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New NFL Draft intel reveals how close Steelers were to picking Shedeur Sanders

It's the story that'll never end.
Cameron Ellis
Cameron Ellis

Still Curtain

Cleveland Browns Rookie Minicamp / Nick Cammett/GettyImages

Shedeur Sanders is extremely not on the Steelers. Maybe you remember those three days when that was all anyone could talk about? Sanders' draft fall was the topic of the NFL Draft last month, and you'd think that now that we're well past it and heading towards the most exciting Wednesday afternoon in the history of sports – the NFL schedule release – that we'd all move on.

RELATED: Steelers bring in ex-third-rounder to shake up RB competition

But nope! That's not how content works. The rules of content allow us to revisit things literally whenever we want, for literally any reason we want, as long as Google finds it compelling. And, I gotta say: it's awfully convenient during the NFL offseason. For instance, ESPN dropped a big list of 'draft intel' just because they could. See? Very convenient. In said list of draft intel, they even talk a little bit about how close the Steelers were to drafting Sanders. Spoiler alert: it's underwhelming, but not quite underwhelming enough to ignore. It got my click, at least.


Shedeur Sanders was reportedly almost the Steelers' 4th round pick

"The Steelers were comfortable with Shedeur Sanders as a distributing point guard type, which makes it a mild surprise they didn't take him with their fourth-round pick. To borrow another basketball analogy, those inside the Steelers' building did not reach a consensus on Sanders as a slam dunk pick. But the debate was close enough to justify taking him."

A mild surprise! That's the kind of draft intel I'm looking for. I'm also not really sure how using 'a slam dunk pick' is a basketball analogy and not just a commonly-used phrase, but I'm just being pedantic at this point. ESPN's not wrong: it is mildly interesting that the Steelers were debating drafting him. It kinda sounds like 90% of the NFL was debating drafting at one point or another.

But at least now your priors are confirmed – the Steelers were, in fact, at one point having discussions about Shedeur Sanders. You knew it. And now he's on their division rival, which totally definitely won't come back to bite them at any point in the future. I'm sure it'll be fine. His mentor, Tom Brady, was big on not keeping grudges and moving on from the past, so I'm sure that'll be the crux of whatever wisdom he imparts on Sanders going forward.

Cameron Ellis

Cameron Ellis

Cam Ellis is an NFL staff writer for FanSided, specializing in covering all 32 teams across the league, including the Las Vegas Raiders. He has a decade of experience in sports media, having spent time at 680 The Score in Chicago, ABC Denver, and NBC Sports Washington. Since 2014 his work has been featured on NBC Sports Chicago, The Ralphie Report, and various sites across Minute Media and FanSided. In his career he has covered the Super Bowl, NFL Draft, free agency, and is a regular part of gameday coverage.