Sports
Potential fatal flaws that could sink 26 playoff contenders
It was an “almost” sort of Saturday in college football. No. 2 Indiana flirted with disaster at Penn State but survived thanks to an Omar Cooper Jr. toe tap. No. 9 Oregon nearly got Iowa’d but saved itself with an Atticus Sappington field goal. Auburn came close to actually winning a close game against a ranked team for once but got Diego Pavia‘d in overtime and couldn’t respond. We even had almosts at the FCS and Division II levels, where top-ranked teams North Dakota State and Ferris State each trailed late but rallied.
Granted, we still got some upsets. Two more top-15 ACC teams fell (in what feels like a weekly occurrence), No. 23 Washington fell to 2-6 Wisconsin in drizzly Madison, and Hawai’i knocked San Diego State out of playoff contention late Saturday night. Lord knows the ACC race doesn’t make any more sense than it did a week ago, but Week 11 wasn’t quite as chaotic as it could have been, and it ended up offering us a decent amount of clarity in the College Football Playoff hunt.
Using the same average CFP odds formula that I used last week — combining those of the Allstate Playoff Predictor with my own odds derived from SP+ — we now have eight teams with at least an 81% chance of making the field of 12. Loads of teams are in the hunt for those other four (or so) spots, but with three Saturdays remaining before Championship Week, let’s again break contenders into tiers and talk about their most toxic traits, the flaws that will likely keep them from either winning the national title or reaching the CFP at all.
Playoff contenders’ fatal flaws
Tier 1
At a combined 28-0 with a 95% (Indiana), 75% (Ohio State) and 49% (Texas A&M) chance of finishing the regular season 12-0, respectively, these three teams are just about at the finish line when it comes to sealing playoff bids. Indiana needed all 60 minutes to get to that point at Penn State, however. For these teams, we’re definitely gauging fatal flaws in terms of what will prevent them from winning the national title; almost nothing will prevent them from reaching the CFP.
Indiana (average CFP odds: 99.9%): Big-play glitches. Indiana has had a dynamite defense since Curt Cignetti and coordinator Bryant Haines moved to Bloomington, but when the Hoosiers give up a successful play, it’s a very successful play. Usually that comes via run defense — as evidenced by a 59-yard run for Penn State’s Nicholas Singleton on Saturday — but IU also gave up six completions of 19 or more yards against an iffy PSU passing attack, and, combined with an ill-timed interception from Fernando Mendoza, it almost cost them their unbeaten record.
Ohio State (99.6%): A merely decent run game. Indiana’s combined playoff odds are ever-so-slightly higher than those of top-ranked Ohio State, primarily because the Hoosiers only have two remaining regular-season games left and the Buckeyes have three (including one against 7-2 Michigan). But OSU is indeed the top-ranked team per both the computers. It’s not hard to see why: The defense ranks first nationally in points per drive and yards per play, and the offense features the best receiver in the country (Jeremiah Smith) and a quarterback completing over 80% of his passes (Julian Sayin).
Sayin will face plenty of elite defenses down the stretch, however — Michigan ranks ninth in defensive SP+, likely Big Ten championship opponent Indiana ranks fourth despite the big plays, and the CFP will obviously feature lots of good defenses — and there’s a chance the Buckeyes are rendered one-dimensional at some point because of a run game that ranks 19th in rushing success rate* but doesn’t really go anywhere (4.7 yards per carry). Sayin could carry the offense anyway, but he’s still a redshirt freshman.
(* Success rate: how frequently an offense is gaining 50% of necessary yards on first down, 70% on second and 100% on third and fourth.)
Texas A&M (99.3%): Run defense. A&M once again proved its versatility on Saturday. The Aggies thumped a Missouri team that was admittedly without starting quarterback Beau Pribula — third-string freshman Matt Zollers was a dire 7-for-22 passing — but they showed off a wonderfully spaced passing game and an elite pass rush, and after a poor first half, the run game showed up in the second half, too. But even with no pass threat, Mizzou rushed for 207 yards, furthering a scary trend: A&M ranks 130th in yards allowed per carry (no sacks). I’m really struggling to see them winning three or four straight playoff games with that anchor dragging them down.
