to sports bettors about his health and limited his participation in one or more games for betting purposes while playing for the Toronto Raptors

Sports betting scandals are almost as old as sports themselves. Think of the Black Sox scandal during the 1919 World Series, when multiple team members conspired with professional gamblers to throw games.

, who played in the NBA for eight years and overseas for three, said gambling is part of the culture for professional athletes.

During his 11 years of pro ball, teammates would bet on anything — trick shots during practice, card games on the road, even which referees would call a playoff game, Funderburke said. It’s the nature of being competitive and confident.

“You’re taught at an early age to bet on yourself,” he said. “You’ve overcome the odds, right? Little League, high school, college, now in the NBA, you’re playing against the best in the world. You always feel like you can overcome the odds. And with athletes, they feel like they can win at just about anything.”

Funderburke, who now works as a financial adviser, speaks out against gambling and tells his clients there are better things to do with their money. He traveled to Colorado in May to encourage lawmakers to pass a bill that would establish guardrails on sports betting in an attempt to curb addiction rates.

“Here’s the problem with the culture,” he said. “Most of the guys that I know — and I won’t say names — who had issues with gambling, not only end up having financial constraints and issues, but their marriages and their families deteriorate at the same time, which I think is much worse than any type of financial problems.”

The professional leagues and universities know the temptation is there and they are working to combat it.

But they are not always successful.

The controversy surrounding Texas Tech quarterback Brendan Sorsby serves as the latest example.

‘A source of heartburn’

Days before the NCAA March Madness basketball tournament, sent a warning to all of its athletes: Sports betting is against the rules.

“It is still to a large degree one of the worst violations you can have,” said , CSU’s associate athletic director for compliance. “With sports wagering, the door pretty much gets shut down. Like a positive drug test too many times, your eligibility is just shot.”

However, the Sorsby case upended that policy for college football.

Sorsby made thousands of impermissible bets worth at least $90,000 on college and pro sports, including some on his team when he was a freshman at the University of Indiana. The NCAA suspended Sorsby after he was caught and admitted to gambling, but he sued in an attempt to play his senior season.

A Texas judge ruled June 8 through a temporary injunction that Sorsby should be allowed to play during the upcoming season after serving a two-game suspension. The ruling could overturn NCAA rules, and it propelled college football into uncertainty as to what happens if other student-athletes bet on their own games.

The decision undermined a longstanding NCAA policy that forbids college athletes from gambling on sports and bans them if they’re caught betting on their own teams.

College sports are rapidly changing, with athletes able to earn money from their schools, booster clubs, television commercials and social media feeds. They have more money in their pockets now — in some cases, millions of dollars, Siemer said. The temptation to bet on sports lurks, he said, especially for high-level athletes who believe they know more about their sport than anyone else and can predict wins and losses on sports-betting apps.

“That’s a source of heartburn for us,” he said. “We don’t want to legislate morality, but they have more money now than when they just had a scholarship, and we want them to be smart with it.”

Every student-athlete signs a gambling agreement, acknowledging that they cannot place bets and cannot provide insider information to others, Siemer said.

Each year, CSU brings in experts to talk to students about the risks of gambling and to educate them on the NCAA’s rules that prohibit gambling. The athletics department wants them to understand how important it is that they do not leak tips about injuries or game strategies to others, who might benefit from the inside knowledge, Siemer said.

Last year, a presentation to students revealed just how much money was bet on each sport during a single season, and while Siemer said he could not remember the specifics, he recalled that it was “jaw-dropping.”

While football is the most popular sport for gamblers who bet on CSU sports, other teams also see healthy amounts of wagers, he said.

“I think the presumption is everyone is betting on football,” Siemer said. “Well, it’s not just football. It’s all of the sports. These sports-betting companies will put a line on anything. It doesn’t matter. Women’s tennis. Women’s soccer. The presumption that it’s all on football and basketball should be put to bed.”

Nip it in the bud

Aside from talking to athletes about the pitfalls of gambling, the leagues and teams are turning to professional monitors for help. The NCAA’s major conferences contract with , a company that specializes in sports compliance and integrity.

Matt Heap, a former deputy director, manages IC360’s , a program that monitors betting among athletes at more than 150 universities and more than 25 professional sports leagues.

“That monitors every game, every goal, every pitch,” he said.

Prohibet coordinates with sportsbooks to detect irregular gambling patterns, Heap said. The colleges also provide identifying information — dates of birth, driver’s licenses, phone numbers — on every student-athlete, making it easier to detect prohibited bets. Prohibet also monitors coaches, trainers, administrators and referees to identify irregular betting patterns.

The program can even find crossover bets from different internet addresses that can connect student-athletes to accounts owned by friends and family, he said. Word is spreading among college athletes that they can get caught, he said.

“It nips it in the bud,” Heap said. “The ones that continue to do it and push it are the ones they need to keep an eye on.”

IC360 also works with NCAA athletic departments to educate athletes on the rules surrounding gambling and to warn them about the pitfalls surrounding them. Even telling a friend, family member or classmate about a team member’s injury can sway bets, Heap said.

“Something that seems as innocent or innocuous as that can be the first sign someone is trying to get a hook into a player,” he said. “You guys are targets because someone who wants to manipulate a game outcome has to have a player, a ref or some other game official.”

Those who work with athletes believe education about sports betting must start at a younger age.

Last year, the paired with the to start a gambling awareness program for high school athletes.

CHSAA officials wanted players, parents and coaches to understand the rules and the consequences of violating them, commissioner Mike Krueger said. It’s becoming a national issue at the high school level.

Legal sportsbooks don’t take wagers on high school sports because it is prohibited by state laws, but offshore betting sites accept those wagers, as do emerging prediction markets. People must be 21 to open a legal sports betting account in the U.S., but young people access them through family members and older friends.

“It’s recognizing the reality,” Krueger said. “That’s where we’ve got to have the awareness. While sports betting continues to expand across our society, our responsibility remains unchanged. We look at it as a student well-being issue and not just around rules enforcement.”

READ MORE FROM THIS SPECIAL REPORT: Colorado’s gamble on sports betting

One place the Colorado coach won’t go — gambling on the college game, the likes of which has generated a scandal inside the very conference his team resides. Wagering has jumped to the forefront of college football as won a court order early last week that restored his eligibility and set aside a ban by the on pro and college sports. Colorado plays Big 12 rival Texas Tech on Oct. 3 as part of homecoming festivities.

