NFL hands Falcons coach hefty fine after son’s Shedeur Sanders prank call on draft night

Jeff Ulbrich’s son, Jax, accessed the prospect’s phone number on his father’s iPad

Shedeur Sanders endured a difficult draft weekend (AP)

The defensive coordinator of the Atlanta Falcons has been fined $100,000 (£75,000) by the NFL after his son prank called quarterback Shedeur Sanders during the NFL draft.

Jax Ulbrich - son of newly-appointed Falcons coach Jeff - pretended to be the general manager of the New Orleans Saints when phoning Sanders having accessed the number of the Colorado prospect on his father’s iPad.

The 21-year-old has since apologised to Sanders, who endured a difficult draft weekend after sliding out of the first and second days. He was eventually picked in the fifth round by the Cleveland Browns.

Ulbrich, pretending to be Saints decision-maker Mickey Loomis, initally claimed that the New Orleans team would take the quarterback with their next pick, before suggesting that Sanders was “gonna have to wait a little bit longer”.

His actions have resulted in a hefty fine for his father and his employer, with the Falcons fined $250,000 (£187,000) after “failing to prevent the disclosure of confidential information distributed to the club in advance of the NFL Draft.”

Ulbrich joined the team this offseason after a stint with New York Jets that included an interim head coaching role during the 2024 season.

The Falconsi said in a statement over the weekend: “Earlier in the 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. 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 apologise to, as well as facilitate an apology directly from Jax to the Sanders family.”

Sanders is the son of NFL great Deion Sanders, who spent the first few seasons of his career with the Falcons and coached Shedeur at the University of Colorado.