The Rams are leaving the door open for both Jimmy Garoppolo and the possibility of adding a rookie quarterback in the draft.
Garoppolo is considering retirement and McVay said at a press conference earlier this week that the team doesn’t want to press him for a decision about returning for a third season at this point. He reiterated that during an appearance on ESPN Los Angeles ahead of Thursday’s first round and also said that the team has done the necessary research to be in position to draft a quarterback if things break that way over the next three days.
“We do our work on all these positions,” McVay said. “Whether you’re saying it’s a [Fernando] Mendoza, it’s a Ty Simpson, it’s a [Garrett] Nussmeier, it’s Carson Beck, there are a lot of guys that are going to be good players in this draft and if we feel like it fits for us, you consider it. But we are still hopeful and optimistic that you give Jimmy his time, maybe he’ll have a change of heart. I think the best thing you can do — you never want to force somebody to do something. He’s earned the right to be able to walk away on his terms and it’s been an amazing career.”
Stetson Bennett is currently the only quarterback on the roster behind Matthew Stafford and Stafford’s not guaranteed to be playing beyond 2026, so adding a rookie quarterback would make sense whether Garoppolo wants to come back or not. Should that move come early in the draft, it might be an indication that the Rams don’t think there’s a high likelihood of that change of heart coming to pass.
Throughout the pre-draft process, Notre Dame running back Jeremiyah Love has been widely expected to go to the Titans with the fourth overall pick in the draft.
Not anymore.
A late surge of bets has come in on Ohio State linebacker Sonny Styles, who is now favored over Love to go fourth overall at some sports books.
Styles could make sense because he’s an ideal fit for the defensive scheme preferred by first-year Titans head coach Robert Saleh. As Saleh looks to rebuild the Titans, he may think a linebacker can do more for his defense than a running back could do for his offense.
At the same time, there’s also talk that Love could be off the board when the Titans pick: Love’s odds to go No. 3 overall are now second only to Arvell Reese’s odds.
We all know the Raiders are going to take Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza with the first overall pick, but after that it’s wide open from No. 2 on down. And that includes the possibility of the Titans taking Styles in what would be a surprise, but not a betting upset.
Don’t look for the Saints to make a big move up the draft board on Thursday night.
They are currently slated to pick eighth after going 6-11 during the 2025 season and that record would have looked much worse without four wins in their final five games. On Wednesday, General Manager Mickey Loomis said that was an encouraging run but that it didn’t leave the team feeling like there’s a single player who could vault them into contention.
“When you have a Drew Brees — when you have that caliber of quarterback — you always feel like you’re one player away,” Loomis said, via the team’s website. “And so, ‘Man, let’s go get the one player.’ And when you have a young quarterback and you’re developing your roster, you’re not one player away. So you’re less inclined to give up a number of assets to get one player. We’re not one player away. That’s a five-game stretch or a six-game stretch. I don’t want to read too much into that. We’re excited, we’re optimistic about our future, but by no means have we arrived anywhere.”
Quarterback Tyler Shough was in the center of that winning close to the season and the Saints hope that it was a sign of things to come, but more evidence will be needed before the team considers a big swing.
Ty Simpson hopes to hear his name called in the first round of the draft, but the former Alabama quarterback is going to need to wait a little longer to find out if that will happen.
Simpson’s performance with the Crimson Tide has made him a popular choice to be the second quarterback off the board behind Fernando Mendoza, but his limited experience as a college starter and a rough finish to the season are among the reasons why there’s some doubt that will happen in the first 32 picks. Simpson has been clear about his belief that he has the makeup of a first-round pick and said on Wednesday that he feels he’s made a good of a case for that as possible.
“It’s out of my control,” Simpson said, via Jeremy Bergman of NFL Media. “I’ve done what I can do. I put my best foot forward, and whatever happens, happens. I’m at peace with it. I’m understanding that anything could happen. Just really excited to get started.”
Whether Simpson finds out his NFL destination on Thursday or Friday, he’ll have a chance to keep putting that foot forward and show anyone that passes on him that they dropped the ball while putting together their draft boards over the last few months.
Jets General Manager Darren Mougey downplayed the team’s decision to cancel a pre-draft visit from edge rusher David Bailey on Tuesday and Bailey did the same on Wednesday.
Mougey didn’t share why the team called off the meeting, but said no one should read much into the cancellation because there are a variety of reasons why teams do or don’t invite a player to the facility for a top-30 visit. Among those reasons is that there are other ways to communicate with a prospect and Bailey cited those while saying he thinks he’s built a strong rapport with the team holding the second overall pick.
“They canceled my 30 visit, so I wasn’t able to get around the facility and kinda have an in-depth conversation with all the staff and everything, but I had a great interaction with them at the Combine and obviously whatever FaceTime calls we’ve been having,” Bailey said, via SNY.
Bailey had 14.5 sacks at Texas Tech last season and joins Ohio State edge rusher Arvell Reese as the likeliest picks at No. 2 because of the Jets’ need to upgrade their defense. Their choice is the first big question that will be answered on Thursday night and the pick will have ripple effects on the rest of the first round.
Much of the speculation about the Jets’ plans for the No. 2 pick has centered on edge rushers Arvell Reese and David Bailey, so a report last week that they canceled a top 30 visit with Bailey drew a fair amount of attention.