“Somebody’s gambling on a sport they’re playing? You don’t think something’s wrong with that?” Sanders said in a recent interview with The Associated Press and before the latest court ruling with Sorsby. “Just say that to yourself: This guy on my team is gambling on the sport, in the competition, that we’re about to go out there and have. Something’s wrong that.”

Sanders has plenty of thoughts on refining in this day and age of the volatile transfer portal and lucrative name, image and likeness deals. His takes include a salary cap in an effort to even the NIL playing field, hiring a retired coach as commissioner (a ), instituting some sort of an age limit, teams and, of course, a hard pass when it comes to betting (he’s talked to his squad about this topic).

“The game is still the game,” Sanders said. “The game is just positioned differently. Money’s involved, and any time money’s involved people tend to migrate to what they think they can get out of it, instead of what they could put into it — and that����ap unfortunate.”

Bladder cancer diagnosis

A year ago, Sanders was going through , which included having a section of his intestine reconstructed to function as a bladder. This being Men’s Health Month, he’s working with Depend underwear to encourage regular checkups (and launching a program titled “Depend Wake Up Calls” that allows consumers to receive video messages from Sanders through June).

Earlier this spring, Sanders for a few days as he dealt with blood clots. But he said he’s “feeling great. I’ve got my old swagger back.”

Along with it, a new outlook, which includes actually taking vacation time. Sanders recently partnered on a beachfront property in St. Croix with his entering his second season as a quarterback with the Cleveland Browns.

“I never would’ve done that, because I don’t go anywhere,” the 58-year-old Sanders said. “I’m stepping out, just living life.”

Sanders missed football camps last summer in Boulder as he went through cancer treatments. The Buffaloes finished with a 3-9 mark a year after making a bowl game behind Shedeur Sanders and .

This offseason, a more hands-on version of Deion Sanders.

“I have everybody in that locker room because we said we want them,” he said. “Because I sat there and watched tape on them and said, ‘That����ap who I want, that����ap what I want. Let����ap go get them.’”

The new landscape of college football

Sanders found it funny that his heavy reliance on the so many raised eyebrows.

“Now, everybody’s doing the same thing that I did,” he said. “But it was crazy back then, right?”

He’s seen and heard the plans from conferences — and the legislation proposals from lawmakers — on how to adapt college football in this new landscape. It����ap a lot to untangle, which is why he advocates for an authoritative figure to help oversee the sport.

“A guy like Coach Saban and some of the other coaches that have walked away from the game not because they can’t coach anymore but because they were fed up with how things are operating,” he said.

Sanders also would be in favor of implementing a salary cap (see: NFL).

“So you can really have a consistency with the game,” Sanders said. “The thing about the pro game, everybody gets to spend the same amount of money. It����ap who is crafty in regard to business. College football isn’t like that. You may have a team that����ap spent $40 million playing against a team who spent $10 million. You darn well know the outcome in that game.”

That leads him to his next point — .

“You can’t have a 30-year-old man playing against a 21-year old man and think it����ap fair,” he said. “Should be a transfer rule as well. You’re teaching kids not to fight through adversity when you’re having kids able to transfer two or three or four times.”

As for NIL, he momentarily pondered if anything might have been different for him had a similar system been in place when he was at Florida State.

“It probably wouldn’t have (changed),” said Sanders, a college and pro football hall of famer. “I’ve had a pretty good run. I’m still running, too — still high stepping. I’m probably in the third quarter of this game (of life) and we’re winning. We’re up by about 21. I’m loving life.”

___

AP college football: and

CU hosts Texas Tech on October 3. Red Raiders quarterback Brendan Sorsby has no business inside Folsom Field, unless he’s bought a ticket. Presumably with blood money from a three-team parlay that hit a few days earlier.

Sorsby is 22. He’s young. We’ve all done dumb stuff when we’re invincible during those young, dumb isolated moments. Sorsby, though? He’s a repeat offender, dodging accountability as if it were a blitzing linebacker.

According to court documents, the Texas native placed at least 40 wagers on Indiana football while he was a member of the Hoosiers. He reportedly used others’ online sportsbook accounts to place bets totaling roughly $90,000 over four years. He gambled in Bloomington. He gambled as a member of the Cincinnati Bearcats.

Basically, Brendan is the Art Schlichter of Generation Z. Remember Art? One of the great wasted careers in NFL history. Ohio State star. Drafted No. 4 overall by the Colts in 1982. Got the gambling bug as a teenager in small-town Ohio, an addiction that would ruin his life at almost every stop.

If only he had Sorsby’s lawyers. Or some friendly Texas judges.

On Monday, one of those justices, a man named Ken Curry, ruled that the NCAA would be causing “probable, imminent and irreparable injury” to Sorsby if it prevents him from playing this fall. Curry granted the young man a preliminary injunction that prevents NCAA brass from punishing Sorsby for violating — again, repeatedly — its rules on sports betting.

Now let’s get this out in the open first: The NCAA is a rotten, wage-fixing cartel that’s deserved, for years, to feel the wedgies that it’s been getting lately from the courts.

Just not this one. The NCAA was wrong to create the idea of a “student-athlete” as an indentured servant who would have to work sports as a full-time job while never being technically paid for that time and commitment.

Yet it was right to take a hard line on sports wagering, given the audience and devotion to its entertainment product. Much of the NCAA’s enforcement has been selective, arbitrary and occasionally silly. But if you don’t enforce competitive integrity, you might as well give up the ghost.

Now Texas Tech is haunting CU and the rest of the Buffs’ Big 12 peers. Oh, sure, Red Raiders officials will say they’re backing Sorsby to bring awareness and outreach to the cause of mental health, and how dare you shame an addict. Horse hockey. The Red Raiders are digging in their heels because said addict is a 6-foot-3 gunslinger who tossed 27 touchdowns at Cincy last year against just five interceptions while sporting a 140.8 lifetime passer rating as a collegian. If Brendan didn’t have NFL arm, Bubba Bootstraps would shrug and look the other way. Only now that it’s running with the blue bloods, Texas Tech wants back in the College Football Playoff again — and Sorsby is one of those keys that unlocks the penthouse.

