If the season ended today, this is who the model says wins — ranked purely on this season's box scores through this week, with zero market input. The real board blends in a market prior specifically so a small early sample doesn't overreact; this one doesn't, on purpose. A rough week 1 can knock a preseason favorite way down, fast.
Darian Mensah leads the race, 4 points clear of Giovanni Lopez in chance to win. 18 players currently sit at 10%+ finalist odds, and the rest of the field is chasing.
Finalist46%Ballot odds, top 3099%CFB Zeitgeist Score#2 of 145
Why he's No. 1
Quarterback for 8-0, No. 1 Miami
The box score alone doesn't put him this high
Receipt: 401 yds passing, 5 TD at Stanford (W 45-6)
Darian Mensah led the ACC in passing and won a surprise title at Duke. Now he's Miami's big-money answer at quarterback — a proven passer dropped onto a roster that was a game from the championship.
The full scout
His 2025 at Duke was a breakout in full: an ACC-best 3,973 passing yards, 34 touchdowns against only six interceptions, a 66.8 completion percentage, second-team All-ACC, ACC Newcomer of the Year and a Davey O'Brien semifinal nod — and a surprise conference title. Miami made him the headline of its offseason, the top-dollar portal swing meant to replace its departed quarterback. The fit is the story: a program fresh off a Playoff near-miss adds a passer who already does the hardest thing well — protect the ball while pushing the offense. The forward stakes are a championship window. Miami doesn't need Mensah to be a revelation; it needs him to be exactly what he was at Duke, on a bigger stage. Do that, and the Hurricanes are a Playoff team and he's a 2027 draft riser.
On tape Mensah is a pure pocket passer who wins on efficiency and ball security, and the data is glowing. Our play-by-play grades his EPA per dropback in the 84th percentile and his passing success rate in the 95th, and the interception avoidance is elite — an 85th-percentile (very low) pick rate that matches his real 34-to-6 ratio. He's accurate (91st-percentile completion) and willing to push it (73rd-percentile explosive-pass rate at a healthy depth of target), the rare combination of careful and aggressive. There's no exotic running element here; the value is in the operation — decisive, accurate, turnover-averse. He's the kind of quarterback who doesn't beat himself, and on a roster this talented, that's exactly the profile a Playoff run wants.
Finalist26%Ballot odds, top 3089%CFB Zeitgeist Score#24 of 145
Why he's No. 4
Georgia sits 7-1 and No. 2 in the AP poll — a contender's platform
Turnovers are the blemish on the line
Receipt: 295 yds passing, 3 TD vs Vanderbilt (W 38-14)
Nobody calls Gunner Stockton flashy. He just went 12-2, won the SEC, beat Alabama 28-7, and finished seventh in the Heisman voting — as a first-year starter. He's back to do the one thing that got away: finish.
The full scout
In his first year as the starter he threw for 2,894 yards with 24 touchdowns and only five interceptions, ran for 462 more and ten scores, and carried Georgia to a second straight SEC title and the No. 3 Playoff seed. Todd McShay's read was that he "shows up in clutch moments" and has "carried that team while the defense lagged behind" — high praise for a quarterback most national lists slot as a game-manager. The season ended one round too early, a 39-34 CFP quarterfinal loss to Ole Miss. So the in-state veteran came back for what should be his final college year, now a fringe-Heisman and preseason-award name. The forward stakes are the wall itself: Georgia has the program, the recruiting, and the standard, but Stockton's job is to push it past the quarterfinal it just lost. His ten rushing touchdowns are the weapon defenses underrate — and 2026 is his bid to turn "does everything right" into a national championship.
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): Georgia lost 27-24 to Auburn on Oct. 17 as a 19.5-point favorite and is 6-1, No. 3 in the AP poll. Stockton threw for 272 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions in the loss and ran seven times for 40 yards. He has 1,570 passing yards, 16 touchdowns and four interceptions this season.
On tape Stockton is the operator, not the highlight — and the numbers say the operating is excellent. He posted a 24-to-5 touchdown-to-interception ratio in 2025, the ball-security of a quarterback who knows where to go with it; McShay praised the way he runs the offense and "does everything right" even if "nothing is super flashy." Where he's quietly elite is on the ground near the end zone: ten rushing touchdowns, and our play-by-play grades his rushing-touchdown rate in the 99th percentile — when Georgia gets close, he's a runner defenses have to account for (he scored five total touchdowns, one with his legs, in the win over Ole Miss). The honest frame is the ceiling debate: CBS and others keep him out of the elite QB tier and light on draft buzz, the "game-manager" label he's spent a year outrunning. He's a tough, low-mistake, dual-threat winner — the kind of quarterback who doesn't lose you games and, at the goal line, wins them.
Finalist23%Ballot odds, top 3087%CFB Zeitgeist Score#11 of 145
Why he's No. 5
Elite passing efficiency, top-three quarterback on the box score
Giveaways are the knock
Receipt: 387 yds passing, 3 TD, 1 rushing TD at Auburn (W 38-17), biggest single line by a quarterback in the top 25
Two years ago Sam Leavitt dragged Arizona State to a Big 12 title and the Playoff as a redshirt freshman. Then injuries stole his 2025. Now he's the first quarterback of the Lane Kiffin era at LSU.
The full scout
Leavitt's college career has been a spike and a setback. As a redshirt freshman in 2024 he was the engine of one of the sport's best turnaround stories, leading Arizona State to a Big 12 championship and a Playoff berth. His 2025 never got going — a broken stretch of seven games before injuries ended it.
So he hit the portal as its top quarterback and chose the highest-pressure landing spot available: Baton Rouge, as the first starter of Lane Kiffin's LSU. The fit is the story — a mobile, gunslinging passer handed the keys to an offense built by one of the sport's sharpest play-callers, on a roster expected to return to the Playoff in Year 1.
The forward question is health and fit: a full, healthy season of the 2024 version of Leavitt makes LSU a contender and Kiffin's debut a hit. Anything less, and a new era opens with a familiar question at quarterback.
In LSU's 32-24 loss at Ole Miss, Leavitt completed 16 of 27 passes for 158 yards, one touchdown and one interception, and ran 17 times for 63 yards and a score. In LSU's 35-34 loss at Kentucky, Leavitt completed 25 of 34 passes for 275 yards, two touchdowns and an interception, ran 15 times for 39 yards and a score, and lost a fumble.
On tape Leavitt is a dual-threat whose legs are the headline — and the 2025 numbers say so emphatically. In an injury-shortened season his passing graded middling (28th percentile in completion, 41st in efficiency), but as a runner he was elite: top-3% in the country in rushing success rate and yards per carry, 98th percentile in explosive runs. He's a problem the instant the pocket moves. The fit at LSU is the whole story: Lane Kiffin builds explosive, quarterback-friendly attacks, and Leavitt's mobility adds a dimension Kiffin's recent passers haven't had — if the arm catches up to the legs. The caveats are health and consistency as a thrower, and 2026 is his first year in a new system. Click early and it's the SEC's most fun offense; if the passing stays middling, defenses make him a runner and find the ceiling.
Finalist22%Ballot odds, top 3084%CFB Zeitgeist Score#25 of 145
Why he's No. 7
Most productive quarterback on the board, narrowly
Sophomore — voters lean toward the older name
Receipt: 336 yds passing, 3 TD, 1 rushing TD vs Louisville (W 41-38)
Eighteen months ago Trinidad Chambliss won a Division II national title. Last fall he led Ole Miss to the Playoff quarterfinals and finished eighth in the Heisman. This fall he plays only because a court said he could.
The full scout
Chambliss is the most improbable star in the sport. He won a national championship at Division II Ferris State, entered the portal in April 2025, and arrived at Ole Miss as a backup after spring ball had already ended. Then the starter got hurt at Kentucky, Chambliss stepped in, and a fifth-year unknown took the Rebels to the College Football Playoff quarterfinals and into the Heisman conversation, finishing eighth.
