A few follow-up thoughts on changing football landscape … We’ve had some follow-up thoughts from yesterday’s post on that ESPN article published over the weekend listing the top 5 prospects for the 2026 draft by position. Again, it shouldn’t really be that much of a surprise that people around the NFL doubt that Arch Manning, the presumptive #1 pick next April, will actually come out next year, as staying in school has been what Manning’s do. However, it may be a very different ball game of sorts for most other prospects with eligibility remaining. Indeed, we’re not all that sure that we may be on the precipice of a major change to the draft landscape as a result of the introduction of NIL payments, and now quite literally salaries, in the college ranks.
Until very recently, for most college prospects it was a race to get, not necessarily just to the NFL, but to free agency. Even that, though, was 3 years in school, followed by 4-5 years in the pros. All of a sudden, though, college players are now literally free agents even before they step on campus. Clearly, those players aren’t going to make the truly mega-bucks that a handful of pros get when the reach free agent status, at least for now, but the money in college for most of those players will be pretty much guaranteed. The other thing we kind of wonder about in this whole context is whether we will start to see some pressure from either the colleges, or the players themselves, perhaps thru legal action, for players with remaining eligibility who enter the draft, who either aren’t selected at all, or don’t like where or by whom they were drafted, to return to school. One would think, for example, that college football would be better off this season with a Quinn Ewers playing at Ohio State or Alabama rather than sitting on the bench in Miami.
