To prevent prank calls next year, the NFL has plenty of work to do

NBC Sports

02-05-2025

The 2025 draft has reintroduced millions to the lost art of the prank phone call. The Jerky Boys did it. Bart Simpson has been doing it since 1989. It was one of the funniest moments in what had to have been one of Jerry Jones's favorite '80s movies, Porky's.
Growing up in the '70s, when we had three TV channels (PBS didn't count, except when they rolled out the TV cart at school to show us the latest episode of Ripples) and the home video game technology generally sucked, we made prank calls. A lot of prank calls. (We tried to be a little more high-minded than asking, for example, 'Is your refrigerator running?' or 'Do you have Prince Albert in a can?')
Now, the prank call is back. With a vengeance. And the NFL has a problem.
This year, there were more than a few prank calls made to draft picks. It wasn't just Shedeur Sanders. It happened to Abdul Carter, Ty Warren, Josh Conerly Jr., Isaiah Bond, Kyle McCord, and others.
Sanders ended up being the biggest of them all. Because his name was the biggest in the entire draft pool. Because the prank call, supposedly from Saints G.M. Mickey Loomis, traced to their biggest rival, the Falcons. Because, despite the NFL's misguided effort to paint this as some sort of serious breach of confidentiality, the league office sent Sanders's number to roughly 2,000 people.
As the NFL under Roger Goodell has done in the past (most notably, to the Saints in 2012), the league has attempted to address a possible cultural problem by hammering the one team it caught red handed. But the NFL has direct responsibility for this one, and the league office needs to make changes far more substantive than wagging a finger at the 32 franchises and saying, 'This better not happen again.'
For starters, no prospect's phone number ever should be communicated via the email address that distributes the daily transaction report. That's what happened with Sanders's updated contact information. And that's what put his phone number in Falcons defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbricht's email inbox. (We still find the official 'wandering by an open iPad that happened to have that one email visible' explanation to be convenient, and fishy.)
The contact information for the draft prospects should go to at most three people per team: owner, G.M., head coach. Or it should go to only one person, with the team designating in advance who will receive it. And the very clear instruction should be that no one else in the organization may be given the number.
While that would go a long way toward preventing leaks initiated by one of the 32 teams, it hardly solves the problem. Although Sanders said during his in-draft livestream that he received a new phone specifically for the draft from Boost Mobile (this would explain the separate email with his new number), most players are still using the cell phone that they have had for months if not years.
Others have that number. Current friends. Former friends. Former friends who, in the aftermath of a failed romantic relationship, may now be enemies.
The punishment of the Falcons has caused many to assume (incorrectly) that all of the prank calls trace back to one of the NFL's teams. Common sense suggests that most if not all of the others came from someone who already has the player's number, or who specifically obtained it from someone who does. (As we've mentioned on PFT Live a couple of times this week, a former player once received a prank call from one of his friends that he'd been traded. While on the way to the airport to fly to his new city, the player learned the truth when he called his agent.)
One way to fix this would be to send new brand phones to all the prospects. Of course, that's a lot of phones. Unless the league can find an Official NFL Draft Prospect Burner Phone partner who will provide the phones for free (and also pay the NFL a giant pile of money), the league will have to pay for all of those new phones. (And if the NFL has by next year an Official NFL Draft Prospect Burner Phone partner, you're welcome.)
Then there's the simple fact that the prank-call phenomenon will prompt potential copycats to accept the challenge of positioning themselves to do it in 2026. With mock drafts already popping up everywhere (unfortunately), it's not hard to come up with a list of the players who will be waiting for a phone call next April. If the prospect has the same phone number a year from now, the foundation is already in place for another round of prank calls.
Another possibility that has been raised here and elsewhere (Bucs G.M. Jason Licht suggested it during an appearance with Rich Eisen) is a pivot to FaceTime. It would be instantly obvious that the call is coming from a draft room, not a dorm room.
Then there's the nuclear option. The only way to neutralize the impact of a prank call. As a reader suggested via email (and this is one of those rare moments where I don't regret opening and reviewing them all), why do they need to call the player BEFORE he's drafted? It's not as if the player can say, 'No thanks.' It's a draft.
Make the pick, and then call the player.
The moment won't change. The tears will still flow. The owner, G.M., and/or head coach will have a chance to utter the same old cliches that will be clipped off for social media. And every player who gets the call after he has been officially picked won't be hearing the NFL equivalent of, 'Wanna lick? Psych!'
Time and again, the NFL has shown that it is far more reactive than proactive. When reacting to the prank-call epidemic of 2025, the NFL must be very proactive — and creative — when it comes to ensuring that those who try to make prank calls next April will be wasting their time.
Next April, we'll find out whether the league's strategy has worked. If there's even one prank call, the NFL will get an 'F' in what is a very clear and simple pass-fail proposition.