Shedeur Sanders’ draft stock has been on a bit of a rollercoaster over the last couple of months. Once considered a potential No. 1 pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, many evaluators have recently lowered his stock significantly. Some mock drafts have him going as low as the 20s in the first round, while others believe he may not even be worth a first-round pick.
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ESPN’s Field Yates isn’t among those doubting Sanders. The NFL analyst’s most recent mock saw Sanders drafted No. 3 by the New York Giants. It makes sense, as the Giants are one of just three teams—along with the Cleveland Browns (No. 2 pick) and Pittsburgh Steelers (No. 21)—without a clear plan at QB for 2025.
However, Chris “Mad Dog” Russo doesn’t believe the Giants are still high on Sanders based on the news and rumors linking them to various veteran QBs. They were one of the first teams to be connected to Aaron Rodgers. They continue to pursue the 41-year-old signal caller as of this writing.
The Giants also negotiated extensively with Matthew Stafford’s camp before he returned to L.A. The fact that they had a two-year deal set up with Stafford makes Russo—and many others—think that New York has moved on from Shedeur Sanders at this point.
“If the Giants wanted Sanders so much, why’d they have a deal done with Stafford? They knew they would have Sanders with the third pick. The Browns weren’t gonna take him, the Browns have got too many issues with Watson,” said Russo.
“So why would the Giants reach a two-year contract with Stafford before he bolted back to L.A.? … Why go waste their time with Stafford? And then have to trade collateral to the Rams to get Stafford?”
Most on the panel did not agree with Russo, however. Stephen A. Smith believed that regardless of how they viewed Sanders as a football player, a big market like New York would benefit from a big name and personality like him. If anyone can handle the spotlight, he argued, it’s Deion Sanders’ most famous son.
“This brother is considered to be big-time. And because that’s the reality of the situation, it would not surprise me at all if, in the New York market, you end up grabbing yourself a cat, whose magnetizing, will draw an audience, will have eyeballs highly curious to see him. Particularly when you’re a team… that has struggled so much.”
Ryan Clark, meanwhile, believed that the Giants’ interest in Stafford didn’t necessarily mean they were out on Sanders. He drew an interesting parallel to a similar situation the Giants faced in the 2004 NFL Draft. They knew they’d be selecting either Eli Manning or Philip Rivers with the No. 4 overall pick. Yet, that didn’t stop them from signing veteran Kurt Warner — who was just three years removed from an MVP season.
There are some slight differences here, though. Warner had suffered several injuries in 2002 and 2003 that resulted in his benching by the Rams in 2003. He was not viewed as a bonafide franchise QB in 2004, the way Matthew Stafford still is.
It’s possible that the Giants had an interest in all of these QBs, including Shedeur Sanders. However, it seems pretty clear from the smoke we’ve seen that head coach Brian Daboll and general manager Joe Schoen are looking for a veteran in 2025 so that they can save their jobs.
If they insert a rookie as their starter, they’re more than likely to have another losing season. That would probably result in the dismissal of the HC-GM tandem.
The fact that they’re still chasing Aaron Rodgers as hard as they are should say a lot about what they think about the QBs in this draft class. You can make a similar inference from the New York Jets’ (No. 7 pick) decision to sign Justin Fields rather than draft a top QB with their first-round pick.