That was supposed to be the end — fifth year, eligibility spent. Chambliss petitioned the NCAA for a sixth on medical grounds, was denied, sued, and won a preliminary injunction; the state's Supreme Court turned away the NCAA's appeal. So he's back, on borrowed-and-litigated time — and for a new boss, after Lane Kiffin left for LSU and Ole Miss handed the program to Pete Golding.
The forward stakes are pure proof. A new staff, a target on his back, and one season to answer the only question a story this strange invites: was it real? If the Division II kid does it twice, in the SEC, the fairy tale becomes a resume.
Update (Nov. 2, 2026): Ole Miss is 6-2. Through eight games Chambliss has thrown for 2,189 yards, 18 touchdowns and 8 interceptions, and has run for 199 yards and 7 touchdowns. The interception count is the change from last season, when his rate was close to nothing.
On tape Chambliss plays quarterback like a man who learned it on improvisation — a dual-threat who extends plays and hunts the explosive — and the numbers under the fairy tale are real: a 94th-percentile average depth of target (he pushes it downfield as much as anyone in the country), 90th-percentile efficiency, a near-nonexistent interception rate last season, plus the legs for 80th-percentile rushing success. He chases big plays and rarely gives it back, a rare combination. His game is feel and creativity more than textbook timing; he's at his best when the play breaks. That's also the open question: how a more disciplined SEC defense — and a brand-new Ole Miss staff under Pete Golding — asks him to operate within structure rather than around it. 2026 is a fit test as much as a talent one: marry the off-script magic to a real system and the fairy tale gets a sequel.
Finalist20%Ballot odds, top 3085%CFB Zeitgeist Score#30 of 145
Why he's No. 8
7-1 and ranked No. 4: Notre Dame gives him the stage
The platform is carrying the case more than the numbers are
Receipt: 234 yds passing, 4 TD, 1 rushing TD at North Carolina (W 37-26)
Notre Dame went 0-2, ripped off ten straight, and still got left out of the Playoff. The redshirt-freshman QB who drove that run, CJ Carr, began 2026 as the preseason Heisman favorite, with a rematch against the team that bounced him still waiting on the schedule.
The full scout
That team is Miami, whose season-opening win over the Irish last fall became the exact tiebreaker the committee used to keep a 10-2 Notre Dame home. The schedule-makers put the rematch first. You couldn't script it crueler.
Here's what the box score buries: no returning quarterback in the country was blitzed more than Carr — 36.7% of his dropbacks — because defenses saw a first-year starter and came hunting. It backfired. When teams didn't blitz, nobody in America averaged more per dropback (9.4). He finished fifth nationally in efficiency and a Manning Award finalist as a freshman.
The bloodline is the subplot you'll hear all year: Carr was raised in Saline, Michigan — grandson of Lloyd Carr, the man who won Michigan's last title in 1997 — and he chose Notre Dame over the Wolverines. Now he carries the title hopes of the program Ann Arbor loves to hate.
The forward question isn't the arm; it's the margin. The independent path leaves almost none — win at Miami and BYU and an 87%-likely Playoff bid is his; slip once and the snub debate reopens. Carr says his Year 2 leap is leadership and footwork, not numbers. The Irish haven't won it all since 1988. If the sophomore who shrugged off the blitz becomes the closer this program's been missing, the story stops being "good Notre Dame QB" and becomes "the one who ended the drought."
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): Notre Dame lost 28-24 at BYU on Oct. 17 as a 10.5-point favorite and is 6-1, No. 5 in the AP poll. Carr threw for 261 yards with no touchdowns or interceptions in the loss. He has 1,639 passing yards, 16 touchdowns and one interception this season and ranks sixth in our Heisman model. The Miami game is Nov. 7 at Notre Dame.
On tape Carr plays the position like a chess clock — pre-snap he's already three moves ahead, and the ball is gone the instant his back foot lands. The surprise is where it's going: he's not a checkdown surgeon, he's a downfield one. His average throw traveled nearly fifteen yards in the air — 94th-percentile depth — and he still finished 92nd percentile in success rate and 96th in explosive passes. He takes shots, and he connects. What he doesn't do is run; thirty-three yards all season says he'd rather solve the problem than flee it. The edge is the flip side of the gift: when the first read's gone and the pocket caves, the anticipation that makes him lethal on schedule has less to lean on — exactly the off-platform footwork he chased all offseason. In a 2026 where Notre Dame needs him to carry a title run, the question was never the deep ball; it's the third-and-8 when the script's gone.
Finalist22%Ballot odds, top 3086%CFB Zeitgeist Score#21 of 145
Why he's No. 9
The quarterback of a national contender, 8-1 Indiana
Ball security is the soft spot
Receipt: 251 yds passing, 4 TD at Rutgers (W 47-15)
Josh Hoover has thrown for more than 9,500 yards. Now he's taking over the Indiana offense that just produced a Heisman winner. A proven arm, a proven system — and one question: can he cut the giveaways?
The full scout
At TCU he was a yardage machine — 3,472 yards, 29 touchdowns and a 65.9 completion percentage in 2025, on top of a single-season program record in 2024 and more than 9,500 career passing yards. Now he inherits one of the best landing spots in the sport: Indiana, where Curt Cignetti's CFP-tested offense just turned Fernando Mendoza into a Heisman winner. The pairing is the pitch — a high-volume veteran arm dropped into a system proven to maximize quarterbacks. The forward stakes are a sleeper Heisman run and a Playoff push, gated by the one flaw that has followed him: he's turnover-prone, with 13 interceptions in 2025. If Cignetti's structure tightens his decisions the way it sharpened Mendoza's, Hoover has the arm and the volume to be one of the most productive quarterbacks in the country. The talent was never the question; the giveaways are.
On tape Hoover is a high-volume pocket passer who pushes the ball and lives with the consequences. Our play-by-play likes the production — a 92nd-percentile touchdown rate, an 88th-percentile EPA per dropback, a 76th-percentile explosive-pass rate at a real depth of target (13.8 yards) — the profile of an aggressive thrower who hunts chunk plays. The accuracy is solid (73rd-percentile completion), but the honest mark is the one that's followed him: a 27th-percentile interception avoidance, i.e. a fairly high pick rate, the cost of all that ambition. He's a true gunslinger — the kind of arm that piles up yards and touchdowns and, on the wrong night, hands a game away. In a system built to discipline that exact profile, the upside is a star.
Finalist19%Ballot odds, top 3083%CFB Zeitgeist Score#32 of 145
Why he's No. 11
Strong passing efficiency, a top-twenty-five box score at the position
Production says lower; the résumé around him says here
Receipt: 244 yds passing, 2 TD vs Utah State (W 37-18)
Maddux Madsen does not aim for underneath completions. He aims for the end zone and the 20-yard marker, and Boise State's third straight Mountain West title says that philosophy works. The 2026 question is whether a rebuilt receiving corps can keep pace with a quarterback who throws the ball down the field by design.
The full scout
Madsen's 2025 stat line looks modest on the surface — 2,333 yards, 58.3 percent completions, 18 touchdowns, 9 interceptions — but the play-by-play context reframes it. His average depth of target sits at the 78th percentile nationally, and his explosive pass rate (completions of 15-plus yards) ranks 79th. He is not a timing-rhythm quarterback padding completion percentages on three-yard hitches. Every time he drops back he is asking his receivers to beat somebody.
That approach inflates his touchdown rate to the 71st percentile and his EPA per dropback to the 67th — real production, generated by taking shots. The cost is visible: a 31st-percentile completion percentage and a 14th-percentile interception rate. Those are not anomalies to explain away; they are the predictable tradeoff of a vertically-oriented offense. Madsen's sack rate (64th percentile) suggests he moves on quickly when the shot isn't there, which limits the damage on any given play.
