Colorado Buffaloes football coach Deion Sanders reportedly plans on deploying Julian Lewis in a similar fashion to how Michigan State Spartans football coach Jonathan Smith utilized Aidan Chiles during the latter’s freshman year with the Oregon State Beavers.

On3’s Peter Nakos reported that it “would not be surprising” to see Coach Prime take a page out of Smith’s playbook after naming Kaidon Salter QB1 over Julian Lewis.

In 2023, Smith gave most snaps to big-money Clemson Tigers transfer DJ Uiagalelei but still found opportunities to give Chiles reps. Chiles ended up following Smith to East Lansing afterwards, because Chiles was Smith’s plan.

Sanders admitted that was the plan.

“He’s the guy. At this point, we’re praying and we’re hoping that you see some Juju periodically through the game as well. We would like to get him some reps as well, but the game predicates that,” Sanders said.

Lewis is not just Sanders’ plan. The Carrollton (GA) product is Coach Prime’s future in Boulder. Sanders said as much while discussing how his freshman phenom took the news.

“He knows where we stand,” Sanders said. “He knows what the future holds for him. He knows how we see him, and he knows what we expect of him. So it’s not an elongated conversation.”

Lewis came in with a gaudy seven-figure NIL valuation. As far as roster-building goes, he’s the equivalent of a max contract player for Colorado. He needs to be kept happy, or he’ll sign a deal elsewhere. Every offseason is free agency for every player in the NIL era.

It sounds like Coach Prime has the foresight to see that with how he’s discussed Lewis since announcing he’ll be QB2 this year.