“The injunction issued (Monday) regarding Brendan Sorsby is troubling,” new CU athletic director Fernando Lovo said in a prepared statement released earlier this week, “as his admitted actions are a clear violation of long-held standards of integrity in college athletics … this injunction is a clear affront to the competitive principles that have been the foundation of college sports for more than a century. We will continue to engage with the Big 12 Conference and our peers on this issue.”

Why? Tech didn’t consult with any of you when it came to picking up Sorsby, skeletons and all. Last July, the Red Raiders signed a five-star lineman, Felix Ojo, for what was reportedly a three-year, fully-guaranteed $5.1-million contract. Context: The No. 11 pick in the 2026 NFL Draft is slotted to make $5.26 million this fall.

If I’m Lovo, I don’t wait around for Big 12 commissioner Brent Yormark to grow a spine. I cancel anything I’ve got scheduled with Texas Tech, in all sports, until Sorsby is off the roster.

Then I call CSU athletic director John Weber.

How’s this for a twist in the tale? Instead of playing a dirty, tainted Red Raiders squad on Oct. 3, the Buffs should host rival CSU on Oct. 10. Bring back the Rocky Mountain Showdown three years early.

CU keeps that home game — now with potentially a bigger home gate, to boot. New CSU coach Jim Mora gets to tangle with his old pal Deion Sanders and gets a chance to shock the world, and put his stamp on the Front Range, in Year 1.

Before you laugh, look at the calendar. CU and CSU both have concurrent bye weeks on Oct. 10. The Buffs host Utah on Oct. 17. CSU visits Texas State on Oct. 15.

Now, granted, that’s a lousy turnaround for the Rams, given a Thursday nighter on the road. Ah, but lookie here: The Bobcats don’t play a game between Oct. 16 and Oct. 24. As recently as March, Texas State athletics presented the CSU tilt as a flexible date, Surely, CBS Sports Network can find something else to fill that prime-time Thursday night window.

Why not here? Why not now? The Buffs and Rams wrapped up a home-and-home, two-year mini-series in ’23 and ’24 that made Colorado the center of the college football universe. Studio shows from ESPN and FOX were tripping all over themselves for Front Range real estate. The games themselves featured biting coach-on-coach smack talk, sellout crowds and epic performances (Shedeur Sanders in ’23; Travis Hunter in ’24).

Which is why it’s a shame that there isn’t another CU-CSU football game on the docket until September 15, 2029, in Fort Collins. That’s a five-year gap — which would be the longest in the history of the rivalry since it was renewed in 1983. The Buffs and Rams have tussled 34 times in the last 43 years, with CU winning 26 of the matchups.

It’s too good, too juicy, to keep mothballed in the attic for this long. If activist judges are going to burn college football to the ground, you might as well dance in the ashes with the time it’s got left.

Utah, Arizona and Arizona State all shredded the Buffs en route to dominating victories.

Overall, the Buffs ranked 13th in the Big 12 in points allowed (30.5 per game) and last in yards allowed (425.7 per game). Nationally, CU was 135th out of 136 FBS teams in rushing defense, giving up 222.5 yards per game on the ground.

The good news? There’s been a total reset on defense this offseason, including new coordinator Chris Marve, several new assistant coaches and a host of new players. Of the 44 players on the defensive roster, just eight were with the Buffs last year and three of those are walk-ons who didn’t play much.

Led by Marve and 29 transfers, the Buffs are hoping to be a much better unit this year, with Marve setting the tone in the spring.

“We’ve made it crystal clear who we want to be and how we want to do things,” he said. “We want to be violent and aggressive. We’ve defined and gave visible examples of what being violent and aggressive looks like. We want to play extremely fast. So, that����ap on the players to be aggressive to the ball, but also on the coaches, specifically me, in terms of making sure we don’t call things or do things that slow them down. We have to play smart, can’t beat yourself.”

As Marve looks to establish those standards, here’s a position-by-position look at the defense and special teams:

Defensive line

Scholarship: Malachi Brown, 6-foot-3, 315 pounds, Jr.; Ezra Christensen, 6-2, 280, Sr.; Santana Hopper, 6-2, 265, Sr.; Dylan Manuel, 6-1, 300, Jr.; Josiah Manu, 6-5, 295, Fr.; Tyler Moore, 6-0, 290, Jr.; Sedrick Smith, 6-4, 320, Jr.; Samu Taumanupepe, 6-3, 375, Jr.; Quency Wiggins, 6-5, 255, Sr.

Walk-ons: None

Outlook: The only player in this room who was with the Buffs last year is Wiggins, who was a defensive end in 2025. He has since bulked up to move inside and could be a key player on the line. Hopper was first-team all-conference at his previous two schools (Tulane and Appalachian State) and had a great spring for the Buffs. Manuel had a good year at App State a year ago and played well in spring. Moore, Smith and Taumanupepe are all aiming for key roles after playing as backups in previous stops. Brown was a late addition from the junior college ranks and brings size and experience. Manu, a Thompson Valley High School graduate, was brought in as an offensive lineman but moved to defense in the spring. He could be counted on for depth. Christensen was first-team All-Conference USA last year at New Mexico State and has the potential to be a starter for the Buffs, but as a former JUCO player he needs a court ruling to gain an extra year of eligibility, so his status is unclear.

Defensive end

Scholarship: Toby Anene, 6-4, 260, Sr.; Immanuel Ezeogu, 6-1, 239, So.; Sam Gadie, 6-3, 235, Jr.; Balansama Kamara, 6-3, 257, Sr.; Lamont Lester Jr., 6-2, 230, So.; Domata Peko Jr., 6-4, 235, Jr.; Kylan Salter, 6-2, 230, Jr.; Yamil Talib, 6-2, 240, So.; Vili Taufatofua, 6-3, 259, Sr.

Walk-ons: None

Outlook: There is plenty of talent here, which should allow the Buffs to improve upon their 13 sacks from a year ago (which tied for 14th in the Big 12). Anene, Kamara, Lester and Taufatofua all earned all-conference recognition last year at previous schools and they played well in spring. Salter, the lone returner from last year, moved from inside linebacker and made some plays in the spring game. Peko Jr. missed the spring with injury but has good potential to help. Gadie, who is a summer addition, Ezeogu and Talib provide good depth.