Tier 2
All of the teams in Tier 2 have one loss; four are part of either the Big Ten or SEC, while Texas Tech lands here both because of its overwhelming quality (the Red Raiders remain fourth in SP+) and its increasingly likely Big 12 title push. Only James Madison (74%) can top Tech’s 71% conference title odds, per SP+. There’s still a chance that one of these five teams misses the dance, so we’ll say fatal flaws mean a couple of different things here.
Texas Tech (average CFP odds: 90.1%): Quarterback. On one hand, Tech has played a pretty weak schedule featuring only two SP+ top-40 opponents. On the other hand, after Saturday’s win over BYU, the Red Raiders have beaten those two opponents by a combined 63-17. The dream season rolls on in Lubbock. But the school of Patrick Mahomes and the Air Raid’s legacy is still merely good throwing the ball, not great. Behren Morton is (A) injury-prone and (B) only 45th in Total QBR, and while the Red Raiders have scored 34 or more eight times, they’re 53rd in three-and-out rate and are mortal against good defenses.
Ole Miss (87.7%): The run game is a wash. Trinidad Chambliss‘ emergence at quarterback has given Ole Miss another dimension, both passing efficiently and running well at times. But even with Chambliss, and even with Kewan Lacy ranking 10th nationally in rushing yards (first in rushing TDs), Ole Miss still averages only 4.8 yards per carry while allowing the same. They have big advantages in the passing game (8.7 yards per dropback, 5.6 allowed), but it’s their only path to victory against awesome opponents, and it will be hard to win three or four playoff games without a solid Plan B.
Oregon (87.0%): No easy points against good defenses. Oregon’s defense has rounded nicely into form, and beating Iowa in cold and rain, as the Ducks did Saturday, is a great way to prove your resourcefulness. But in their five games against SP+ top-50 defense, they’ve scored just 22.0 points per game in regulation, with Dante Moore averaging just 9.2 yards per completion (he averages 15.3 against everyone else). The run game almost always shows up, but can Moore make big throws in a run of big games?
Georgia (85.4%): The defense only shows up when it has to. Georgia tried something novel Saturday, showing up before the fourth quarter and putting away Mississippi State early with a 38-0 run. But the season stats are still alarming: In the first half, the Dawgs rank 74th in points allowed per drive (2.1) and 106th in success rate allowed (44.8%). It’s hard to beat a string of elite teams if you’re taking 30-45 minutes to play your way into the game.
Alabama (81.0%): No run game. As you’re probably picking up by now, a lot of contenders struggle either with or against the run (or both). Alabama ranks 83rd in yards allowed per carry (not factoring in sacks) despite a solid showing against an admittedly poor LSU run game, but the more alarming part was on the other side of the ball, where Jam Miller and Daniel Hill combined to rush 15 times for 34 yards. Bama is 126th in yards per carry and continues to put everything on Ty Simpson and the (strong) passing game.
Tier 3
Notre Dame was, as expected, the highest-ranked two-loss team in last week’s CFP rankings, while BYU and Georgia Tech have each suffered only one loss (even though both losses were recent and rather demoralizing). It’s highly unlikely all three will reach the CFP, but they each have a decent chance.
Notre Dame (average CFP odds: 59.6%): Third-and-longs. They face too many of them on offense and allow too many conversions on defense. Thanks in part to a lot of negative run plays (which are often offset by explosive runs), CJ Carr & Co. have needed at least seven yards on 50% of third downs, 86th in the country. They’ve converted 46.9% of them (second), but that will be harder to do against elite teams. Meanwhile, they rank 87th in third-and-long conversion rate allowed.
BYU (45.4%): Not enough offensive threat. Despite Saturday’s loss at Texas Tech, BYU still has plenty to offer: The Cougars defend the pass well and both create and avoid negative plays. But against two SP+ top-30 defenses, they’ve scored just 31 combined points and averaged 4.8 yards per play. Quarterback Bear Bachmeier has been excellent for a freshman, but he doesn’t get the help he needs against the best defenses.
Georgia Tech (37.4%): Defense. The Yellow Jackets rank 82nd in points allowed per drive, and they don’t offer enough in terms of either efficiency (87th in success rate) or explosiveness (113th in percent of 20-yard gains allowed). Haynes King and the offense are dynamite, but the dam broke in Week 10’s 48-36 loss to NC State, and it will probably break again moving forward.