The 2026 stakes are concrete. Boise State's top four pass-catchers from 2025 all moved on, leaving Madsen to build chemistry with an essentially new supporting cast. If the Broncos can develop a genuine go-to downfield target, the infrastructure is already in place for a Davey O'Brien watch-list conversation. If the receiver room sputters, the interception rate becomes the loudest number on the page.
On tape Madsen plays like a quarterback who has decided that short completions are someone else's job. His 78th-percentile average depth of target and 87th-percentile explosive pass rate are not byproducts of receiver separation — they are the plan. He takes the shot, finishes at a 87th-percentile touchdown rate when drives reach the red zone, and limits negative plays with a 64th-percentile sack rate. The completion percentage (31st percentile) and interception rate (20th percentile) are the honest price of that scheme. He is not a game-manager; he is a vertical-first signal-caller who needs talent around him to function at his ceiling.
Finalist19%Ballot odds, top 3082%CFB Zeitgeist Score#43 of 145
Why he's No. 13
Texas sits 6-2 and No. 10 in the AP poll — a contender's platform
Giveaways are the knock
Receipt: 305 yds passing, 4 TD vs Texas State (W 59-7)
For three years, Arch Manning was the most famous backup in football — the name, the bloodline, the hype with no tape. Then he finally played, struggled, and figured it out. He entered 2026 with Heisman expectations; so far this season he has 1,510 passing yards, 12 touchdowns and seven interceptions in seven starts.
The full scout
The grandson of Archie, nephew of Peyton and Eli, was the most-hyped recruit of his generation before he'd thrown a college pass — and he sat, behind Quinn Ewers, while the legend grew on zero evidence. His 2025 debut as the starter was supposed to settle it; for five games it only complicated it. He averaged an interception a game, the offense sputtered, and the takes turned. Then the season flipped: over the final eight games he turned the ball over twice, and across his last six he was responsible for 20 touchdowns through the air, on the ground, and even on a catch.
That late surge is why he enters 2026 as a betting co-favorite — by some books the favorite — and why one analyst flatly said there's 'a 0% chance' he isn't in New York for the ceremony. The bar isn't a good season; it's a coronation. A Manning has never won a Heisman; Texas has produced only two. He'd close both gaps at once.
The forward question isn't talent — the arm was never in doubt. It's whether the second half of 2025 was the real Arch and the first half was the learning curve, or the other way around. In an SEC where Texas is built to win it all, a full season at his ceiling makes him the story of the sport. Anything less reopens the only debate that's ever followed him: was the hype ever real?
As of Oct 28: Manning has thrown for 1,510 yards and 12 touchdowns with seven interceptions in seven starts. Texas lost 27-24 to Oklahoma on Oct 10 and 27-24 to Florida on Oct 17, then beat No. 7 Ole Miss 34-27 on Oct 24, when he ran for two touchdowns, the second a 1-yard run with about eight minutes left.
On tape Manning is a big-bodied gunslinger who plays the position downhill — a live arm that pushes it deep (88th-percentile average depth) and the juice to run for eight scores. But the 2025 tape is the rawness as much as the upside: he graded bottom-fifth in completion and ninth percentile in success rate, throwing his share of picks even as the flashes — the explosive shots, a top-quarter touchdown rate — hinted at the ceiling. The lightbulb came late: an interception a game through five weeks, then two turnovers across the final eight. That arc is the whole scouting report — the tools are loud and the consistency is the project. On schedule, Sarkisian's pro-style attack has a weapon with no ceiling; when he forces it, the efficiency cratered. 2026 is about turning the back-half flashes into the baseline — making the rare reps the every-down ones.
Finalist15%Ballot odds, top 3073%CFB Zeitgeist Score#15 of 145
Why he's No. 17
Top-ten box score among quarterbacks
Ball security is the soft spot
Receipt: 325 yds passing, 4 TD, 1 rushing TD vs Northern Illinois (W 42-17)
Noah Fifita could have cashed a portal check and chased a blue-blood. Instead the kid who keeps choosing Arizona signed up for one more, calling it 'all or nothing' and 'unfinished business' on his way out of the Holiday Bowl. Tucson is already saying Heisman. The rest of the country hasn't looked up.
The full scout
The story before the season wasn't whether Fifita would come back — he settled that the night of the loss to SMU, telling anyone listening he had unfinished business. It's the gap between how Arizona talks about him and how everyone else does. Brent Brennan calls him a 'Heisman-caliber candidate' and means it; CBS, On3 and SI all spent the spring arguing he's the Big 12's best quarterback, edging Brendan Sorsby and the new transfer arms for the top spot. He's the program's all-time passing touchdown leader (73 career scores, first nationally among 2026 returners) and the first Arizona QB to make first-team all-conference since 1975. And yet the national board has him at +10000 to win the Heisman — one writer literally headlined the disconnect 'He Can Win The Heisman. So Why Is Nobody Talking About Him?'
The receipts say the 2025 bounce-back was real but not yet transcendent: 3,228 yards, 29 touchdowns, six picks, and play-by-play that ranks 64th percentile in pass success rate and 70th in touchdown rate but only 45th in EPA per dropback among 233 FBS quarterbacks. That's the tension our own signal flags — the buzz around Fifita (78th percentile perception) is running about 18 points ahead of the production (60th), an aura tax the fanbase is happy to keep paying.
The quietly important variable: Seth Doege returns as coordinator, the first time in Fifita's college career he's kept the same play-caller in back-to-back years. Doege's Air Raid is what turned a four-win team into a nine-win one, and year-two fluency is the whole bet. The forward stake is the one every Wildcats board is chewing on: does the loyalty finally get rewarded with a Big 12 title and a Heisman invite, or does 'all or nothing' end the way Arizona seasons usually do?
Update (Nov. 2, 2026): Through eight games Fifita has thrown for 2,464 yards, 19 touchdowns and 4 interceptions, and has run for 97 yards and 3 touchdowns.
On tape A steady, low-risk operator more than a gunslinger. The play-by-play paints a quarterback who wins on accuracy and decision-making rather than explosion: 64th percentile in pass success rate and 70th in touchdown rate, but a careful, underneath profile — 67th percentile in average depth of target and just 35th in explosive-pass rate. He protects the ball reasonably (69th percentile interception rate) and his overall efficiency lands middle-of-the-pack at 45th percentile EPA per dropback. The 35th-percentile sack rate hints he'll eat some pressure behind a shaky front. He adds just enough as a runner (3 rushing scores) to keep defenses honest without being a designed-run threat. The ceiling lives in the rhythm of Doege's Air Raid; the question is whether he can stretch the field vertically enough to turn efficient into elite.
The case:The rare part: he puts it wherever he wants — and the offense moves when he drops back, too. Top-3% completion rate, top-3% overall passing production.
Finalist14%Ballot odds, top 3073%CFB Zeitgeist Score#17 of 145
Why he's No. 18
Elite yards per attempt — the standout number on the line
Turnovers are the blemish on the line
Receipt: 367 yds passing, 4 TD, 1 rushing TD vs Illinois (W 42-19)
Julian Sayin led the entire country in accuracy, made the Heisman finalist cut as the only underclassman — and still went home empty, beaten on the one stage that mattered. He's back for the part he didn't finish.
The full scout
Sayin's first act was a quiet kind of stardom. The former Alabama signee who left when Nick Saban retired found his home at Ohio State, and in his first year starting he completed 77% of his passes — the best in the nation — for 3,610 yards and 32 touchdowns. He was the only underclassman invited to New York as a Heisman finalist.
