We had the pleasure to sit down and speak with Hall of Fame cornerback and former 49er Deion Sanders, who is currently the coach of Jackson State. Deion joined us on behalf of the GilletteLabs Razor with Exfoliating Bar and gave us his Super Bowl prediction, how he built his coaching staff, and much more.
Deion talked about making adjustments on the fly and being innovative when asked about what you do as a coach when Murphy’s Law is happening — think the fourth quarter of the NFC Championship.
We bounced back and forth between Sanders, the coach, and how he’d have handled a few situations the 49ers were in this past season. Quarterback, naturally, was the talking point. We asked Deion if he would have dealt with the way Kyle Shanahan handled the Niners quarterback situation any differently:
Coach Shanahan is a great coach. I think he’s an offensive genius. What he does is really, really good. [Jimmy] Garoppolo played great. Everybody is looking for an excuse to pull him out or sit him down. The kid can play. Give him his credit.
I know you drafted Trey Lance and you don’t know what you’re going to do with him. The reason Trey Lance didn’t play is because something he displayed at practice and the inconsistency of that probably was alarming.
I’m pretty sure that Kyle Shanahan wants to win. He’s going to put the best guy on the field. When he makes the decision to go with Garoppolol, that means he’s the best guy available.
The more I look back on the season, the more impressed I am with how everyone remained tight-lipped about how they really felt and continued to go about their business.
Garoppolo should be applauded. It would have been difficult to be thrown into a worse situation. Now, his play was inconsistent enough where the doubters couldn’t be silenced, but it was evident Jimmy’s teammates had his back.
In the game of football, where emotion and relationships rule, Garoppolo’s teammates going out of their way to defend him at every turn tells you all you need to know about the player.
Again, and I’m not defending him, but it was clear as day that Shanahan didn’t fully trust Garoppolo to run his offense. Think of your boss micro-managing everything you do, and the moment you screw up, the world will end.
Players are at their best when they play loose and don’t have to do too much thinking. When was Jimmy at his best? In two-minute and end of game scenarios where the team hurried up and played more scattered.
You can listen to our entire conversation below:
My final question asked Deion about the lack of Black head coaches in the NFL. I asked him if I were to put him in charge of a committee, what would he change to ensure we’d have more Black head coaches in the pipeline:
I can’t make sure you have more Black head coaches. I can’t do that. What I could do is give you Black ownership. Let’s expand. Let’s go to three more cities and mandate there must be inclusions in ownership. Not just Black. Hispanic, Asian, whatever it is.
Let’s go there and see where the ball falls. Instead of fighting for the mediocre job of coaching, let’s go to ownership. Let’s mandate that and see how the game is played then. Let’s fight for that instead of the middle man or middle ground.
I’d love to see what the African American owner does.
Deion was fantastic, but that shouldn’t come as a surprise. We’ll have the full video on our Niners Nation YouTube page later today. Stay tuned, as we have two of the best players on the 49ers joining us today as well.
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