Tier 4a: Non-ACC teams
All of these teams are in “win out to finish the regular season, and you have to feel good about your chances” territory. Unfortunately, SP+ gives only one of them (Utah) a greater than 35% chance of winning out, and a 10-2 Utah team wouldn’t have a spectacular résumé to lean on.
Texas (average CFP odds: 28.0%): Negative plays. Offensive line issues have plagued Texas this season; it ranks 108th in stuff rate allowed (run stops at or behind the line) and 122nd in pressure rate allowed. Running back injuries and Arch Manning taking forever to throw haven’t helped, obviously, and shuffling the line a bit paid off against Vanderbilt. But it’s a lot to ask for the O-line to suddenly become a strength in November.
Oklahoma (27.0%): Offensive mistakes. Despite their past two games coming against top-10 offenses, the Sooners rank fifth in points allowed per drive and first in success rate allowed. The defense will keep showing up. But the offense has had to master the art of doing just enough to overcome a lack of big plays (102nd in yards per successful play), too many negative plays (84th in percentage of snaps gaining zero or negative yards) and turnovers (12 of them, for 71st).
Utah (25.6%): Untrustworthy explosiveness. In their seven wins, the Utes have been the 1985 Chicago Bears — average score: 46-10 (same as Super Bowl XX) — but in two losses they’ve scored just 31 total points, with below-average efficiency, minimal big-play presence and six turnovers. Even including the wins, quarterback Devon Dampier averages just 10.3 yards per completion. As with other teams here, a lack of easy points will likely be their downfall.
Vanderbilt (25.5%): The defense is fading quickly. While a majority of contenders are less trustworthy on offense, Vandy has few issues in that regard. Just ask Auburn, which was allowing 17.0 points per game in regulation this season but allowed 38 to the Commodores. But after allowing 34 points to Texas and 38 to Auburn, Vanderbilt ranks just 84th in points allowed per drive and 124th in completion rate allowed.
USC (15.8%): Run defense. My line for a while has been that if Lincoln Riley could just craft a top-40 defense, he’d have himself a playoff team. Well, the Trojans are 42nd in defensive SP+. Close. But they’ll probably need to beat Iowa and Oregon to reach the CFP, and both teams have offenses built to punish a terribly passive run defense that ranks 126th in rushing success rate allowed. USC can do the bend-don’t-break thing pretty well, but that’s far too much bending.
Michigan (7.6%): Not enough risk or reward. Michigan runs the ball well, prevents big plays and takes as few risks as possible with freshman quarterback Bryce Underwood. The issue: The Wolverines can’t force the issue very well. They can’t knock opponents off schedule to take advantage of a good pass rush, and among 132 QBR-eligible QBs, Underwood ranks 95th in completion rate (60.9%) despite ranking 86th in air yards per attempt (7.6).
Tier 4b: ACC teams
Someone has to win the ACC, and after both Louisville and Virginia went down Saturday, everything is as blurry as possible. Here are the current ACC title odds, per SP+: Georgia Tech 25.5%, Virginia 17.6%, Duke 17.1%, SMU 15.8%, Pitt 11.3%, Louisville 8.5%, Miami 4.2%. Tech is in Tier 3 thanks to its one-loss status, but there’s a 74.5% chance someone not named the Yellow Jackets will win the conference title.
Miami (15.7%): Not enough big plays. The Canes still have a chance despite two demoralizing losses in the past month, but the offense has underachieved against projections five times in six games, primarily due to a total lack of explosiveness.
They have Georgia’s efficiency but Kentucky’s explosiveness. A lack of easy points will likely be their downfall.
Virginia (14.5%): The offense has run out of juice. Even before Chandler Morris left Saturday’s loss to Wake Forest injured, Virginia had gained just 36 yards in 14 scoreless snaps, furthering a recent downward trend.
First six games: 6.4 yards per play, 46.5% success rate, 3.25 points per drive
Last four games: 5.0 yards per play, 37.0% success rate, 1.37 points per drive
That the Cavaliers reached 8-1 before finally dropping a close game was remarkable. It was also unsustainable. We’ll see if they’re able to rebound in an elimination game at Duke this week.