What he didn't get was the trophy or the title. Indiana beat Ohio State in the Big Ten Championship and Fernando Mendoza ran off with the Heisman; the door Sayin had pried open swung shut on the biggest stage. That's the engine of his 2026: fans don't just want him better, they want it finished.
He's built to deliver — 14 career starts now, the nation's best receiver in Jeremiah Smith, and a roster that opens the year as a national-title favorite. The forward question isn't whether Sayin is good; the nation-leading numbers settled that. It's whether the quiet accuracy becomes a closer's resume — and whether the next time the season comes down to one game, the result flips.
As of Oct 28: Ohio State is 6-1 in his seven starts. He has 2,007 passing yards, 19 touchdowns and four interceptions. The loss came at No. 4 Texas on Sep 12, 24-23, after Ohio State led 23-3 entering the fourth quarter. At No. 5 Indiana on Oct 17 his last pass came in the fourth quarter, and Luke Fahey finished the 19-15 win. On Oct 20 Ryan Day confirmed that Sayin is out indefinitely, according to headlines that day.
On tape Sayin's 2025 wasn't just good, it was statistically absurd: he finished in the 99th percentile nationally in completion percentage, in expected points per dropback, and in success rate — the three numbers that matter most, all at the ceiling. The game looks easy because he plays it fast and clean; he was sacked on barely 1.5% of his dropbacks, top-five in the country at getting the ball out. He isn't a gunslinger pushing it deep — his average throw was middle-of-the-pack in air yards — he's a precision machine who takes exactly what the defense gives and never gives it back. The honest questions trail every efficient passer in a loaded offense: at 6-1 he doesn't tower, and with Jeremiah Smith outside, skeptics ask how much is him. In Ohio State's attack he's the conductor — and 2026 is the year he answers the doubt the only way a quarterback can, by carrying a title himself.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 3063%CFB Zeitgeist Score#71 of 330
Why he's No. 23
Rushing touchdowns is where he separates from the pack
The box score alone doesn't put him this high
Receipt: 43 yds rushing, 3 TD, 43 yds receiving at North Carolina (W 38-35)
Mark Fletcher Jr. ran for 507 yards in the College Football Playoff and carried Miami to the national championship game. Then he turned down the NFL to come back and finish the job.
The full scout
He led the ACC with 1,192 rushing yards in 2025, scored 12 times, and saved his best for January — 507 yards across four Playoff games as Miami reached the national championship. A 6-2, 225 senior could have left for the draft; instead he stayed, telling reporters he'd always planned to be "a true senior," and Mario Cristobal has held him up as the program's standard. Now he's a preseason All-American anchoring a Cristobal backfield built on exactly the kind of downhill, gap-scheme power he runs. The forward stakes are the rematch with history: Miami was one game from a title, and Fletcher came back to close the gap. A projected 1,500-yard season would do two things at once — vault a throwback power back into the top tier of 2027 draft running backs, and give the Hurricanes the closer they were missing.
On tape Fletcher is a true bruiser — 6-2, 225, built to fall forward. The power shows up on tape and in the numbers: PFF charted 3.66 yards after contact per carry and 104 forced missed tackles in 2025, and our play-by-play put his rushing-touchdown rate in the 52nd percentile, the mark of a back defenses can't stop at the goal line (he scored 12 times). Scouts (Vikings Wire's summer eval) describe a runner who "keeps his legs moving through contact" but "also elusive in space," with "dynamic change-of-direction skills once in the second level" and "excellent motor to finish big runs late." The honest read is in the efficiency: a 94th-percentile success rate and mid-pack yards-per-carry say he's a volume-and-finish back more than a home-run hitter — the chunk gains come from contact balance and a closing motor, not breakaway speed. He's a gap-scheme, between-the-tackles hammer who wears defenses down and finishes drives.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 3059%CFB Zeitgeist Score#1 of 465
Why he's No. 25
Top-ten box score among receivers
Numbers alone place him a few rungs down
Receipt: 12 catches, 234 yds, 3 TD at Stanford (W 45-6), biggest single line by a receiver in the top 25
As a true freshman, Malachi Toney led the entire country in receptions. He set Miami's freshman receiving record, won ACC Rookie of the Year — and he can't enter the NFL until 2028. Miami has him for years.
The full scout
A Miami freshman receiving record, ACC Rookie of the Year, first-team All-ACC, and a Shaun Alexander Freshman of the Year finalist. On3 ranked him the No. 5 player in college football entering 2026; Bleacher Report called him the most explosive player in the sport. And here's the part that should scare the ACC: he won't be NFL-draft-eligible until 2028, so Miami gets two more years of him. He's the centerpiece of a Miami offense rebuilding around him — a slot-and-space weapon who already commands the attention reserved for veterans. The forward question isn't whether he's good; the freshman record settled that. It's how high the ceiling goes: whether the sophomore leap turns the nation's leading receiver into its best, and whether Miami's offense rises with him. Players this productive this young don't come along often — the runway is the story.
On tape Toney is a volume machine with juice. He caught 84% of his targets — 96th percentile — as a true freshman, the reliability that makes him a quarterback's security blanket, with the after-the-catch burst (72nd-percentile explosive-play rate) to turn a five-yard hitch into a chunk gain. He lives in the slot and in space, where his quickness and vision do the damage; it's why he led the country in catches and why the highlight folder is full of broken tackles. The growth edge is the vertical game — his yards-per-catch sat mid-pack, so the next tier is stretching the field, not just carving up the underneath. But a true freshman who led the nation in receptions has a floor most receivers never reach.
The case:The rare part: the passing game runs through him — and every touch moves the offense, too. Top-1% reception volume, top-1% overall receiving production.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 3059%CFB Zeitgeist Score#28 of 145
A top-twenty-five line among quarterbacks
Giveaways are the knock
LaNorris Sellers could have been a first-round pick. Instead he's running it back at South Carolina — because everyone can see the 242-pound athlete, and almost nobody has seen him throw it consistently yet. That's the bet of his 2026.
The full scout
He entered 2025 with No. 1-overall buzz and left it with questions: 2,437 passing yards, 13 touchdowns against eight interceptions, 270 yards and five scores on the ground — on a team that went 4-8. The tools are undeniable (6-3, 242, the inevitable Cam Newton comparison), and he bet on them, forgoing the 2026 NFL Draft to come back. South Carolina answered by hiring Kendal Briles to install a free-flowing Air Raid built to unlock exactly his kind of athlete from a too-structured scheme. The forward stakes are the leap that defines his career: the legs are already elite, so 2026 is about the throws — cleaner pocket play, fewer sacks, more consistency. Do that, and the No. 1-pick conversation comes back. Don't, and he's the cautionary tale of a freak who never learned to pass. In South Carolina's 41-34 home loss to Mississippi State, Sellers completed 25 of 40 passes for 282 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions, and ran 14 times for 52 yards.
On tape Sellers is a problem as a runner and a project as a passer, and the data draws the line hard. On the ground he's elite: our play-by-play grades his rushing success rate in the 91st percentile and his EPA per carry in the 81st — a 242-pound back playing quarterback. Through the air it's the opposite: an 17th-percentile EPA per dropback, a 39th-percentile completion rate, and a sack rate in the 2nd percentile — he holds the ball and takes a brutal number of hits. Scouts (Pro Football Network) see the same film: "wicked arm strength," but he "gets stuck staring down his primary target" and turns throwaways into negatives, "wholly too inconsistent" with accuracy that runs "hot-and-cold." The encouraging note is ball security — he's "relatively patient" and protective for an elite rushing threat. The whole season is one question: can the passing rise to meet the athlete?
Program BenchmarkTop-10 RecruitNIL LeaderDark Horse
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 3052%CFB Zeitgeist Score#2 of 465
Leads every receiver in the country on production, barely
The line says higher — voters' quarterback habit says here
Jeremiah Smith is playing his draft-eligible season as Ohio State's career receiving-yards leader, and he's chasing what no receiver has done since DeVonta Smith in 2020: win the Heisman.