Jets General Manager Darren Mougey confirmed that the team called off Bailey’s visit to their facility during a Tuesday press conference, but he downplayed the significance of the decision. Mougey noted that teams schedule those visits for a variety of reasons — and that some teams don’t do them — or have them as smokescreens to cloud their true draft intentions before turning specifically to Bailey.
“In regards to David, we had good touch points with him at the Combine,” Mougey said, via SNY. “We went to his Pro Day, had a good dinner with him. We were just kinda juggling our 30 and how to use them. I wouldn’t look too much into a cancellation because there were other ones we may have changed as well.”
Bailey led the country with 14.5 sacks for Texas Tech last season and that production has pushed him to the top of draft boards. Reese saw time at off-ball linebacker as well while at Ohio State and projection of how he’ll develop is the reason he’s set to be an early pick. With Fernando Mendoza set to go to the Raiders at No. 1, the choice the Jets make between those two paths will have a lot to say about how the rest of the first round unfolds on Thursday night.
The NFL changed the rules for this year’s draft, limiting teams to eight minutes between first-round picks. Some NFL general managers are not happy about that.
Steelers GM Omar Khan said he preferred the old rule of 10 minutes between first-round picks.
“I’d love to have 10 minutes, but it’s the same for everybody else,” Khan said. “Eight minutes is what it is, but those two minutes, it feels like an eternity sometimes.”
After Khan said that at the Steelers’ pre-draft press conference, head coach Mike McCarthy joked that if Khan feels rushed during the draft, he should try calling plays on the sideline during a game.
“I only get 40 seconds to call a play,” McCarthy said. “We’ll be fine.”
Khan said he and other GMs have been talking more about trades in the days leading up to the draft because they know they’ll have less time to work out trades while they’re on the clock.
“They moved the first round from 10 minutes to eight minutes, so naturally we’ve been having more conversations to set parameters of what the value is if you move up to this spot or trade back,” Khan said. “There’s more conversation, but until we get there, I’m not sure how that’s going to go.”
This is the first time the NFL has changed the timing of the first round since 2008, when the time between picks was reduced from 15 minutes to 10 minutes. The timing for Rounds 2-7 remains the same as last year: Teams get seven minutes to make picks in the second round, five minutes in Rounds 3-6 and four minutes in round 7.
The Seahawks currently hold the final pick in the first round of the draft on Thursday night, but they wouldn’t mind waiting until Friday to make their first selection.
After making other deals to help build a Super Bowl champion, General Manager John Schneider only has four picks in the arsenal heading into the draft. During a press conference on Monday, Schneider saw no reason to put up a smokescreen about his desire to add to that total.
“It’s no secret with us,” Schneider said. “We have four picks, so we’ll be looking to move back.”
Schneider expects the No. 32 pick to be an attractive one as he tries to make that happen. He called No. 32 “the pick everybody wants” because teams get a fifth-year option on a first-round pick, so it should not come as a surprise to anyone if the final pick of the first round is made by a team other than the reigning champs.
Former Alabama quarterback Ty Simpson is expected to be a late first-round draft pick on Thursday night, which will bring him a guaranteed four-year contract worth around $20 million. But he considered turning that down for a big-money offer to stay in college.
Simpson, who has previously said that Miami offered him $6.5 million to transfer and play for the Hurricanes in 2026, said on David Pollack’s podcast that the money was too good not to at least think about.
“I think the last offer was definitely one that I just had to sit down and consider, because it would have been life-changing money,” Simpson said. “It would have made me the highest-paid player in college, and it was something to where I was like, I can’t just ignore this. I have to sit down and think about it. That’s how I am, I don’t want to do anything sporadic. I want to sit down and think it all out, and it really just came down to how I wanted to be remembered and what do I want to do.”
Simpson, who spent three years as a backup at Alabama before becoming the starter last year, went to his former coach, Nick Saban, for advice.
“I actually talked to Coach Saban about this,” Simpson said. “The things he was talking about were, do you want to play football in college, or do you want to play football professionally? And he was like, ‘Take the money out of it, take the rounds out of it, what do you want to do next year?’ And without a doubt, without hesitation, I said, ‘I want to play professional football.’ And he was like, ‘Well, there’s your answer.’ It was something that I’ve always dreamed of, and I felt that I was ready to take that next step and be the face of a franchise and lead a locker room.”
It’s a different world in football now that players might make more money with another year in college than their annual average salary will be in the NFL. Now, players have to think about whether the NCAA or the NFL will be more lucrative. NIL deals have changed both college football and pro football.
Georgia wide receiver Zachariah Branch, who projects as a Day 2 draft pick, may have just damaged his draft stock with an arrest on misdemeanor obstruction charges.
Athens Clarke County police arrested Branch Sunday morning for obstructing public sidewalks/streets-prowling and obstruction of a law enforcement officer, according to the Athens Banner Herald.
Branch was booked into the Clarke County Jail at 1:26 a.m. Sunday and released at 3:44 a.m.
Branch was considered the No. 1 wide receiver recruit in the country coming out of high school. He started his college football career at USC in 2023 and played two seasons for the Trojans before transferring to Georgia last year.
As a freshman Branch was a first-team All-American punt returner and last year he led the SEC with 81 catches. His 4.35-second 40-yard dash at the Combine bolstered his draft stock. Now Branch will have to hope his arrest doesn’t tank his draft stock.