Inside linebacker

Scholarship: Rodney Colton Jr., 6-1, 225, Fr.; Carson Crawford, 6-4, 220, Fr.; Colby Johnson, 6-2, 195, Fr.; Gideon Lampron, 6-0, 220, Sr.; Liona Lefau, 6-1, 227, Sr.; Tyler Martinez, 6-2, 225, Sr.

Walk-ons: Gage Goldberg, 6-0, 210, So.; Bo LaPenna, 6-1, 235, Sr.

Outlook: This was a major weakness for the Buffs a year ago, but they believe it����ap a strength now, with Lampron, Lefau and Martinez forming perhaps the best trio of inside linebackers CU’s had under head coach Deion Sanders. All of them were highly productive full-time starters and leaders at previous schools. Colton, Crawford and Johnson are all talented, but they are true freshmen. They’ll be counted on to get up to speed in a hurry in case they are called upon.

Cornerback

Scholarship: Preston Ashley, 5-11, 185, Fr.; Boo Carter, 5-11, 200, Jr.; Justin Eaglin, 6-0, 177, Sr.; Emory Floyd, 6-1, 195, Sr.; RJ Johnson, 6-2, 185, Jr.; Paul Omodia, 6-2, 198, Jr.; Donavan Stephens, 5-10, 170, R-Fr.; Jason Stokes, 6-2, 184, So.; Cree Thomas, 6-1, 190, R-Fr.; Makari Vickers, 6-1, 190, Jr.; Maurice Williams, 5-11, 170, Fr.

Walk-ons: Kole Mathis, 5-8, 140, So.

Outlook: Late in spring, Sanders said Thomas, a transfer from Notre Dame, had emerged as the top corner in the room. At the time, the Buffs were utilizing Carter in more of a nickel role, but that might change, as he could be a starter at corner. Carter and Thomas could form a talented duo in the starting spots. Eaglin and Floyd were All-Sun Belt players last year, while Johnson and Vickers both started games for the Buffs. They’ll all compete for playing time. Ashley, who could play nickel, and Williams are among CU’s better freshmen on the roster and both could play key roles. Omodia, Stephens and Stokes are talented players that add depth.

Safety

Scholarship: Braylon Edwards, 5-11, 180, Fr.; Ben Finneseth, 6-2, 205, Sr.; Randon Fontenette, 6-2, 220, Sr.; Naeten Mitchell, 5-10, 175, Jr.; Jaydan Hardy, 5-10, 180, Jr.; Jah Jay Boyd, 5-11, 173, So.

Walk-ons: None

Outlook: As long as this group stays healthy, it could have a major impact on the Buffs’ season. Mitchell, who was all-conference at New Mexico State last year, is in the mold of former CU star Cam’Ron Silmon-Craig and could be a big-time playmaker. Fontenette was a two-year starter and captain at Vanderbilt, and Finneseth is an experienced starter at CU who is one of the team’s best leaders. Hardy (Oklahoma) and Boyd (Indiana) both came from winning programs and they’ll bring good depth, while Edwards is one of the best young players on the team.

Special teams

Scholarship: Damon Greaves, 6-1, 190, Sr.; Joshua McCormick, 6-0, 205, Sr.

Walk-ons: Elliott Arnold, 5-10, 165, R-Fr.; Aiden DeCorte, 6-1, 300, So.; Daniel Gerlach, 6-0, 160, Jr.; Luke Whiting, 6-4, 225, So.; Trey Young, 5-11, 210, So.

Outlook: Greaves returns after a solid season last year as the Buffs’ punter. He’s also a team leader. With Alejandro Mata graduating, the Buffs will have a new placekicker for the first time since 2022. Arnold, who displayed a powerful leg in high school, will have that job going into the season and the Buffs are confident in him. McCormick was brought in as a kickoff specialist, while Gerlach is a capable backup at punter and kicker. DeCorte, Whiting and Young are battling for long-snapper duties.

CU coach Deion Sanders loves his son and means well. But continued involvement in his career remains a problem.

Deion said Shedeur “went through hell” during his pre-draft process and rookie season in Cleveland, alleging that untruthful reporting contributed to the adversity and drama.

Shedeur, a record-setting quarterback in his two seasons in Boulder, fell to the fifth round after many mock drafts pegged him as a top 25 pick. Reporting citing NFL sources claimed that Shedeur bombed his combine interviews, causing the slide.

As a dad, Deion had every reason to be furious with these stories. Destroying a prospect’s character behind the veil of anonymity is bush league. But teams operate in vacuums. For Shedeur to drop to the 144th pick, something gave NFL teams pause, whether it was his skillset, traits or an aversion to distraction.

The Browns, looking for their quarterback of the future since Bernie Kosar, took him because they felt the reward outweighed the risk, that throwing another dart even after drafting Dillon Gabriel in the third round could pay off more than a backup at another position.

Following injuries and ineffectiveness from others, Shedeur got his shot, completing 56.6 % of his passes for 1,400 yards, seven touchdowns and 10 interceptions in eight games.

He is now in a quarterback competition with Deshaun Watson, given a fresh start by new coach Todd Monken.

By all accounts, Shedeur learned from his experience and is ready to compete for the starting job.

That is good news. The bad? Deion plans to travel to Cleveland to talk with Monken.

He says it would be under the guise of Shedeur’s former coach, not his father. But the optics are terrible. Shedeur is 24. A college graduate. This is his fight to fight.

“I can tell him a few things about (Shedeur), how to get him going,” Deion said. “That wasn’t asked of me a year ago. I don’t understand it. Even a guy like Travis Hunter being drafted to Jacksonville and I’ve had him for the last three (years), don’t you think you would want to talk to me to ask me what gets him going and what backs him off? You would want to know that. So, I anticipate, and I can’t wait to have that conversation with Coach Monken.”

Deion coached his son from Pop Warner through college. He prepared him. Now, he has to accept that he has been handed off to someone else.

You think Ty Simpson’s dad, Jason, the long-time coach at Tennessee Martin, wouldn’t want to sidle up to Rams boss Sean McVay during OTAs? Or that legendary high school coach Patrick Nix wouldn’t welcome standing next to Sean Payton at Broncos practice?

