2025 NFL Draft Prospect and reigning Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter said that he would consider giving up football if he can’t play on both offense and defense at the NFL level.
“It’s never playing football again,” Hunter told CBS Sports. “Because I’ve been doing it my whole life, and I love being on the football field. I feel like I could dominate on each side of the ball, so I really enjoy doing it.”
Hunter is a unique prospect who can play on the offensive and defensive side of the ball at a high level. In fact, he’s the only player in FBS (Football Bowl Subdivision) history to record 1,000 receiving yards, ten touchdowns, and three interceptions in a single season.
#Colorado Travis Hunter says if he falls to #Raiders, they will get Charles Woodson 2.0 pic.twitter.com/ArE0BqUnnO
— NFL Rumors (@nflrums) April 16, 2025
“I just feel very confident in myself, and I got a competitive spirit that I can do whatever I put my mind to, and I feel like I can do it.”
Hunter was on the field for 748 defensive plays and 714 offensive plays last season. According to CBS Research, he’s the first player since 2017 to record at least 250 snaps on both sides of the ball.
Hunter’s college coach, Pro Football Hall of Famer Deion Sanders, is confident that he can be a wide receiver and a cornerback at the next level.
“The NFL is a slow game. You huddle (every play). How is the contact nowadays? Minimal. That game is more conducive to him being successful than a college game,” Sanders explained while speaking to the NFL Network during the outlet’s coverage of Colorado’s Pro Day. “College is tempo, tempo, tempo. Now, you’re talking about you have to be in shape. Pros, how many seconds between plays? Please, he’s going to go jogging after the darn game because he’s going to have all that energy man. He is built for this.”
The Cleveland Browns, who hold the second-overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, are heavily favored to be Hunter’s landing spot. Thankfully, Cleveland general manager Andrew Berry already addressed how the team would handle him if he ended up being the number-two pick.
“If you don’t play Travis Hunter on both sides of the football, you don’t need to draft Travis Hunter in the top three.”
—@Realrclark25 on Travis Hunter pic.twitter.com/vnYhxUEGr8
— NFL on ESPN (@ESPNNFL) April 15, 2025
“In terms of Travis Hunter; cornerback or receiver, the answer is ‘yes.’ He can play both and I think that’s what makes him special,” Berry said during the 2025 NFL Scouting Combine. “But we would see him as a receiver primarily first. But I think what makes him a bit of a unicorn is that he can do both at a high level.”
“It’s up to them to want me to be on their team and the organization to believe that they can let me do exactly what I want to do, and that’s play both sides of the ball and be the same Travis that I was in college and better,” Hunter said when talking about potentially being drafted by the Browns. “I don’t believe in wishing to be the second overall pick. If it was up to me, I’ll be the first overall pick. I’m blessed to be the best player in this, one of the best players in this draft, in this class, so I’m blessed to be where I’m at.”
