BOULDER, Colo. — Colorado football coach Deion Sanders delivered a series of remarks Saturday that criticized and questioned why the university waited so long to put up a statue in honor of late Colorado coach Bill McCartney.
The school announced Saturday that it was erecting a bronze statue of McCartney to be unveiled before a home football game this year. But McCartney, the winningest coach in CU history, died in January, prompting Sanders to give a passionate speech about the best way to honor people for their accomplishments in an era of instant gratification.
Sanders said he would try “not to get in trouble with what I’m about to say.”
Then he launched into it:
“Why we wait?” Sanders said in a news conference after his team’s annual intrasquad spring game at Folsom Field. “Wouldn’t we have wanted him to see? To be involved in it? To feel it? To feel the love, the respect, the appreciation?
“Why we wait?”
The school noted in its announcement that the statue of McCartney is a project “two full years in the making.” McCartney’s family announced in 2016 that he was diagnosed with late-onset dementia/Alzheimer’s. His condition deteriorated from there before his death at age 84.
“He can’t enjoy that right now,” Sanders said.
When told the statue was two years in the making, Sanders asked, “How we in the making?”
“This is a new generation,’ Sanders said. ‘Everything y’all want, you want it right now. And you go get it right now. You don’t wait for nothing no more, do we? We wanna go, we call Uber. We wanna eat, who we call? UberEats? Everything we get is right now. We want something, we order it off Amazon, right now. We ain’t in no waiting generation no more. That’s over. That’s a wrap on that. Everybody in here is impatient. You’re downloading stuff right now putting it out, as I speak. This ain’t that no more. Let’s stop.”
Deion Sanders ties his remarks to number retirement ceremony
Sanders’ remarks come after a week of controversy involving another honor for other previous Colorado stars − his quarterback son Shedeur and two-way star Travis Hunter. Both had their jersey numbers retired Saturday in a pregame ceremony at Folsom Field. An announced crowd of 20,430 cheered as their highlights were played on the stadium video board.
But Sanders heard backlash about it from former Colorado players earlier this week after it was announced on Monday. Those former players said they thought it was premature to retire their numbers less than four months after they played their last college game. The last Colorado football player to have his jersey number retired was running back Rashaan Salaam in 2017, 23 years after he won the Heisman Trophy in 1994 and less a year after he died in 2016.
Sanders said he was “sad” because he wanted McCartney to see that statue.
“He can’t see that,” Sanders said. “The same thing with Rashaan Salaam, right? How long did we wait? … How many years after his death?”
After being told it was less than a year, Sanders asked, ‘So we gotta die to get recognized?’
Sanders said his policy is to “give people their flowers while they can enjoy them and they can smell them.”
Sanders made the same point earlier in his postgame news conference Saturday when asked about the jersey retirement ceremony for Hunter and his son Shedeur. Before the game, Colorado football fans had lined up to take pictures outside of the stadium with the Heisman Trophy won last December by Hunter.
“I’m not gonna really wait, so I give you your flowers now,” he said. “I’m not gonna wait 20 years down the street, then bring you back when you limping and can barely walk or some tragedy happens to recognize your greatness and what you contributed to this program.”
He suggested the decision to retire their jersey numbers now was made by athletic director Rick George. Hunter and Shedeur Sanders are now only the fifth and sixth players to have their jersey numbers retired in the 135-year history of Colorado football.
“I’m thankful Rick shot his shot and moved on what we all know was inevitable in due time,’ Sanders said. ‘The timeframe, nobody’s gonna be happy with it. Somebody’s always gonna have something to say. But the way we are right now, we’re a now generation.”
What happened in Colorado’s spring game?
The Gold team beat the Black team, 25-17, using an unconventional scoring system. No statistics were provided by the school, and several players did not play because of injury. After snow fell on Boulder Friday, an announced crowd 20,430 showed up to enjoy the sunshine on Saturday — the third-biggest spring crowd in school history, ranking behind the only other spring crowds under Sanders in 2023 (47,277) and 2024 (28,424).
But the big story was the quarterback competition to replace Shedeur. In a bit of a surprise, 17-year-old freshman Julian Lewis worked with the first-team offense against the first-team defense instead of Kaidon Salter, the veteran transfer from Liberty.
Deion Sanders said the reason for that was “kind of disciplinary.” But their overall performances weren’t enough to establish who’s the top QB right now.
“The QB battle is gonna be really good this year,” offensive tackle Jordan Seaton said. ‘So we’re still trying to figure out that.’
Salter completed nine of his first 12 passes for 64 yards but didn’t really show what he could do with his legs as a dual run-pass quarterback. The defense wasn’t allowed to hit the quarterbacks Saturday.
In other news, Sanders awarded a scholarship to walk-on safety Ben Finneseth, a self-proclaimed “zero-star” player out of high school in Durango. Sanders has praised his attitude and work ethic.
Finneseth said he only had scholarship offers from Division II schools out of high school but opted to walk on at CU in 2021, before Sanders arrived in December 2022.
“Thank you for believing in me,” Finneseth said he told Sanders.
“First time I’ve seen Ben cry,” Seaton said of the scene in the locker room when the news was announced.
Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com