Those conversations are for fathers and sons after practice. Away from the field. No one is saying Deion should not communicate with Monken as the CU coach. Send him a text. Or an email. Anything else comes across as helicopter parenting, no matter how Prime frames the discussion.

Shedeur has talent. Let him prove it.

Punishment issued: Always intentional. It sure looks like the NFL punished Sean Payton. The Broncos’ opening six games are as tough as anyone can remember. Fortunately for Denver, the league did the Chargers and Chiefs no favors either. The Chargers must navigate a brutal seven-game stretch, starting in Week 3. But they got two gimmes at home to start the season with the Cardinals and Raiders and their aforementioned gauntlet includes a bye week. And the Chiefs’ final seven games feature three straight on the road at the Bills, Rams and Bengals.

Seven Degrees of Separation: Brett Kulak made history on Wednesday and remains part of it. The Avs veteran has a chance to become the latest teammate of Jaromir Jagr to appear in the Stanley Cup final, which has become a four-decade-plus tradition in the NHL. Kulak played with Jagr in Calgary during the 2017-18 season.

And yet the NFL’s king of cheese why he remains untouched atop a golden throne.

The former Broncos quarterback turned a lot of heads at the Met Gala in New York City this past Monday. Although the cynics on the admittedly fashion-challenged Grading The Week staff think those turns were more because his wife, Ciara, rocked the ball in a shimmering gold gown and headdress that

DangeRuss, meanwhile, perfectly channeled, well … um …. himself?

Russell Wilson at the Met Gala — C

Here’s the thing, though: The GTW historical types had a heck of a time tracking down pictures of a pharaoh who’d donned something that closely resembled Wilson’s ensemble — a shirtless white vest covered by a large white coat with massive golden epaulets on each shoulder.

Now, the man sure looked dapper, don’t get us wrong. But the whole thing came off, to our unhip eyes, as less Egyptian pharaoh and more a mix of from 1992; the and a pinch of

Although the butterfly on Russ’ left lapel was a nice touch. The history wonks upstairs tell us that ancient Egyptians considered butterflies to be symbols of eternity, souls and divine transformation. Considering that the 37-year-old Wilson is reportedly weighing a contract offer to join the Jets that certainly tracks.

CU staying out of private equity game (for now) — B

Should we give the Buffs credit for not maxing out a new line of credit? over the last few days that they would be among at least nine known Big 12 schools to decline an offer from the league to take a $30-million line of credit as part of a new Big 12 deal with Weatherford Capital and RedBird Capital Partners.

CU athletics is reportedly $27 million in the red. The university has vowed to continue to draw from CU’s general fund to keep The Deion Sanders Experiment afloat. But fine print is fine print, whether you’re co-signing on a house or figuring out how to pay enough to keep your men’s basketball players from jumping ship. While it’s not the greatest look for commissioner Brett Yormark to have this many members turn their backs on new private equity partners, good on the Buffs for not digging themselves an even deeper ditch. For now, at any rate.

NCAA tourney expansion — B

Does it dilute the product? Yep. Does it fatten up some lean coaching resumes? No question. But count the GTW basketball junkies as those in favor of a bigger Big Dance. The NCAA men’s and women’s hoops tournament fields are growing by eight bids starting in March 2027, from 68 schools to 76. We don’t love it, mind you, but in a world of student-athlete revenue sharing and the transfer portal, it was inevitable, for the same reason expanding the College Football Playoff was inevitable: Money. Schools need it, and badly in many cases, so if more broadcast outlets are willing to pay it, university presidents will follow the sweet smell of cash wherever it leads them. Team GTW was never a huge fan of 68, anyway — at the last round of expansion, we were rooting for the 15/16 seeds to keep their slots in the round of 64 with at least one “last-teams-in” game against 11s or 12s for each of the four brackets, instead of just some of them. The new setup gets us closer, although it’s still gross on the part of the “majors” that so many 15s and 16s (i.e., mid-major programs) who automatically qualified could really use the money/units from the tourney get stuck with an even longer road to glory.

A couple weeks before the Buffaloes began spring practices, ex-Colorado defensive coordinator  Robert Livingston ventured south to interview as the Broncos’ defensive passing-game coordinator. He was particularly “excited,” as Colorado offensive coordinator Brennan Marion recalled to The Denver Post, about the prospect of coaching Denver’s 2025 first-round cornerback Jahdae Barron. A day later, Livingston was back in the Buffs’ building in Boulder.

There, walking in around noon, was Barron — there to catch up with Marion, who was the receivers coach at Texas in 2022 while Barron was a junior cornerback.

“The synergy of them two just meeting at the same time — being right there, right after (Livingston) was at the interview the day before — sometimes, God just syncs things up that way,” Marion said.

Barron talked ball with Marion and cousin Naeten Mitchell, a safety who recently transferred to Colorado. He ventured into the Buffs’ secondary room, too, to break down tape. And eventually, as Marion recounted, he and Livingston wandered off to go watch film together.

Barron stayed until 8 p.m.

“I haven’t met a person yet who doesn’t like Jahdae,” Marion said. “I mean, he’s kinda like a quarterback from that standpoint, where — he has that infectious personality.

“So him and Rob hit it off pretty easy, pretty quick.”

Shortly thereafter, the Broncos officially hired Livingston to replace the departed Jim Leonhard. It marked a professional reunion with Denver DC Vance Joseph, who Livingston worked with in Cincinnati in 2014 and 2015. It also marked a new figure in Barron’s development. And the development of their relationship will shape one of the most important questions awaiting the Broncos in 2026 and beyond: how can Denver extract first-round value from its 2025 first-round pick?

Finding a fit in a crowded secondary room

None of the dozens of Barron’s friends and family watching the NFL Draft last year, as his old high school coach Jason Cecil said, expected the Broncos to be the team to call in the first round. Denver — a team with established starters at every cornerback spot — simply felt he was the best player available, and took him “out of a place of luxury,” as Leonhard recounted to The Post.

Barron, according to data reviewed by The Denver Post, played the fewest percentage of his team’s regular-season defensive snaps (30%) of any first-round defensive rookie in 2025, when active. He played just 17 snaps combined in two playoff games.