The full scout
Smith arrived as the country's No. 1 recruit and has spent three seasons making the ranking look cautious: a national title as a freshman in 2024, a unanimous All-America season in 2025, and, through Sept. 26, the best four-game start an Ohio State receiver has had, by Eleven Warriors' count — 33 catches, 617 yards and seven touchdowns. The run peaked with the best day of his career, 12 catches for 217 yards and four scores against Illinois on Sept. 26. A week earlier he passed Michael Jenkins for the most receiving yards in school history.
Through September, the one mark on the season is Texas: Ohio State lost 24-23 in Austin on Sept. 12, and his 164 yards weren't enough. That afternoon is why 2026 reads as a chase rather than a coronation. He took over as the Heisman betting favorite after the Illinois game, Ohio State fans say he still needs a signature afternoon, and Indiana (Oct. 17), Oregon (Nov. 7) and Michigan (Nov. 28) are on the schedule.
The rest is legacy math. As of Sept. 28 he was one touchdown from tying Chris Olave's school record and nine catches from tying Emeka Egbuka's, and CBS Sports' Sept. 28 mock draft sent him first overall — no receiver has gone No. 1 since Keyshawn Johnson in 1996. He has said this will likely be his last college season. Fans are already arguing over whether 'the best receiver in the country' undersells him.
On tape Smith is what every coordinator sketches on a napkin and never finds: a 6-foot-4 receiver who moves like a man eighty pounds lighter. The production backs it where the box can measure — an efficient, reliable target at 18.7 yards a catch through Sept. 26 — and the scouting fills the rest: the cleanest receiver evaluation in years, a route runner with the long speed to house any of them. He wins three ways, at the line, at the catch point, and after it, so defenses don't have a leverage to take away; they pick which way they'd rather lose. In Ohio State's vertical attack he's the gravity the whole offense bends around. Analysts have struggled to name a flaw, and his receivers coach, Cortez Hankton, calls him generational. The only question the tape leaves is how a defense even schemes for him.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 3047%CFB Zeitgeist Score#70 of 465
6-2 and ranked No. 10: Texas gives him the stage
Plenty of receivers have the bigger line; the stage does the rest
Ryan Wingo is the most explosive receiver on Texas' offense and a returning weapon for Arch Manning. The talent has never been the question. The consistency is — and 2026 is where he answers it.
The full scout
A former five-star, Wingo flashed the ceiling in 2025 — 54 catches, 834 yards, seven touchdowns, a 184-yard eruption, and coaches second-team All-SEC honors — enough to be called the most explosive piece of the Texas offense. Now he's continuity in a loaded room, returning alongside transfer Cam Coleman to give Arch Manning a deep and dangerous group in what's expected to be Manning's defining year. The forward stakes are about turning flashes into a full season: the explosive plays are there, but the consistency — finishing the routine catches, stacking good games — is the difference between a complementary weapon and Manning's true No. 1. For Wingo, the tools were never in doubt; 2026 is about reliability.
So far in 2026 Wingo has 21 catches for 296 yards and three touchdowns.
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): Texas lost 27-24 to Florida as a 13.5-point favorite on Oct. 17, then beat No. 7 Ole Miss 34-27 on Oct. 24 and is 5-2, No. 11 in the AP poll. Wingo has 33 catches for 456 yards and four touchdowns through seven games, with 7 catches for 111 yards and a touchdown against Ole Miss.
On tape Wingo is a vertical, big-play receiver whose tape and reputation say explosive — and our data says the polish hasn't fully caught up. The good: a solid yards-per-catch and a 79th-percentile touchdown rate, the chunk-play juice of a field-stretcher. The honest part is the efficiency underneath it: a low catch rate (11th percentile) and a modest EPA per target (20th), the numbers of a receiver who flashes big plays but leaves production on the field between them — drops and inconsistency, the most fixable kind of flaw. He's a straight-line, take-the-top-off athlete more than a polished route technician right now. With an elite quarterback and a year of seasoning, the path is clear: keep the explosiveness, clean up the consistency, and the All-SEC flashes become an All-SEC season.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 3045%CFB Zeitgeist Score#121 of 465
Yards per catch is where he separates from the pack
The team around him carries more of this than his own line
Cam Coleman was a five-star out of high school and the No. 2 player in the transfer portal. He left Auburn for one reason: to catch passes from Arch Manning. The talent was never the question — the quarterback was.
The full scout
He was the No. 5 overall recruit in the 2024 class, and even through a 2025 coaching change at Auburn he put up 708 yards — 1,306 across his two seasons, third-most by an Auburn receiver through a sophomore year. Then he became the marquee move of the offseason: portal's No. 2 player, off to Texas to be Arch Manning's WR1 in Manning's first full year as the unquestioned starter. At 6-3, 201 he's the catch-radius target a vertical passing game is built to feed, and he joins a room that still returns Ryan Wingo. The forward stakes are the swing of the whole bet: a five-star whose production always hinted at more than it showed now has the quarterback to prove it. For Coleman, 2026 is the breakout that's been waiting on the throw — and the line between a good college receiver and a top-of-the-2027-board profile.
So far in 2026 Coleman has 16 catches for 304 yards and five touchdowns. Texas lost 27-24 to Oklahoma on October 10.
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): Texas lost 27-24 to Florida as a 13.5-point favorite on Oct. 17, then beat No. 7 Ole Miss 34-27 on Oct. 24 and is 5-2, No. 11 in the AP poll. Coleman has 20 catches for 334 yards and six touchdowns through seven games, with 3 catches for 18 yards and a touchdown against Florida.
On tape Coleman wins above the rim. At 6-3, 201 he's a jump-ball and contested-catch specialist — On3's scouting deep-dive calls him a receiver who "plays above the rim," "climbs the ladder and boxes out defenders," and finishes through contact, a "red-zone nightmare with an exceptional catch radius." Our play-by-play backs the vertical profile: his explosive-catch rate graded in the 66th percentile, the chunk-play element of a downfield target, even as his overall efficiency (mid-pack yards-per-reception and touchdown rate) marks a player whose production hadn't yet caught up to the talent. The honest edge, per the same report, is hip stiffness that makes him gear down on comebacks and curls — he's a stack-and-go vertical weapon more than a sudden separator underneath. The bet is simple: elite quarterback play turns 72nd-percentile explosiveness into the highlight reel the five-star ranking always promised.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 3043%CFB Zeitgeist Score#51 of 330
Top-twenty-five back on production
On production alone, a few spots lower
A freshman named Bo Jackson ran for over 1,000 yards at Ohio State last fall — joining a list that includes Maurice Clarett and JK Dobbins. The name is a coincidence. The talent isn't.
The full scout
Jackson's first season was a statement: 1,090 rushing yards at 6.1 a carry, enough to make him the fifth true freshman in Ohio State history to crack 1,000 — company that includes Robert Smith, Maurice Clarett, JK Dobbins, and TreVeyon Henderson. A teammate, James Peoples, transferred out before the season in part because Jackson had simply become the guy.
The forward case is about the gap between good and great. He scored just six rushing touchdowns — low for an Ohio State back — and may share carries with returning and added depth, so 2026 is about efficiency and finishing, not just volume. On a national-title contender stacked with Sayin and Jeremiah Smith, a back who turns 1,000 quiet yards into 1,400 loud ones is the piece that tips a very good offense into an unstoppable one. The name will always draw the double-take. This is the year he makes people remember him for his own.
Update (Nov. 2, 2026): Ohio State is 6-2. Through eight games Jackson has 128 carries for 637 yards (5.0 a carry) and four rushing touchdowns, plus 13 catches for 103 yards and a score. He would need about 760 more yards to reach the 1,400 the question above asks about.
