Media personality Jason Whitlock has never been shy about criticizing head coach Deion Sanders, and the Jacksonville Jaguars’ handling of two-way player Travis Hunter as a wide receiver and starting cornerback gave him fresh ammunition this week.
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Reacting to a post from a Jacksonville outlet detailing Hunter’s limited defensive workload, Whitlock, a longtime FOX Sports and Blaze Media commentator known for his outspoken sports commentary, delivered a blunt verdict on X.
“Say it with me. Travis Hunter is a bust,” Whitlock wrote. “He’s a good kid. Deion sold him as a 2-way player and making history… instead of selling him as ‘go be a shutdown corner’ and maybe play a handful of offensive snaps.”
Whitlock’s post was responding to the fact that Hunter played just 37 defensive snaps on Sunday and questioned whether the Jaguars should be using their No. 2 overall pick on every defensive down instead.
Hunter won the 2024 Heisman Trophy after starring at both cornerback and wide receiver for Deion Sanders at Colorado. He was the first full-time two-way player to win the award since the early 1960s, and the first to do so with significant snaps on both sides of the ball since Charles Woodson in 1997. That two-way ability was a big reason Hunter stood out to Jacksonville, which moved from No. 5 to No. 2 to get him, sending out two more 2025 picks and a 2026 first-rounder.
Hunter’s first NFL season was cut short by a knee injury. Before that happened, though, Jacksonville had actually used him more on offense, with 324 offensive snaps compared with 162 on defense. This season, Jacksonville head coach Liam Coen has deliberately flipped that ratio, leaning on Hunter far more heavily at cornerback.
Through Week 2, Hunter played 58% to 60% of Jacksonville’s defensive snaps and only 9% to 10% on offense, and by the metrics that actually track coverage performance, he’s holding up well: Through two weeks, PFF had Hunter ranked 16th among 92 qualified cornerbacks, while he had allowed just one reception for four yards on the season. Coen addressed the shift directly when asked about Hunter’s role this offseason.
“I’d say not so fast. Let’s pump the brakes and just give the guy a chance to get back from obviously a pretty serious injury in which he’s worked his tail off to get himself into the position where he can continue to do those things. What the exact number of reps looks like. I can’t say right now, but I do know that he’s a, he’s a playmaker,” Coen said. “He’s somebody that we want to get the ball in his hands, too.”
That’s precisely the tension Whitlock is pointing at. Hunter is performing well as a cornerback, arguably the exact “shutdown corner” role Whitlock says the Jaguars should have committed to from day one, but his offensive production has nearly disappeared in the process, undercutting the whole “two-way star” pitch that justified trading multiple premium picks to get him in the first place. Hunter himself addressed the reduced offensive role with characteristic calm after Jacksonville’s Week 2 loss in Denver.
“That’s the plan. Coaches tell me what I’ve got to do; I just follow their plan, follow their lead,” Hunter said. “My job is to go out there and play, no matter when they put me out there. That’s what I’ve got to do.”
The Jaguars sit at 1-1 heading into a Week 3 matchup with the New England Patriots, still searching for the balance between the two-way vision Sanders sold them on and the more conventional role Whitlock argues they should have targeted from the start.
It’s still too early to know whether Hunter can truly handle both roles at a high level. For now, his offensive numbers give Whitlock something to point to, while his coverage grades paint a much stronger picture of what he is doing defensively.