"I need you to run for office": When Deion Sanders issued hilarious advice to Dwayne Johnson on Jimmy Fallon's show

Deion Sanders has no shortage of celebrity star power. The Colorado football coach has invited many stars to the Buffaloes' sidelines during games, but there's one who might be more noticeable, especially in stature, than all the others — Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.

Appearing on "The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon," Sanders spoke to a life-size cardboard cutout of Johnson being held and animated by Fallon.

"Rock, I love you and I appreciate you," Sanders said. "You're a great actor. You're a great inspirer. You're great at everything you do. But, it's time for you to step up to the plate and take it to the next level. I need you to run for office. I need you to be the president of the United States of the World!"

The respect between the two is mutual. Deion Sanders had a hand in inspiring Johnson while he developed his brash sports entertainment persona, The Rock.

"Years before Colorado, Sanders was creating culture," Sean Gregory wrote for Time in 2023. "Dwayne Johnson was watching closely during these years. Over Zoom, I ask him about Sanders' influence on his own career, and he shows me goosebumps on his forearm.

"'No one has ever asked me that,' he says. 'So much of the character and the entity of the Rock came from Prime. One of the characteristics of the character of the Rock was talking in the third person. Deion would say certain things in the third person. I always found that so f***ing cool. Because he walked the walk."

What other former pro wrestler does Deion Sanders have a relationship with?

Deion Sanders once shared the field with Bill Goldberg in Atlanta. Goldberg went on to become a household name in World Championship Wrestling, a career move Coach Prime wasn't all that surprised by.

"We used to have wrestling matches every Friday in the middle of the locker room," Sanders said in a video posted by Well Off Media last May. "I was like the Don King ... and we were promoting different guys, and I used to always say, 'Who wants Goldberg?' Everybody would put their head down. Nobody wanted him, and then he becomes a wrestler."

Deion Sanders and Goldberg grew close in part because Goldberg protected Sandberg on a late hit.

"Let me tell you the story," Sanders said. "I ran a punt back. They hit me out of bounds. Goldberg was my dog. They didn't understand who Goldberg was gonna become, but we already knew. He ran from one end of the sideline to the other end and slammed the cat."

Sanders currently coaches Goldberg's son, Gage Goldberg, who's an inside linebacker at Colorado.