Montana
Ex-Colorado Buffaloes Wide Receiver Signs NFL Deal With Pittsburgh Steelers
Another former Colorado Buffaloes wide recevier is headed to the NFL.
On Tuesday, the Pittsburgh Steelers announced their signing of one-time rising Colorado star Montana Lemonious-Craig. The 22-year-old spent his first three college football seasons in Boulder before entering the transfer portal in April 2023 and ultimately landing with the Arizona Wildcats.
Lemonious-Craig’s decision to leave Colorado was largely unexpected, as he was seemingly building a strong connection with quarterback Shedeur Sanders during their lone spring together. In front of a sold-out spring game crowd at Folsom Field in 2023, Lemonious-Craig recorded six catches for 169 yards, including a 98-yard touchdown. One day later, he announced his intentions to leave coach Deion Sanders’ Colorado program for the transfer portal.
The 6-foot-2 wide receiver was a bright spot on Colorado’s 2021 and 2022 teams. Although the Buffs won only a combined five games, Lemonious-Craig stood out with 482 receiving yards and five touchdowns. He also played a key role in helping Colorado secure its only win in 2022, finishing with 119 receiving yards and one touchdown against Cal.
During his two seasons at Arizona, Lemonious-Craig never truly developed a strong connection with Wildcats quarterback Noah Fifita. The former three-star prospect from California had 296 receiving yards and three touchdowns in 2023 and failed to eclipse 200 receiving yards this past season.
Lemonious-Craig did, however, make his presence known during his return to Folsom Field in 2023. In a 34-31 win for Arizona, he caught five passes for 67 yards, including a clutch five-yard catch on third down late in the fourth quarter.
“It was tough to leave, because of the history I have here. I love Colorado,” Lemonious-Craig told The Denver Post after his return to Boulder. “This was the place where I got an opportunity to play collegiate football. Of course, it was tough to leave. But I thought it was the right decision for me to move on, with the direction Sanders was going with the CU program. I just made the decision, rolled the dice and went on with my life.”
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Despite never putting up consistent numbers as a college player, his occasional flashes of greatness and strong NFL potential seemingly caught Pittsburgh’s eye. Longtime coach Mike Tomlin also needs all the offensive help he can get with Mason Rudolph and sixth-round NFL Draft pick Will Howard battling for the Steelers’ starting quarterback job.
Lemonious-Craig joins a wide receivers room headlined by two-time Pro Bowler DK Metcalf, who was traded from the Seattle Seahawks to the Steelers in March. Metcalf was reportedly absent from the Steelers’ first OTA practice on Tuesday, however.
Other former Buffs who signed with an NFL team post-draft include safeties Shilo Sanders (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) and Cam’Ron Silmon-Craig (Jacksonville Jaguars) and defensive end BJ Green (Jaguars). Cornerback/wide receiver Travis Hunter (Jaguars), Shedeur Sanders (Cleveland Browns), and wide receivers Jimmy Horn Jr. (Carolina Panthers) and LaJohntay Wester (Baltimore Ravens) were each selected in the draft.
Ye (the artist formerly known as Kanye West) is facing yet another lawsuit over allegations of unlicensed sampling — only this time, it’s centered on a video clip of the rapper’s infamous 2013 fight with paparazzi.
In a case filed Wednesday (July 15) in Los Angeles federal court, the celebrity news agency Bauer-Griffin claims that Ye, French Montana (Karim Kharbouch) and others used audio from the headline-grabbing incident in “Where They At,” released in 2024 off French’s Mac & Cheese 5.
The May 2013 video, which also features a pregnant Kim Kardashian, shows West charging at a photographer outside a Los Angeles restaurant and shouting “don’t take no photos” and a string of profanities: “All of you m*therf*ckers stop it, man!”
The clip appears prominently in the intro to Montana’s song — a use that the lawsuit calls “blatant and willful” copyright infringement.
“Given Mr. Ye’s history of numerous confrontations with paparazzi, the video was highly newsworthy,” the agency’s lawyers write in legal documents obtained and first reported by Billboard. “Listeners immediately recognized the audio sample that begins the infringing record as being copied from the video.”
Ye has been sued over a dozen times for allegedly using unlicensed samples and interpolations in his music, including a high-profile battle with Donna Summer. In May, he lost a jury trial over using an uncleared sample in an early version of the Grammy-winning “Hurricane” from Donda. He had testified at trial that he’s “very generous” about giving credit and compensation when it’s due, but that “a lot of people try to take advantage of me.”
In Wednesday’s complaint, Bauer-Griffin says the creators of “Where They At” showed no such respect to its rights in the video of the paparazzi incident, using it despite being well aware that sound recordings must be licensed when any amount is directly sampled into a song.
“In the music industry, copyrights are prevalent and well understood,” lawyers for the agency write. “Every defendant knew that they needed to have but did not have permission to use the audio sample.”
Reps for both stars did not immediately return requests for comment. The lawsuit also names as defendants producers Dem Jointz (Dwayne Abernathy Jr.) and BoogzDaBeast (Jahmal Gwin), as well Gamma, the label that released the song, and its distribution unit Vydia.
The confrontation at issue in Wednesday’s lawsuit was one of two high-profile scuffles with paparazzi that year for the rapper, who was then still known as Kanye West. Two months later, he clashed with photographer Daniel Ramos outside of LAX, resulting in a civil assault lawsuit that the star eventually settled two years later on the eve of trial.
As many celebrities have learned over the years, simply appearing in a photo or video does not give someone any legal rights to it. Ownership of such material is always retained by the creator — an inconvenient fact that has sparked lawsuits against Jennifer Lopez, Miley Cyrus and Dua Lipa.
It’s unclear who filmed the May 2013 incident, which happened outside a Beverly Hills restaurant minutes after the star had also been filmed accidentally banging his head into a signpost while trying to avoid other photographers. But the rights to the footage have been owned by Bauer-Griffin from the beginning: When TMZ first posted it at the time, it came with a watermark crediting the agency.
“The infringing record has been widely distributed on various streaming platforms, in flagrant violation of plaintiff’s exclusive rights under copyright laws,” Bauer-Griffin’s attorneys write. “Plaintiff brings these claims to vindicate those rights.”
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