“He was obviously upset,” Marion said of Barron, “from the standpoint that, he wanted to have a better year.”

Leonhard’s greatest challenge with Barron in his first NFL season, as the ex-Broncos coach told The Post last summer, was getting the rookie to actually turn his brain off. To understand his assignment at nickel — sometimes fitting a run gap, sometimes checking a tight end, sometimes fluid until a play developed — and stay within that. Read. React. Don’t cheat and try to apply learned collegiate tendencies to the NFL game.

At times, Barron looked like the instinctive ballhawk he was advertised to be; at times, he also looked like a 2001 iMac desktop trying to process five billion lines of code before triggering a decision.

Denver’s staff anticipated this, yo-yoing Barron between nickel and outside assignments from the start of his rookie camp.

“The vision was, he’s going to come in and challenge,” Leonhard, now the Bills’ defensive coordinator, told The Post this week. “But it wasn’t this, like — ‘There is a glaring hole in our secondary that he has to fill.’ We just thought he complemented the room great, and we were going to be able to create ways where he can impact games as he’s growing into what his eventual every-down-player role is going to be in that system, and the NFL.”

Entering Year Two, though, the Broncos need to solidify where Barron’s strengths fit best, both for his own development and for the future of their secondary. CB2 Riley Moss is entering the last year of his contract. So is Ja’Quan McMillian. Barron may well have a better shot at competing with Moss at outside cornerback in camp, but the organization has expressed a mixed view of his abilities there.

Head coach Sean Payton said multiple times last season that the Broncos view Barron as a nickel “with outside flex.” Ex-cornerbacks coach Addison Lynch, meanwhile, pounded the table to Denver brass in the pre-draft process in 2025 that Barron could play outside corner in the NFL. Leonhard said this week, too, that he felt Barron proved in 2025 he could “be an every-down player on the outside.” But both Lynch — fired after the season — and Leonhard are gone.

Enter Livingston, now, who has a decade-long track record back in Cincinnati of developing young secondary talent in veteran-laden rooms — as the Bengals had a habit of drafting a cornerback “every other year,” former Cincinnati defensive coordinator Paul Guenther recalled.

“I’m sure he can teach (Jahdae) how to play the position a little more instinctually,” Marion said. “The thought process of, ‘OK, they’re in 13-personnel, it����ap 3rd-and-3, this is what plays are coming.’ Or, ‘They’re in 11-personnel, 3rd-and-8, this is what plays are coming.’

“And they’ll be able to play a little bit faster, with the knowledge that Rob has.”

An up-and-down rookie year

“I just know the kid that he is – the faith-based kid that he is, how hungry he is to prove and take care of his mom and all of this stuff that he has to do and he’s responsible for — I know he’s going to get it done,” Marion told The Post last week. “The hard part is knowing, will he be able to get it done there, because of the talent in the room?”

Pat Surtain II is, well, Pat Surtain II. McMillian had a career year at nickel. Moss tied for the most-penalized cornerback in the league in 2025 (12) but also led the league in passes defensed (19). Barron vacillated between playing deep in situational dime packages, fitting run gaps as a veritable off-ball linebacker in big-nickel packages, covering tight ends man-to-man, and even started a game at safety.

During one conversation last year, Leonhard reminded Barron that Surtain, who came out of Alabama at the No. 9 overall pick in 2021, actually didn’t start in Week 1 of his 2021 rookie year. And Leonhard would confirm to Barron, from the staff’s side, that there was no frustration with his development.

But there was frustration, of course, from Barron’s own standpoint, a player who Leonhard said has “extremely high standards of himself.”

In a Week 11 win over the Chiefs, the rookie cornerback turned in his best game of the year: four tackles, a pick-six that was called back, and a few reps of excellent coverage on Kansas City legend Travis Kelce. A few days later, : “Tell swift (sic) put me on a song RIGHT NOW.” His confidence was soaring. Temporarily.

Two weeks later, Barron called Marion one late night after a sloppy Broncos overtime win over the Commanders.

“One week he’s riding high and thinks like, ‘Man, I’m killing it,'” Marion said. “And the next week, he’s like, ‘Damn, Coach — I messed up on this situation, I messed up here, I was supposed to be on this guy.'”

A film review of that Barron performance showed no real glaring errors, in his 24 snaps against Washington. He was a step too slow on a couple routes covering tight end Zach Ertz. He took a poor angle on a first-down scramble by Commanders quarterback Marcus Mariota. He communicated well on multiple other snaps, and nearly jumped a route for a would-be game-sealing pick in overtime. But Barron played more than 40% of Denver’s snaps in just one more game (Week 17 against Kansas City) the rest of the season.

“In no way was it a punishment thing — like, ‘He wasn’t doing what we asked him to do,'” Leonhard said, asked about Barron’s declining snaps down the stretch. “Just plays out sometimes, when you’re not a starter, that way.”

Barron, the 2024 Thorpe Award winner as the best defensive back in collegiate football, is not cursing circumstance. He is of the mentality, as Marion described, to shape his own results.

“From a parent situation, you want your kid to be on a great team sometimes, just to see what greatness looks like,” Marion said. “And they can match that, and then it takes their game to a whole new level. So, I think that����ap what that did for him, right? Seeing, like, ‘I can’t make a mistake. These guys aren’t making any. I can’t slip up. I have to be on point at all times.’”

“He took that as a challenge. He didn’t take that as a crutch, or crippling his development. He’s taking that as like, ‘Alright, I’m gonna prove it.’”

Barron, Marion said, respects Joseph, who’s repeatedly gushed about Barron to The Post. By proxy, Marion added, Barron will respect Livingston, who worked with Joseph in coaching Cincinnati’s defensive backs in 2014 and 2015. Many of Joseph’s current defensive principles — disguising blitzers indistinguishably from players dropping back into coverage — are similar to what Cincinnati did a decade ago, under defensive coordinator Guenther. And the “roots” of Livingston’s defenses for the last two seasons at Colorado, Guenther told The Post, are the same.

Upon arriving to Colorado, Livingston organized a turnaround from one of the worst defenses in the FBS in 2023 to a top-45 unit in 2024. Colorado slumped back to 112th in the country in opponent points-per-game in a 3-9 season in 2025. But he leaves the building with high marks from head coach Deion Sanders, one of the best corners in the history of the NFL.

