After inking a 5-year contract extension on Friday, Deion Sanders joined a group of eight college football head coaches to earn at least $10 million per year. But in joining the 8-figure club -- and nearly doubling his 2024 salary in the process -- Sanders crossed another historical milestone: he'll earn more as Coach Prime than he did as Prime Time. Much more, in fact.
According to Spotrac, Sanders earned a total of $33,568,331 across a 14-year NFL career, which lasted from 1989-2000 and then again from 2004-05. The 5-year extension that Colorado announced Friday is worth $54 million, surpassing his on-field earnings alone. (Yes, we are aware inflation exists.) Prime Time's playing salary peaked at $8.5 million in his one season as a Washington Redskin in 2000; he's now set to earn $12 million as Colorado's head coach in 2029.
And it's not as if Prime Time was bad at the business end of football, either. The fifth pick in the 1989 NFL draft, Sanders earned $2.5 million as a rookie and in 1995, fresh off winning a Super Bowl in a starring cameo for the San Francisco 49ers, a free-agent Prime Time held the "Deion Sweepstakes," where the Eagles, Raiders, Dolphins, Saints, 49ers and Cowboys bid on the rights to his services. Sanders and his agent Eugene Parker were so committed to driving the price up and so secure in his value among NFL players that the bidding lasted into the 1995 regular season. The Cowboys ultimately won the honor, signing him to a 7-year, $35 million contract with a $12.99 million signing bonus, the richest free-agent contract in NFL history at the time. As the story went back then, Jerry Jones was paying Prime Time $25 million for defense and $10 million for offense. The Cowboys released Deion after the 1999 season, and Washington then signed him to a 7-year, $56 million deal. Sanders played one of those seven seasons before abruptly retiring in the summer of 2001.
This is a story of how much more valuable the football industry has become over a generation. When the NFL salary cap debuted in 1994, it limited teams to a $34.608 million payroll. The cap will be $279.2 million in 2025, with no signs of slowing. Fifteen players will earn $35 million or more in 2025, and Jones is now in the process of negotiating a $200 million contract with his highest-paid defender. Inflation only explains a portion of that: The 1994 NFL salary cap would be worth below $75 million in today's dollars.
And speaking of today's dollars, Coach Prime is making lots more than Prime Time ever could've imagined.