On tape Jackson is a one-cut runner with a second gear — he presses the hole, plants, and is past the second level before the angle closes, which shows up as an 85th-percentile yards-per-carry and a 72nd-percentile explosive-run rate as a true freshman. He's not just a between-the-tackles back; 19 catches keep him on the field on third down, a fit for the way Ohio State spreads you out and runs behind it. The honest gap is the finish: his success rate sat in the 67th percentile and his touchdown rate in the bottom fifteen — he hits the big one but doesn't yet own the grind or the red zone, which is how a back with his yardage scored only six times. So 2026 isn't about whether he's good; it's whether the explosive freshman becomes the complete one — the same chunk runs, more of them ending in the end zone.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#14 of 330
A top-ten back on production alone
Louisville is 5-3 and out of the polls; his case travels alone
Isaac Brown was the No. 1 running back in the transfer portal. Texas, Notre Dame, and Miami all called. He stayed at Louisville — because he's the offense, and he has a statement to make.
The full scout
Two seasons, 2,057 rushing yards, 18 touchdowns — and in 2025, 884 yards on 8.75 yards a carry in just nine games, one of the most explosive per-carry marks in the country (our explosiveness metric grades it in the 98th percentile). When he entered the portal in January he became its No. 1 back overnight; then he negotiated a new deal and came home, telling Louisville he wanted to "make a statement." Now the Freshman All-American turned third-team All-ACC pick is the undisputed centerpiece of Jeff Brohm's offense for his junior year. The forward stakes are an All-America case and a draft climb: a back who turns the corner and is gone needs only volume and health to be the ACC's premier home-run hitter. For Brown, 2026 is the year the highlight reel becomes a résumé. In Louisville's 31-28 loss at NC State, Brown ran nine times for 125 yards and a touchdown, with a long of 70.
On tape Brown is a home-run hitter in a 5-9, 190 frame — built low, built to disappear around the edge. The explosiveness is the headline and it's real: 8.75 yards per carry in 2025 (up from 7.1 as a freshman), which our play-by-play grades in the 98th percentile, paired with an 77th-percentile success rate that says the booms don't come at the cost of steady gains. The earliest scouting read (an SI breakdown, from his recruiting days) flagged exactly what the tape now shows — "elusive" and "very good at avoiding contact," with a specialty "running to the boundary and turning the corner" off an "above-average first cut" — plus real value as a receiver "out of the backfield, especially on swing passes." The honest note is the frame: at 190 pounds he's a speed-and-space back, not a between-the-tackles grinder. Give him the edge and a crease, and he's one of the fastest players to the perimeter in the sport.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#34 of 465
Strong receiving yards, a top-twenty-five box score at the position
Numbers alone place him a few rungs down
Amare Thomas tied for the Big 12 lead in touchdowns and led every returning receiver in slot scores. He re-signed with his quarterback to run it back as Houston's go-to weapon — the man they throw it to when it matters.
The full scout
The UAB transfer broke out in 2025: roughly 966 yards, 12 touchdowns to tie for the Big 12 lead, first-team All-Big 12, and a league-best nine slot touchdowns among returning receivers — a separator where games are decided. He and quarterback Conner Weigman both came back, keeping Houston's most dangerous connection intact. The forward stakes are a breakout into a genuine NFL-prospect profile: he's already a proven scorer, and 2026 is about expanding from red-zone specialist to full-field No. 1. For Houston, he's the weapon the offense leans on when it needs points.
On tape Thomas is a scoring-and-explosive-play receiver, strongest where it counts. Our play-by-play likes the big stuff — an 82nd-percentile yards-per-catch, an 80th-percentile explosive-catch rate, and an 84th-percentile EPA per target — and the real-world signature is the nine slot touchdowns, the trait of a receiver who wins the leverage and separation battles inside the 20. The catch rate is more ordinary (48th percentile), the mark of a vertical, contested-leaning target rather than a high-volume possession type. He's a chunk-play and red-zone specialist — the guy who turns a third-down target into six points — and the growth edge is the underneath consistency that rounds him into an every-down No. 1.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#7 of 465
Inside the top twenty-five receivers on production
No. 14 Wake Forest — a solid stage, not the biggest one
The case:The rare part: the passing game runs through him — and every touch moves the offense, too. Top-1% reception volume, top-1% overall receiving production.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#18 of 330
A top-twenty-five line among backs
No. 25 Florida — a solid stage, not the biggest one
Jadan Baugh did everything for Florida in 2025 — ran for over 1,100 yards, caught 31 passes, and dropped 266 on Florida State. PFF says no Power Four back has been more valuable over the last two years. The breakout is next.
The full scout
He carried it 220 times for 1,170 yards and eight scores, added 31 catches as a genuine receiving threat, and saved a 266-yard explosion for the rivalry game against Florida State — a 5.3-per-carry, all-situations workhorse who earned an 89.5 PFF grade and, by PFF's measure, has been as valuable as any Power Four back over two seasons. Now he anchors a made-over Florida offense entering his junior year. The forward stakes are the leap from very good to All-America: the durability and the three-down skill set are already there, so 2026 is about volume, health, and an offense that gives him room. For a back this complete, the breakout isn't a question of ability — it's a question of opportunity.
So far in 2026 Baugh has 672 rushing yards and 12 touchdowns on 110 carries, with seven catches for 46 yards. Florida lost 38-19 to South Carolina at home on October 10.
On tape Baugh is a true three-down back whose value is in his completeness rather than one elite trait. Our play-by-play has him solidly above-average as a runner — mid-pack yards-per-carry and success rate on heavy volume — but the number that pops is his 87th-percentile catch rate: he's a reliable, natural receiver out of the backfield, not just a checkdown. He runs with patience and enough power to handle a feature load (220 carries, and a 266-yard rivalry game says he can take over). He's not a track-speed home-run hitter; he's the every-down hammer who catches, pass-protects, and finishes — the kind of back a coordinator can build a whole offense's rhythm around.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#3 of 330
Elite rushing touchdowns, top-three back on the box score
6-2 Duke, unranked — the résumé follows the team
Nate Sheppard ran for over 1,100 yards and broke Duke's freshman records — as a true freshman. PFF said he "played like a five-star." Now a sophomore, he has 875 rushing yards through seven games in 2026.
The full scout
As a true freshman he carried it 200 times for 1,132 yards at 5.66 a pop, scored 11 times, caught 37 passes, and set Duke's freshman rushing records on his way to Freshman All-America and second-team All-ACC honors. The trait that travels: 63 forced missed tackles, ninth-most in the country, a make-you-miss elusiveness that already grades among the nation's best. PFF ranks him the No. 7 returning running back for 2026. The forward stakes are simply the leap: he's a three-down back with year-one production most players never reach, and the sophomore year is where hyped underclassmen either consolidate or explode. For Sheppard, there's no arrival question left to answer — only how high the ceiling goes.
So far in 2026 Sheppard has 743 rushing yards and eight touchdowns on 118 carries, plus 17 catches for 161 yards and three scores. Duke lost 28-25 at Georgia Tech on October 10.
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): Duke lost 24-20 to North Carolina on Oct. 17 as a 3-point favorite, then won 19-16 at Virginia on Oct. 23, and is 5-2. Through seven games Sheppard has 875 rushing yards, fifth in the FBS, with 77 against North Carolina and 55 and a touchdown at Virginia.