“I feel like, he knows, inside, what he’s done with this program,” Sanders said. “Sometimes, we get caught up in numbers, and statistics, and not understanding personnel and knowledge and what he brought to this program. He brought a lot.”

A track record of molding young talent

In February, Barron met former Bengals cornerback Darqueze Dennard for the second time at the annual Thorpe Award banquet in Oklahoma City. They’d first chatted a year before, when Barron took the stage himself to accept the trophy. The circumstances, this time around, were rather different.

Dennard offered a shred of advice.

“I told him, he’s just gotta trust them,” Dennard said, speaking on Denver’s staff. “They’re mad scientists, what they’re doing. Just put the work in, and all the rest of the stuff gon’ play out how it����ap supposed to.”

He would know. 11 years before Barron, there was Dennard, who was drafted late in 2014’s first round by Cincinnati after a Thorpe Award-winning senior season at Michigan State. Guenther and Joseph shifted Dennard from outside corner to nickel to eventually supplant aging veteran Leon Hall. It was not easily received.

Livingston, as Dennard recounted, was a constant support, then in his first year as a staffer after spending a couple years in Cincinnati’s scouting department.

“He saw more into me than I did, at the time,” Dennard said. “I just kinda wanted to be on my island, X-out this player, and be done with it for the day. Where, he wanted me to come in and actually be able to impact football games.”

“Like, I don’t know how much he can help a 10-year vet,” Early said. “But a young one that he’s able to get his hands on and that hasn’t quite had that breakout year yet — I think you’ll see a tremendous difference in whoever the previous guy was, and how Doug is able to bring those guys along.”

Those development-focused hires, then, will set up a fascinating positional battle between three younger cornerbacks vying for two starting spots — and long-term futures in Denver. The 25-year-old McMillian is playing this season on a one-year, $5.8 million tender, and is currently set to hit unrestricted free agency in 2027. The 26-year-old Moss is on the final year of his rookie deal.

The Broncos got plenty of glimpses last season of Barron in big-nickel units, and saw him play heavier snaps outside midseason when Surtain was sidelined with a pec injury. And the rising second-year corner has a chance, this spring and summer, to make it easy for Denver to decide whether to pay McMillian or Moss long-term.

“There is learning in the NFL, but nothing’s going to be new this year that he (doesn’t) already know,” Leonhard said. “But he did prove last year, he can be an every-down player on the outside, just as much as he can play on the inside and be a nickel and dime.”

At this year’s Thorpe ceremony, too, Barron and Dennard — men of faith — bonded over Proverbs 27:17, talking about Barron’s future.

“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.”

“Get better with your sword, get better with your crown,” Dennard said. “And that was his mindset.”

when she reaches for her CU shirt. And now she’s starting to criticize little things Deion Sanders does.

“We’re not anything new and shiny anymore,” Stephan, a CU sophomore, told me as the 2026 Black & Gold scrimmage kicked off Saturday at Folsom Field.

“We’re just kind of a mediocre team that somehow still makes headlines because of our coach.”

Talk about a mic drop

On a pleasant, overcast Saturday afternoon along Colorado Avenue, The Coach Prime Era at CU officially shifted from the honeymoon phase to the reality phase. Especially with the undergrads in the crowd.

“I think the honeymoon is definitely not going anymore, personally,” said Stephan, a Minneapolis native and one of those out-of-staters whose parents dug her going to CU, in part, after watching the Sanders Effect from afar. “I think the honeymoon phase has ended. And they’re really struggling to try to keep it up, in my opinion.”

You know the signs. The passion fades. The glow dims. Little things you used to overlook start to get on your nerves. Expectations don’t always line up. Communication can be blunt and awkward.

Saturday wasn’t awkward, but compared to previous Aprils in Prime Time, it was remarkably … normal. No national TV. No Hollywood A-listers — although ex-Broncos great Aqib Talib did show up to talk shop.

The event was ticketed, but free. CU reported a crowd of 27,772 in “claimed” attendance. In person, it looked more like 17,000-18,000, up close.

Which is, you know, fine. Not great. Fine. And pretty close to last year’s reported attendance of 20,430. CU announced a spring crowd of 28,424 in ’24, well down from 47,277 in ’23, Coach Prime’s first public exhibition as the Buffs’ boss.

“As someone who came from a Big Ten-school culture, there’s a lack of culture here in general for football,” Stephan continued. “It kind of feels like, for me, (for) students, it’s like, ‘Show up, it’s a fashion show, smoke, drink, leave.”’

“So,” I countered, “it’s sort of like the SEC?”

“Yeah, but the thing is, they win. And even if they lose, they do a ton of pregame activities. They have more lights, and just … everything.”

The lower bowl of Folsom’s east side was pretty much full; the upper section of bleachers, not so much. Mind you, that was also by design — the west side of the stadium was roped off entirely, so that 50% of capacity was scrunched into one half of the building.

And the eye test made it seem smaller. Like, a lot smaller.

“That’s not just us,” Sanders said after the scrimmage. “No one’s valuing spring (football games) anymore. You’ve got several major colleges not even having spring games. The only thing that would bring it back is if we compete against another school …

“Winning also helps increase that (interest). But people get tired of the same-old, same-old, at a certain point … Things are so different in college football right now with kids moving, kids leaving … so it’s hard for the fan base to get to know all these kids and to buy in and say, ‘You know what, I’m going to support that, (and now) he’s gone.’ So I understand it, wholeheartedly. But we have a tremendous fan base. We have a tremendous student body. We still have a lot of people out there that (are) crazy about CU football. And I’m excited about that.”

On one hand, he’s right. Nebraska, which would fill Memorial Stadium in Lincoln for a “Magic: The Gathering” tournament if it meant setting some kind of record, drew just 27,188 for its spring game late last month. That was the smallest crowd for a Big Red football exhibition since 2000.

“And so to come here and walk in, there’s like 10 people,” said Omaha native Jess Wozniak, a Folsom first-timer whose son played alto sax in the pep band Saturday. “When we first got here … I was like, ‘Wow, there’s not many.’ Now it’s filling up. Now it’s looking better.’

“I think the hype (for Sanders) is still there. I feel like it’s filling up — so the hype has got to be here, still, somewhere, right?”

