The fallout from five-star recruit Travis Hunter committing to Jackson State during the early signing period continues.
For several weeks, the college football world and recruiting industry has marveled at how Hunter — the No. 1 overall recruit in the country who had verbally committed to Florida State a year ago — all of a sudden ended up at an HBCU under Deion Sanders.
Since the groundbreaking signing, Sanders has repeatedly explained that he was able to lure the highly-touted defensive back and wide receiver prospect to Jackson State on the strength of his authenticity — not through rumored million-dollar endorsement deals or anything that would be considered nefarious practices to acquire such a talent.
Also read: Jackson State landed nation’s top high school prospect. Does that change the landscape for HBCUs?
The Eddie Robinson Award winner made an appearance on The Rich Eisen Show to once again articulate to scorned Florida State fans and stakeholders that Hunter never “belonged to them” and fair game just like any other recruit available in the marketplace.
“People were so surprised about that deal that you got it because people are always astonished for what they hadn’t seen and they hadn’t seen a young man of that caliber go to an HBCU in the last 30 years,” Sanders told Eisen last week. “So that’s why they were surprised. Then the idiots start to think foul play. How are we going to play foul when we don’t have any funding. If we had funding, now, you can play the game like everyone else plays, but we don’t have it.”
Sanders then told Eisen that Florida State, where he starred in college, had used him as a conduit over the years to attract recruits to the Seminoles program.
“Florida State has been using me for years to do what I do to help influence these kids to come to the wonderful alma mater,” he said. “No problem. So it was good enough for you. But it’s not good enough for me. That’s what I have a problem with. So you’re saying now. I’m good enough to get you players. But the player or I’m not good enough to get me players, which one is it? Are we not good enough at Jackson State?”