On tape Sheppard is an elusive, explosive three-down back, and the freshman tape already grades like a veteran's. Our play-by-play puts his yards-per-carry in the 72nd percentile and his rushing success rate in the 73rd — efficient and explosive at once — and the 63 forced missed tackles (ninth nationally) are the make-you-miss element behind it. He's a real receiving threat too (37 catches), which is what makes him a true three-down player rather than a between-the-tackles grinder. The profile is a back who creates yards on his own: a cut, a jump-cut, a missed tackle, and he's gone. At his age, with this production, the development curve is the whole story — and it's pointing straight up.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#140 of 465
Elite yards per catch — the standout number on the line
The team around him carries more of this than his own line
Ryan Williams broke the internet as a true freshman. His sophomore year cooled off. Now he's a preseason All-American with a Heisman number — and because he reclassified, Alabama gets him for two more years before he can even leave.
The full scout
As a true freshman in 2024 he was a national sensation: 48 catches, 865 yards, eight touchdowns, the highlight every Saturday. The 2025 sophomore line was quieter — 49 catches, 689 yards, four scores — the kind of step back that, for a player this hyped, becomes the whole storyline. The voters didn't blink: he's a preseason first-team All-American across nearly every outlet and a live Heisman candidate entering 2026. The detail that reframes everything is his age. Williams reclassified up to sign a year early, so he's a junior who won't be draft-eligible until 2027 — Alabama's clear No. 1 target with a runway almost no star his age has. The forward stakes are simple: the bounce-back season that turns a quieter sophomore year back into a generational trajectory. For Williams, 2026 is a contention year, not a farewell.
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): Alabama lost 26-10 at Tennessee on Oct. 17 as a 7.5-point favorite. The Crimson Tide beat Texas A&M 31-20 on Oct. 24 and are 6-2, No. 10 in the AP poll. Williams had no catches in the loss at Tennessee and none against Texas A&M. He has 415 receiving yards through 8 games, with a high of 130 against East Carolina.
On tape Williams is a vertical separator — a slim, wiry frame (listed around 6-0, 180) carrying genuine track speed (he's run 10.49 in the 100 meters). Our play-by-play backs the big-play profile: 78th-percentile yards-per-catch, 85th-percentile EPA per target, a 83rd-percentile explosive-catch rate — the chunk-play element of a true downfield weapon, and a 55th-percentile catch rate on top of it. Scouts (Ourlads/draft profiles) credit the "initial burst and long speed to easily separate from DBs" and consistent ball-tracking over his shoulder. The honest edge is the one his sophomore tape raised: the drop rate ticked up, and evaluators note "his hands need to improve." He's a take-the-top-off vertical threat who also works the intermediate level — and at his age, the polish is supposed to come.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#40 of 145
Quarterback for 4-4 Penn State
Carrying a 4-4 Penn State team, and voters notice the record first
When James Franklin got fired mid-2025 and Penn State went and hired Matt Campbell, the question wasn't whether the Nittany Lions would find a quarterback. It was whether Campbell's quarterback would follow him. Rocco Becht did, and so did about two dozen other Cyclones.
The full scout
The discourse around Penn State this offseason has a nickname: the "Penn State Cyclones." Campbell didn't just take the job after Franklin's seventh-ranked team lost three straight and got upset by UCLA; he brought 24 Iowa State players with him, including his longtime starter, his coordinator and his receiver room. Becht is the anchor of it. "Last year, it wasn't player-led, and the culture wasn't consistently present," he told ESPN of Franklin's final season. "Right now, everyone is completely bought in." He says he got chills the first time he walked into Beaver Stadium.
What he carries is the most starting wins of any returning quarterback in college football (26) and a body that's still healing. Becht played all 12 games in 2025 through a torn labrum, threw for nearly 1,000 fewer yards and nine fewer touchdowns than his 2024 peak, finished at 2,565 and 16 scores, and got surgery after the season that limited him through spring. That gap is the whole argument. Our perception signal pegs him in the 89th percentile of fan attention while his production lands at the 34th: a classic aura tax, the boards selling a gamer the play-by-play grades as merely steady (43rd-percentile EPA per dropback). The skeptics are loud too. His career-high completion rate is 62.9 percent, and analysts who slot him 18th nationally and behind six Big Ten quarterbacks say the deep-shot diet and the arm talent cap his ceiling.
And yet he's a real Heisman dark horse, named to award watch lists before taking a snap in blue and white. The schedule is one of the league's more manageable, the receivers are his old ones, the staff is his old one. The question Happy Valley is actually asking: at Iowa State a healthy Becht was a very good story; at Penn State, with USC, Michigan and Washington on the board, anything short of the Playoff is a failed gamble. Can he be the difference in the games Iowa State never got to play?
The plan just cleared its first live test, and not well: Penn State lost at home to Wisconsin, 24-20, on September 26 as 10-point favorites, with USC, Michigan and Washington still ahead on the schedule. Becht's own line that day — 114 passing yards, no passing touchdowns, an interception — was his shakiest start in blue and white. The Playoff math survives one loss; it has no room for another against the three blue-bloods still on the board.
The next test went no better: Penn State lost 34-13 at Northwestern, and Becht went 26 of 41 for 243 yards with a touchdown and two interceptions.
On tape Becht is a downfield gambler who lives a tier above the field on aggression and a tick below on touch. His 12.8-yard average depth of target sits 75th percentile and his sack rate (61st) shows a quarterback who'll hold for the shot rather than check down, while his interception rate (61st) says the gambles mostly stay clean. The efficiency is the rub: 51st-percentile explosive-pass rate, 50th-percentile pass success, 48th-percentile EPA per dropback, 45th-percentile completion percentage, and a 29th-percentile touchdown rate that screams a 2025 spent grinding through a bad shoulder. Add eight rushing scores and you get a steady, willing, slightly streaky operator whose tape is a healthy-arm bet, not a finished product.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#60 of 145
Junior quarterback, 5-3 Washington
The platform is carrying the case more than the numbers are
Demond Williams Jr. is one of the most explosive players in college football, and the money and the portal both came calling. He turned them down to run it back at Washington — the dynamo who decided to stay.
The full scout
In 2025 he threw for 3,065 yards with 25 touchdowns against just eight interceptions and added 611 yards and six scores on the ground, starting all 13 games in Jedd Fisch's quarterback-friendly offense. The dual-threat juice is obvious; the part that separates him is that the accuracy is real too — he completed 78 percent as a 2024 freshman. When LSU and the portal came knocking with serious money, he declared himself fully committed to Washington. The forward stakes are simple ascension: he's already one of the country's most dynamic players, and a full season as the entrenched, unquestioned starter is the kind of runway that turns a dynamo into a Heisman name. For Williams, 2026 is the leap from electric to elite. In Washington's 27-24 home loss to Minnesota, Williams completed 18 of 28 passes for 239 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions, and ran 15 times for 15 yards and a score. In Washington's 41-24 home loss to Iowa, Williams completed 6 of 11 passes for 69 yards and ran 11 times for minus 8 yards.
On tape Williams is a rare quarterback who grades elite in both phases. On the ground our play-by-play is almost off the chart — 98th-percentile EPA per carry, 98th-percentile explosive-run rate, a 90th-percentile rushing success rate. Through the air he's not just a runner who throws: a 94th-percentile passing success rate, a 92nd-percentile completion rate, and an 81st-percentile EPA per dropback, with the arm to hit explosive throws (95th percentile). The one honest wart is a 22nd-percentile sack rate — he holds the ball and takes hits, the flip side of a playmaker who trusts his legs to extend everything. He's a true dual-threat in the modern mold: accurate from the pocket, terrifying out of it, and only just scratching his ceiling.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#63 of 145
Share of the offense is where he separates from the pack
Unranked Oklahoma (4-4) gives him a thin stage
John Mateer broke his thumb, then kept playing. The numbers that survived that wreckage — 91st-percentile rushing touchdown rate, 57th-percentile explosive pass rate — tell you what the healthy version looks like. He's back in Norman for 2026, and the SEC should take note.