“It’s also a free ticket,” I noted.

“Oh, true,” she laughed. “I didn’t think about that.”

Garrett Tyrrell of Durango, sitting to her right, piped up.

“Put it this way,” he said. “The old man is still watching.”

So are the kids. Stephan and fellow CU sophomore Colin Chow hiked it up to the top of Section 213 to get an aerial view of Ralphie’s run. Not long after, Buffs QB Julian Lewis opened the scoring for the day with a 13-yard scoring touch pass in the back of the end zone to Danny Scudero, the former San Jose State star and arguably the jewel of Coach Prime’s transfer haul.

“I think (2026) could be better than (last fall),” Stephan reflected. “I don’t think it’s going to be better than (2024) with Shedeur (Sanders) and Travis (Hunter). That was an insane year. A lot of culture. It was really fun. Everyone was excited going into every game.

“But (2025), not so much. There were a couple of games we went into, and we were like, ‘(CU) is going to lose, might as well show up.'”

Stephan stayed for the Buffs’ home finale against Arizona State last fall — all the way to the bitter end of a 42-17 defeat. Her dad, a Badgers alum, taught her to never leave early.

“And I was like, ‘This (stinks),'” she laughed.

“That was the only game I left halfway through,” Chow, a Golden native, added.  “I mean, they were competitive in (’23 and ’24) — even if (CU) didn’t win, everyone was excited. People had expectations for weird games or sudden victories. But (last year), it was like, ‘Well, we’re down 30, no one on this team is going to pull that out.'”

Chow grew up nearby. But Stephan’s parents were so enamored of the Coach Prime Experience that they flew down to attend games, just to see Sanders up close.

“I think part of it, too, is (that) Deion isn’t really as new or as (much of) a novelty now,” Stephan said. “He’s been here as long as a lot of students who go to the games.

“That’s cool, but it’s not the same as Deion coming in and ‘saving it’ from what it was earlier. So it’s just a different feel when new students come in. There are expectations now instead of (it being) the new cool thing.”

At 11:35 a.m., about 90 minutes before the scrimmage, a 20-something in a blue t-shirt looked at the line forming across the street and waved at me.

“Excuse me,” he asked, nodding back to Folsom behind us. “So, what is the event today?”

“CU’s Black & Gold game,” I replied. “Spring football.”

“OK, thanks.”

He shrugged, turned on his heel and walked away. Never saw him again. Sometimes, reality bites.

“I truly thank God every day that I’m here because it����ap truly a blessing to be a part of such a fun culture and in a beautiful place,” the Colorado receiver said after the Buffaloes’ annual Black & Gold Day at Folsom Field. “Colorado is a beautiful place, and Folsom Field is … I couldn’t get enough.

“I had to take a moment and just kind of look around and kind of be proud of myself for where I was and where my feet were. So, it was definitely a blessing to be here.”

A senior transfer from San Jose State, Scudero provided one of the few highlights in a spring game that was vanilla by design. His 13-yard touchdown reception from quarterback JuJu Lewis was the only touchdown of the abbreviated scrimmage, won by the Gold team, 7-6.

It was a scrimmage, however, that got the job done, in terms of completing a session of 15 spring workouts that sets the table for the 2026 Buffs.

“You accomplish things, and we need to better ourselves in a multitude of aspects,” CU head coach Deion Sanders said. “We got some good things going on. I think you can see the fruit thereof.”

Offensively, there weren’t many fireworks, other than Lewis’ sensational pass to Scudero for the lone touchdown, but there were some efficient and productive plays.

Lewis, projected as the starter at quarterback, unofficially completed 6-of-11 passes for 60 yards. The redshirt freshman looked more comfortable than he did in last year’s spring game.

“He was a lot better,” Sanders said. “And I think that����ap very easy to obtain when you got Danny Scudero on your side. He is a dawg, and having a comfort level with the playbook and the way (offensive coordinator Brennan) Marion communicates on the set. You gotta understand that was the first time that all the coaches got an opportunity to communicate (on the headsets).”

Isaac Wilson, who is competing for the job as well, was unofficially 6-for-12 for 65 yards and was intercepted by freshman cornerback Mojo Williams Jr. on the last play.

Scudero had two catches for 25 yards, running back Damian Henderson had 39 rushing yards on five carries, and Quentin Gibson caught four passes for 38 yards.

Defensively, end Toby Anene had a sack and batted down a pass, defensive tackle Santana Hopper made several plays at the line of scrimmage and defensive back Boo Carter was active all day.

“The hardest thing to measure when you’re measuring the spring game is if the offense does well, that means the defense is not doing well. And vice versa,” Sanders said. “You hope to see the quarterbacks not throw interceptions like we did on the last play. You hope that they move the ball down the field. You hope that defensive backs are aggressive and physical.

“It����ap a multitude of things, but the main thing is you don’t want to get anybody hurt.”

Sanders said two players suffered “strained MCLs,” but not tears, so he said, “We’re going to be OK with that.”

Coming off a disappointing 3-9 season in 2025 and rebuilding with 59 new players this spring, CU didn’t draw a lot of buzz for this year’s spring game.

It was the first of Sanders’ four spring games to not be televised, although it was streamed on YouTube.

Unlike the previous three years, CU didn’t charge for tickets. Officially, 27,772 tickets were claimed, which would make it the third-most “attended” spring game in CU history, behind the 2023 and 2024 games. However, BuffZone estimates that roughly 10,000 tickets were used.

Around the country, many programs have cancelled spring games and Sanders said that plays a role in the decreased interest in CU’s game.

“No one’s valuing spring anymore,” he said. “The only thing that would bring that back is we compete against another school, and I’ve been saying that for the last several years.”

CU’s disappointing season in 2025 played a role, too, though.

“Winning also helps increase that, but people get tired of the same old, same old at a certain point and you want more,” he said.

He also acknowledged it����ap tough for fans to get to know players when there’s so much movement in the transfer portal every year. Yet, he was appreciative of the thousands of fans who did show up to watch and enjoy Black & Gold Day.

“I understand (the other factors) wholeheartedly, but we have a tremendous fan base,” he said. “We have a tremendous student body and we still have a lot of people out there that����ap crazy about CU football. And I’m excited about that.”