Cowboys Blockbuster Trade Brewing? Pass Rusher Surging? Everything I'm hearing from League Sources | 2026 NFL Draft Notebook
Inside the 2026 Draft's Final Hours
The NFL Draft kicks off in earnest Thursday, when Commissioner Roger Goodell steps to the podium in the shadow of Acrisure Stadium in Pittsburgh, to a likely chorus of boos to open the first round.
Those boos might be a time-honored tradition come draft day as fans voice their displeasure towards Goodell entering his 20th season as commissioner, but this year may also symbolize the quality of players available in the 2026 class.
“A lot of teams don’t really want to draft this year,” one prominent agent who represents several prospects in this year’s class tells Between The Hashmarks. “It’s just a bad grouping of players. No depth.”
That has been a common sentiment from agents, as well as scouts and high-ranking front office executives in buildings across the league.
“At least two-thirds of the first round will be populated by players who have lower than a first-round grade,” an assistant general manager tells Between The Hashmarks, echoing the agent’s viewpoint.
While there might be some star power at some premium positions (edge rusher, cornerback, and wide receiver) at the very top of the first round, finding value across three days and seven rounds could prove a daunting task for the general managers occupying the 32 war rooms, plotting the course of 32 franchises’ futures.
Each year, during the days leading up to the draft, I carve out a few hours to place phone calls to agents who I’m friendly with, text helpful general managers, and scouts to find out what they are hearing entering the draft or what they’re thinking about certain prospects who could rise up the boards or seem destined to fall.
In this column last spring, we were among the first outlets to suggest that Shedeur Sanders might not hear his name called by Roger Goodell in the first round, despite many believing he was destined to be as high as a top-10 selection: “From multiple conversations both on the team-side, and among agents who represent potential first-round picks and are thus in constant conversations with teams, it sure sounds like Shedeur Sanders could slide.
“Where Sanders winds up going may be the most interesting storyline of this entire draft,” one agent tells me. “I think he could slide and not be taken until the second round.”
Sanders, of course, didn’t just slip until the second round, but became the storyline of the entire draft, falling all the way to the Cleveland Browns, on Saturday afternoon, and the fifth round.
Two years ago, in the hours leading up to the NFL Draft, we reported that Michael Penix Jr. could go as high as the top-10 picks. He went to Atlanta at No. 9.
Here’s a glimpse at what I’m hearing, and those inside the league are saying as the hype machine shifts into overdrive ahead of the 2026 NFL Draft beginning.
Quarterbacks may have a wait …
Fernando Mendoza will be a Las Vegas Raider, roughly 10 minutes into the 2026 NFL Draft, but that’s about as much certainty as this draft offers.
One other quarterback consensus is forming, and that is that quarterbacks may need to wait a while to hear their name called. It’s sounding more and more likely, from conversations with scouts, front office types, and even agents who represent some of this class’s more heralded passers, that Mendoza will be the only quarterback off the board at the end of night one.
“A few scouts I’ve crossed paths with on the road feel that all of the quarterbacks, except for Fernando Mendoza, are backups at this point and really shouldn’t be considered until Day 3 of this draft,” one veteran scout tells Between The Hashmarks.
There has been this odd, but timely, groundswell of hype around Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson’s possibilities of being chosen in the first round, or a team trading into the back-half of the first round to select him, as the Giants did with Jaxson Dart last spring. However, that just does not sound likely, according to sources we have spoken to over the past month.
One veteran evaluator suggests that, were it not for the desperation that quarterback-needy teams feel to fill that position, Simpson wouldn’t be chosen until the third round. He sees a backup quarterback with the potential to one day become Mac Jones.
All it takes is one desperate team, though, to see potential in Simpson. Maybe the Steelers are tired of waiting for Aaron Rodgers to walk off the beach, or want to give him a nudge towards a decision while having another young developmental prospect, such as Simpson, alongside Will Howard in their quarterback room.
But, it doesn’t seem like there’s much upside to just about any other team investing a first-round pick in a quarterback with as few starts as Simpson’s 15 in college and as many question marks as he has as a prospect.
The Phone is Ringing: Why the League’s Top Evaluators are Asking ME About One Specific Star
Every year, it seems that there is at least one player who is chosen way higher than many analysts, fans, and folks in the year-long cottage industry of NFL Mock Draft Authorship expected him to.