The full scout
Mateer arrived at Oklahoma as the Washington State transfer nobody in the SEC had film on, and for the first month of 2025 he looked like the most dangerous quarterback in the country. Then came the broken throwing hand against the Tigers, and what followed was 14 touchdowns against 11 interceptions on a compromised release — numbers that understate both how good he'd been and how bad the injury was.
The play-by-play data cuts through the noise. As a runner, Mateer graded at the 87th percentile in rushing touchdown rate and the 89th in success rate on scrambles and designed runs — he converts, he doesn't just accumulate. As a passer, his 57th-percentile explosive pass rate signals genuine downfield ability; the 59th-percentile EPA per dropback is the injury hangover, not the baseline. The 45th-percentile interception rate is the number that has to move in 2026, and it almost certainly will with a healthy hand.
He has returned for his final season with Ben Arbuckle calling plays in Year 2 together. He's on the Maxwell and Heisman preseason watch lists, the weapons around him are better, and the system fits his dual-threat profile as well as any offense in college football. The question isn't whether the talent is there. It's whether the thumb is.
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): Oklahoma lost 21-13 to Kentucky as a 7-point favorite on Oct. 17, then beat Mississippi State 23-15 on Oct. 24 and is 4-3. Mateer has completed 136 of 204 passes for 1,591 yards, 11 touchdowns and 7 interceptions, including 3 interceptions against Kentucky and 22 of 29 for 283 yards and 2 touchdowns at Mississippi State.
On tape Mateer is a dual-threat whose running game grades elite by every efficiency measure — 87th percentile in rushing touchdown rate (he punches it in), 89th in rushing success rate (he moves the chains), 83rd in EPA per carry (he generates value on the ground). As a passer he lives over the top: an 57th-percentile explosive pass rate says he's willing to attack downfield and has the arm to make it work. The tension is turnover rate — a 45th-percentile interception rate in 2025 that tracked almost exactly with the moment his thumb broke. At 6'0.5", 200 pounds, he's not a bruiser but he's slippery enough to make defenses account for him on every snap, which opens the windows his receivers need.
Dante Moore was a projected top-five NFL pick. He said no, and came back to Oregon — to finish something a 56-22 playoff beating left undone. The most interesting quarterback decision of the offseason now has a full season to be judged.
The full scout
Most quarterbacks with Moore's draft stock are gone. He left it on the table. After a 13-2 season — 71.8% completions, 3,565 yards, 30 touchdowns — that ended in a 56-22 Playoff semifinal humbling by Indiana, the projected first-rounder turned down the draft and returned to Eugene. He said his reasons were only 20 career starts across stops at UCLA and Oregon, a sense he 'wasn't prepared yet,' and a title that got away.
As of Oct 28: he played Oregon's first four games, 69 of 99 for 926 yards, nine touchdowns and no interceptions, with 378 yards against Boise State. His last pass at USC on Sep 26 came in the second quarter; Dylan Raiola finished the 41-27 win. Moore has not played since, and Oregon is 1-2 without him: Raiola started at UCLA and at Illinois, Brock Thomas against Nebraska. On Oct 26 headlines reported that Oregon coach Dan Lanning confirmed Moore will not return this season.
On tape Moore is a clean, efficient pocket passer, and the metrics are emphatic about it: 97th percentile in efficiency, 98th in both explosive-pass rate and touchdown rate — he gets it out, he hits the big one, he finishes drives. What the resume lacks isn't production, it's volume: just 20 career starts across UCLA and Oregon going into 2026. The blemish the tape keeps is the stage — a 56-22 semifinal where the moment swallowed the offense whole. In 2025 his sack rate was in the top tenth of FBS starters; in his four 2026 games it sat near the middle.
Backs need a season for the ages to beat the quarterbacks
LJ Martin led the Big 12 in rushing and won Offensive Player of the Year. He could have moved on. Instead he's "not done yet" — back to chase BYU's career rushing record and the program's first real Playoff push.
The full scout
He led the Big 12 in rushing with 1,305 yards on a conference-high 236 carries, scored 12 times, added 36 catches, and walked off with Offensive Player of the Year — the workhorse engine of a BYU team with rising ambitions. He returns for his senior season with two prizes in sight: the school's career rushing record (within about 1,347 yards) and a CFP berth, paired with quarterback Bear Bachmeier in a backfield built to contend. The forward stakes are legacy and a ceiling: the most-used back in his conference, chasing a number that would etch him into BYU history and a season that could put the Cougars in the Playoff for the first time. For Martin, 2026 is the year the productive grinder goes for something permanent.
Update (Oct. 28, 2026): BYU lost 39-31 at UCF on Oct. 24 as a 7.5-point favorite. The Cougars are 6-1 and No. 8 in the AP poll. Martin has 344 rushing yards in the four games in which he carried, with a high of 176 at Colorado State.
On tape Martin is a high-volume, reliable lead back rather than a flashy one. Our play-by-play has him solidly above-average — a 67th-percentile yards-per-carry on the heaviest workload in his conference — with the efficiency profile of a grinder (mid-pack success rate and EPA per carry) who wins by accumulation and durability more than explosion. He's a dependable receiver too (36 catches), the every-down sort a Playoff hopeful can lean on for 25 touches without blinking. The game is steadiness: he doesn't come off the field, he doesn't fumble away games, and over four quarters the yards pile up. For a team chasing its first Playoff, that kind of bell-cow reliability is its own form of star power.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#98 of 330
Playing for No. 12 Ole Miss, 6-2 — the stage voters watch
A back has to out-produce every quarterback to get the invite
Nobody in college football carried the ball more than Kewan Lacy in 2025. He scored 24 touchdowns doing it — then turned down a pursuit to stay and anchor a made-over Ole Miss. The workload is the point.
The full scout
He led all of FBS with 307 carries, ran for roughly 1,564 yards, scored 23 or 24 touchdowns, made first-team All-SEC and powered Ole Miss to a College Football Playoff semifinal — a true bell cow in every sense. When a transfer pursuit came, he re-signed with the Rebels rather than chase it. The forward stakes are continuity through change: with the program made over around him, Lacy is the established constant, the back an offense can hand the ball to thirty times and trust to wear a defense down and finish at the goal line. The question for 2026 isn't whether he can carry the load — he proved that — it's whether the offense around him keeps the lanes open. For a runner this durable and this productive in the red zone, that's the difference between a good year and an All-America one.
On tape Lacy is a volume-and-finish back, and the data draws him honestly. The elite trait is scoring: an 79th-percentile rushing-touchdown rate, which fits a back who found the end zone two dozen times and lived at the goal line. The efficiency numbers are more workmanlike — a 29th-percentile yards-per-carry and a 58th-percentile success rate — the mark of a runner who took an enormous, grinding workload (a nation-leading 307 carries) rather than a home-run hitter picking his spots. He's also a capable outlet (84th-percentile catch rate). The profile is a downhill, physical, every-down grinder: not the back who breaks a 60-yarder, but the one who gets you the tough four yards on third down and punches it in from the two. Durability and finishing are the whole game, and both are his.
Finalist0%Ballot odds, top 300%CFB Zeitgeist Score#54 of 465
Share of the offense is where he separates from the pack
5-3 Nebraska, unranked — the résumé follows the team
Who owns each region
The Heisman's six voting regions (145 electors each) reward hometown stars.
Pick Field to see each region's projected leader in his team colors — or pick a
player to light up his own footprint: bright where he projects first, fading where
he trails.
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Projected standings by region
If the season plays out as the market expects, this is how the regions would lean. Projection only: no ballots are cast until December. Each region's order
is the market-implied national strength (de-vigged sportsbook futures) times a modeled
home-region boost, the Heisman's documented hometown bias. Points are indexed (national
strength ×100). It recomputes as the odds move; in-season it switches to the live model.
Same model as the real board (heisman_rankings_weekly_no_market), with the market-prior term forced to zero. Recomputed the same night the real board is.
