Mark Kiszla: CU’s Travis Hunter is college football’s most dominant two-way player since Champ Bailey—maybe even Jim Thorpe

BOULDER – The CU Buffs are blessed with three of the top 10 players in college football. And Travis Hunter is two of them.

“That’s well said,” agreed Buffs coach Deion Sanders, seconding my emotion.

While CU quarterback Shedeur Sanders is in the conversation as QB1 in the college game, Hunter is everybody’s All-American at receiver and cornerback. While he richly deserves to win the Heisman, Hunter doesn’t need a trophy to claim a much larger prize, by becoming the first player in Colorado history to become the No. 1 overall choice in the NFL draft.

The only legit question regarding Hunter at the pro level: Can he play every snap?

Hunter is doing things we’ve seldom achieved by any athlete during the past 30 years, not since Coach Prime was in his prime as Neon Deion, when he earned NFL defensive player of the year honors as a cornerback with the San Francisco 49ers, as well as batting .283 and stealing 38 bases in 92 major-league baseball games.

So, I asked Sanders: Is Hunter a more talented athlete than you were?

“It’s not me against Travis. I had my turn, man,” Prime replied Tuesday. ”I’m not a doorknob. You can’t turn me on and off anymore, like a light switch.”

At age 57, with distinguished gray proudly worn in his beard, Sanders has not hit a home run in the majors in 24 years, and the last NFL interception he nabbed was in 2005.

Now the toast of Boulder during his second season as CU’s football coach, with a victory on Saturday night in Folsom Field against 18th-ranked Kansas State, Prime has a shot to do what seemed impossible two scant years ago. The Buffs could not only improve their record to 5-1, but also return the top 25 rankings and inject themselves in the conversation about playoff contenders.

Hunter humbly thanks Sanders for being a father figure and Prime unabashedly refers to Travis as his son.

“I want him to have all the accolades, all the praise, all the love, all the attention that he desires. I’ve had my time,” Sanders said.

“I’m that old boxing coach in the corner that says, ‘Left, right. Left, right. Hit it right here. All right, come on up to the corner, and let me tell you ..’ That’s what I am right now. It’s not me against him.”

With Prime in his corner, it’s Hunter versus history.

Running back Rashaan Salaam claimed the Heisman Trophy in the name of the Buffs in 1994. But it’s no longer a question whether Hunter is a generational player or the best athlete to ever wear a CU football uniform.

There’s a bigger topic worthy of discussion: Have we ever seen anything quite like him in the history of college football?

While I admire Randy Gradishar and Von Miller, the most talented defensive player in Broncos history is Hall of Fame cornerback Champ Bailey.

While in college at Georgia in the 1990s, Bailey also racked up 47 catches for 744 yards and five touchdowns as a receiver in his final season for the Bulldogs. Not too shabby. But given good health, Hunter will far eclipse all those impressive offensive statistics during the course of this season with Colorado.

Nevertheless, when asked earlier this year if Hunter should attempt to play both cornerback and receiver in the NFL, Bailey scoffed.

“No, focus on one thing,” Bailey warned Hunter during a recent appearance on a podcast of our old friend Domonique Foxworth.

“Don’t try to be Justin Jefferson and Pat Surtain. You cannot. You better pick one, because you’re going to get exposed.”

Although I would advise Hunter to follow the money and play receiver in the pros, because the NFL puts a higher premium on catching touchdown passes than preventing them, I wouldn’t put it past him to play 100 snaps in a game at the next level.

With all due respect to the other leading Heisman contenders, Boise State running back Ashton Jeanty and Miami quarterback Cam Ward, they ain’t him.

“Travis is everything now,” Sanders said. “He’s it.”

And we haven’t seen anything like it since … Champ Bailey?

Try again.

We might not have seen anybody dominate both sides of the football in the college game since Jim Thorpe, when he played running back, defensive back and punted for a coach named Pop Warner at Carlisle Indian School in 1912.