Colorado star Shedeur Sanders is nation's most-sacked QB. Painkillers may be his best blockers.

Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders seems to have found an effective solution for his pain and mobility problems in recent weeks.

After his teammates on the offensive line couldn’t block well enough to keep him upright, Sanders got some good blocking from somewhere else – a pain-blocking injection off the field.

He’s received such injections at least two games in a row, according to his head coach and father, Deion Sanders.

And it’s worked almost like a miracle drug, as judged by his performances before and after receiving these shots. But it’s obviously not advisable as a long-term answer, even if it might be a tempting tool to use in the final three games of the regular season starting Saturday in the home finale against Arizona (6-3).

“Of course, he’s suffered injuries. You think he’s walking like me for nothing?” said Deion Sanders, who walks with a limp stemming from recent surgeries. “He’s hurting. He’s hurting. You’d have to check with the trainers on that one, but he’s hurting. But he’s gonna be all right… He’ll be OK come Saturday.”

Much remains at stake for him and Colorado (4-5). The Buffaloes need two more wins to become eligible for a postseason bowl game. Further damage to Shedeur’s body also could harm his draft stock in the NFL.

In the meantime, Shedeur Sanders has pulled off a statistical performance for the ages as measured by success in the face of physical beatdowns. Despite being the most-sacked quarterback in major college football (45 times), he ranks second nationally in passing yards per game (320.2) and 11th in completion percentage (70.1%).

Have painkillers helped Shedeur Sanders?

Deion Sanders hasn’t said what kind of painkillers his son has taken, only that he received an injection at halftime of a 28-16 loss at UCLA Oct. 28 “to block some of the pain.” Last week, in a 26-19 loss against Oregon State, Deion Sanders also indicated Shedeur got an injection in the team's locker-room facility near the end of the third quarter “so he could finish.”

"He don’t even like needles … but he had to get a shot," Deion Sanders said Thursday on the Colorado Football Coaches Show. "And he had to get a shot to numb certain areas so he could play."

Shedeur Sanders then returned for the fourth quarter, when he sprung to life and completed 9-of-14 passes for 179 yards and two touchdowns on his team’s final two drives of the game.

Before that, in the first three quarters, he completed 15-of-25 passes for only 66 yards and no touchdowns. Deion Sanders said Thursday that Shedeur had an ankle injury that affected his footwork on deep passes, causing them to come up short.

“I left, you know, because I had a lot of pain in my body,” Shedeur Sanders said afterward. Then he said he "just got mad."

"When I get mad, you know, it’s just a different me."

It was similar in the UCLA game. Before the injection at halftime, when Colorado trailed 7-6, he was sacked five times as he completed 15-of-26 passes for 98 yards and no touchdowns or interceptions. After the injection, he completed 12-of-17 passes for 119 yards and one touchdown.

In both games combined after injections, he has a pass-efficiency rating of 180.4, which would rank fourth nationally in the NCAA rankings. By contrast, in the same two games before the painkiller injections, he has a pass-efficiency rating of 85.8, which would be too low to be included in the top 110 rankings.

“No one wants to take the shot until you have to,” Darrell Colbert, Shedeur Sanders’ private quarterback trainer, told USA TODAY Sports. “That’s the type of player he is, to go in, take a shot, just to make sure you can finish the game with your teammates. It just shows the type of leader he is and the type of quarterback, because a lot of people wouldn’t do that.”

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How long can this trend continue?

Shedeur wasn’t available to news media this week to address this topic. And it’s not clear how many other times this season he’s resorted to painkiller injections, if any. But the use of painkillers in pro and college football has been controversial and comes with risk from overuse, including the fact that they effectively turn off the body’s warning system for health problems and can lead to further injuries.

Just ask Matt McChesney, a former Colorado and NFL lineman.

“I don’t know how many painkillers I’ve taken, but it’s a lot,” McChesney told USA TODAY Sports. “I don’t know how many shots I’ve taken in my life, but it’s a lot. I have to walk sideways down the stairs. I have a five-level cage fusion in my back, and I can’t lift my left shoulder. I’m only 42, and I’m beat to (expletive). And this kid (Shedeur) is taking a beating.  

"I was delivering. I was an offensive and defensive lineman. I very rarely got hit. I was always hitting someone. He’s getting hit, and absorbing blows is more catastrophic than delivering them and then taking the residuals.”

McChesney has closely followed the Buffs and has grown concerned. Shedeur Sanders is the best quarterback at Colorado since Kordell Stewart in 1994. He’ll also likely be the first Colorado quarterback selected in the NFL draft since Koy Detmer was picked in the seventh round in 1997. By contrast, Shedeur Sanders might be a first-round pick, either in 2024 or 2025, depending on how long he wants to stay in college.

“I think it’s extremely fixable,” McChesney said. “If they don’t (fix it), you’re sacrificing a guy in Shedeur Sanders who’s really, really special and tough as (expletive) nails, too. At some point, the offensive line and the defensive line have got to be tougher than the quarterback, and right now the quarterback is the toughest guy in the room.”

What can be done to protect Shedeur Sanders?

McChesney said Shedeur is an NFL-level quarterback who would benefit from being in a more traditional pro-style system instead of a college spread system at Colorado that’s become predictable for being overly reliant on Shedeur with no credible running game. For example, why not two tight ends and a fullback to help block for Shedeur, instead of one tight end sometimes? And why not put Shedeur under center sometimes instead of shotgun to make it harder for the opposing team to know what’s coming?

Otherwise, McChesney said, Colorado is “trying to rely on five guys (on the offensive line) who can’t block the other five.”

Help might be on the way, however. Florida high school prospect Jordan Seaton visited Colorado last week as the No. 1 offensive tackle recruit in the nation, according to 247Sports’ composite rankings.

Shedeur Sanders still has three games left this year in the meantime. Deion Sanders said Tuesday his son’s body was “tremendously sore” and that he’s doing some things he normally doesn’t do to get ready for the next game. He didn’t say what that was.

But there’s also something ironic about the beatings Shedeur has taken this season. While it’s not good for his health, his performance in spite of it shows he can play in the NFL, especially for bad teams with high draft picks.

“The ability for him to show toughness and be that guy, that’s what they’re looking for,” McChesney said. “Let’s be real. That is absolutely, unequivocally what they are looking for at the next level.”

Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com