College Football

Deion Sanders' roster overhaul at Colorado: 'We're gonna get it done'

Published Apr. 28, 2023 4:45 p.m. ET

"This process is gonna be quick, it’s gonna be fast, but we’re gonna get it done."

That was Deion Sanders’ message when asked about his plans to rebuild Colorado's football program following last weekend’s spring football game, where 47,000-plus fans flocked to Folsom Field to watch Coach Prime and the Buffaloes in action.

"You all know that we are going to make some moves," Sanders added. "We're gonna move on from some team members, and we're gonna reload and get some kids that we really identify with."

The speed and timely matter in which that has occurred is shocking to many. As of Friday morning, a total of 41 Colorado players have entered the transfer portal in the last month alone and remain uncommitted to another school, according to 247Sports.com. That number includes the 18 players who announced their exit from the program during a portal barrage Monday following the past weekend’s spring game.

Among the players who announced their intentions to enter the portal this past week are wide receiver Montana-Lemonious-Craig — who was one of the stars in the Buffaloes spring game, hauling in three catches for 154 yards and a pair of touchdowns, Jordyn Tyson (22 catches 470 yards, four TDs in 2022), running back Deion Smith (83 carries, 393 yards, two TDs in 2022) and safety Jeremy Mack (48 tackles in 2022).

Colorado spring game reactions

RJ Young shares his thoughts on Colorado's spring game and explains why he is still high on the Buffaloes despite the roster turnover.

The tally of returning scholarship players from Colorado’s 2022 roster is down to just 16 players, according to another report from the Boulder Daily Camera. College football programs are allowed an allotment of 85 scholarships, meaning that more than 80% of Colorado’s 2023 roster will consist of new scholarship players.

"That’s another way of Coach Prime saying ‘hey, I want my guys,’" FOX Sports college football analyst RJ Young said on a recent airing of his podcast, "The Number One College Football Show with RJ Young." "Prime has decided we’ve got to go get players so we can win football games."

Colorado is set to welcome 19 freshmen and 33 transfers as of Friday morning. That means Sanders still has plenty of room on his roster to add more transfers as the spring football period comes to a close. The spring college football transfer window opened on April 15 and is scheduled to officially close again on Sunday. However, players who have entered the portal do not face a set deadline for when they must sign with a new school.

"I do think it’s important to point out two things here," Young said in response to the massive exodus at Colorado over the past week. "One is, Prime said he was going to flip the roster, and he started doing that almost as soon as he stepped on campus. Number two, there have been 40 newcomers to Colorado since Prime got to Colorado, which includes staff.

"What nobody seems to want to say is … when you go 1-11, a lot of people don’t want to play football there anymore."

Turning the roster over is all part of Sanders’ plan ahead of the Buffaloes’ Sept. 2 season-opener against TCU.

"We already know what we have coming in," Sanders said this week on the "Pat McAfee Show." "Y’all just don’t know what we have. There is no way we can put new furniture in this beautiful home if we don’t clean out the old furniture. And that is not a shot."

Colorado is not alone when it comes to programs that have seen a max exodus of players enter the portal this offseason. Arizona State, which parted ways with head coach Herm Edwards three games into the 2022 season and hired former Oregon offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham as head coach in November, has had more than 30 players enter the portal this offseason. The likes of Ole Miss, Arkansas, Oregon and Texas A&M have all seen 25-plus players enter the transfer portal.

According to college sports analytics site On3.com, there are more than 1,300 uncommitted players currently in college football’s transfer portal. Whether Sanders can go in and sway the top players in that group to come to Colorado remains to be seen, although, according to Young, it wouldn’t be smart to bet against Coach Prime doing so.

"Coach Prime showed up to Jackson State University and flipped a loser into a winner, Young said. "Now, he’s at Colorado. Do you trust Coach Prime to go into the portal and pull out the guys he wants and have enough of them on scholarship to go out and compete?

"The last time I checked, the person that bets against Prime, usually loses."