The NFL has fined the Atlanta Falcons $250,000 and defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich $100,000 in response to the leak of Shedeur Sanders’ phone number for the NFL Draft. Ulbrich's son, Jax, used the number to prank call the former Colorado quarterback and trick him into thinking he was New Orleans Saints general manager Mickey Loomis.
The Falcons put out a statement addressing the incident, earlier this week. “Jax Ulbrich, the 21-year-old son of defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich, unintentionally came across the draft contact phone number for Shedeur Sanders off an open iPad while visiting his parent’s home and wrote the number down to later conduct a prank call,” the team said, as caught by The New York Times.
The organization continued: “Jeff Ulbrich was unaware of the data exposure or any facets of the prank and was made aware of the above only after the fact. The Atlanta Falcons do not condone this behavior and send our sincere apologies to Shedeur Sanders and his family, who we have been in contact with to apologize to, as well as facilitate an apology directly from Jax to the Sanders family.”
Jax also released his own apology on his Instagram page after a video surfaced on social media in which he sat next to the person who made the call to Sanders. “On Friday night I made a tremendous mistake. Shedeur, what I did was completely inexcusable, embarrassing and shameful. I’m so sorry I took away from your moment, it was selfish and childish,” he wrote. “I could never imagine getting ready to celebrate one of the greatest moments of your life and I made a terrible mistake and messed with that moment."
Shedeur Sanders NFL Draft
The NFL is continuing to investigate the situation as several other prospects reportedly dealt with prank calls as well, although they appear unrelated to Jax Ulbrich.
The Cleveland Browns ended up taking Shedeur Sanders in the fifth round with the 144th overall pick. It was a shocking result for Sanders, who many analysts expected to be one of the first quarterbacks off the board going into the draft.
