Former Colorado QB Shedeur Sanders supported a Cleveland community after a tragic fire

Shedeur Sanders has received a lot of criticism regarding his character in his two years at Colorado. A lot of the conversations have been driven by people who just don’t like him and the rest of the Sanders family and try to find any angle to pick at them, while some has been validated, like his quote after Colorado’s blowout loss to Nebraska in 2024.

Could character concerns be part of the reason why he slid in the 2025 NFL Draft? Possibly, especially given that he dropped from being a top-20 pick all the way to the fifth round despite the elite numbers he put up at Colorado in two seasons.

Sanders has been up in Cleveland competing with three other quarterbacks for the starting job this offseason, but his actions this week showed that he cares about the community out there, not just the football.

Just under a month ago, the Rainbow Terrace Apartments in Cleveland’s Garden Valley neighborhood caught fire following an explosion, an event that killed one man, hospitalized another five people and displaced 40 families. The community has been looking for ways to come back stronger, and the Garden Valley Fun Fest was the perfect opportunity to do so on Wednesday. The event featured games, dancing, food, drinks and music — all for free in an effort to reunite the community and give those people who went through so much some joy.

The host of the event? None other than Shedeur Sanders, the new quarterback in town.

#Browns QB Shedeur Sanders found out about the Rainbow Terrace Apartment explosion/fire when he was out of town. He knew he didn't just want to send help, he wanted to spend time.

"Sending money and stuff, that's easy. But you have to actually go out there and be in the flesh." pic.twitter.com/iX0p0UyEq9

— Camryn Justice (@camijustice) July 17, 2025

“When everything transpired, I was out of town,” Sanders said at the event. “So I was like ‘nah, the first thing I do when I get back is definitely come to the community.’ I could tell everybody’s vibe out here is down to Earth. There’s a lot of people that didn’t want me coming out here doing but I don’t understand why.”

The 23-year-old quarterback was referring to the comments underneath his Instagram post calling for people to come to the event to help support the community.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Shedeur Sanders (@shedeursanders)

The post, which has 615 comments on it as of Thursday afternoon, was just a simple flyer calling for “everyone in Cleveland” to come support. While there were a lot of people in there supporting the quarterback, there were a handful of comments trying to tell him otherwise. Given his status, he’s not the guy to listen to Instagram comments, but it’s still strange to see average Joe’s hating on someone trying to give back to the community.

The community is just a 13 minute drive south from Huntington Bank Field, home of the Browns. Sanders knows that while there’s a lot of people questioning who he is as a person, only he can control what he does for his new fans in Cleveland, and putting on this event was a big step in showing people that he doesn’t have character concerns.

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