SMU (11.8%): Alls vs. nothings. Let’s bring that efficiency and explosiveness chart back up for a moment and highlight a different team.
SMU has won five of six thanks to a surging defense and an offense that gets chunk plays from receivers Romello Brinson and Jordan Hudson and back Chris Johnson Jr. But even with some recent improvement, the Mustangs still rank 86th in success rate and 114th in three-and-out rate. That will make beating Louisville, Cal and a potential ACC championship game opponent awfully difficult.
Louisville (8.1%): Negative plays. In Saturday’s 29-26 upset loss to Cal, Louisville ran 69 plays; 29 of them (42.0%) gained zero or negative yardage. The Cardinals turned positive yardage on just four of their last 13 snaps. That raised their season average to 35.0%, which ranks 116th nationally. Running back injuries and unreliable QB and line play are dragging Louisville down.
Pittsburgh (7.8%): Red zone and turnovers. Pitt is on a five-game winning streak since making freshman Mason Heintschel the starting quarterback, and even if the Panthers don’t win the ACC or make the CFP, they’ll decide who will — their last three games are against Notre Dame, Georgia Tech and Miami. Pitt’s defense ranks fourth in three-and-out rate but 112th in red zone TD rate allowed. Meanwhile, even looking only at Heintschel’s starts, the offense ranks 78th in red zone TD rate and 73rd in turnover rate.
Tier (Group of) 5
With Memphis and San Diego State getting more-or-less eliminated in Week 11 – Memphis due to a tight loss to Tulane, SDSU due to a blowout loss at Hawai’i – we’re basically looking at a 1-in-3 playoff chance for James Madison and a 2-in-3 chance for whoever emerges from the American Conference battle royale.
James Madison (34.3%): Turnovers and short fields. JMU ranks third in success rate allowed (31.2%) and eighth in yards allowed per play (4.5), but the Dukes have given up at least 20 points against all four top-60 offenses they’ve faced, in part because of turnovers (including a pair of fumble-return scores) or short fields generated by special teams issues. The Dukes are good at almost everything, but underdogs can’t afford egregious breakdowns in the CFP.
North Texas (28.3%): Run defense. Drew Mestemaker is on pace for about 4,000 passing yards, UNT ranks third nationally in points per drive, and the defense – forever flawed in Denton – ranks a solid 26th in yards allowed per dropback. There’s a lot to like here. One thing to dislike? The Mean Green are 125th in rushing success rate allowed. In their lone loss, to USF, they gave up 306 rushing yards. That feels quite damning.
South Florida (22.4%): Soft pass defense. Like North Texas, USF can score in all sorts of ways, and the Bulls’ run defense creates negative plays and renders opponents one-dimensional. But they can let opponents off the hook. They’re just 73rd in both third-down conversion rate allowed and sack rate, and in two losses their opponents completed 69% of their passes.
Tulane (7.5%): Defensive inefficiency. When Tulane looks good, you see a clear playoff contender. The Green Wave have two power-conference wins on their résumé, and they look the part athletically. But they rank 117th in success rate allowed, they don’t create negative plays and their defense no-showed in two losses, allowing a combined 93 points and 1,071 yards to Ole Miss (forgivable) and UTSA (less so).
This week in SP+
The SP+ rankings have been updated for the week. Let’s take a look at the teams that saw the biggest change in their overall ratings. (Note: We’re looking at ratings, not rankings.)
Moving up
Here are the five teams that saw their ratings rise the most this week:
Hawai’i: up 4.1 adjusted points per game (ranking rose from 90th to 72nd)
Utah State: up 3.3 points (from 95th to 79th)
Akron: up 3.1 points (from 126th to 123rd)
Florida International: up 3.1 points (from 125th to 118th)
Kentucky: up 3.1 points (from 63rd to 52nd)
Hawai’i’s blowout of San Diego State was a lovely highlight for a lovely season out on the islands. The Rainbow Warriors hadn’t won more than six games in a season since 2019 and haven’t finished in the SP+ top 75 since 2010, but they’re currently 7-3 and 72nd. College football is a lot more fun when Hawai’i’s doing mean things to opponents late on Saturday night.
Meanwhile, Kentucky has overachieved against SP+ projections by double digits in three of its last four games and has won two in a row to get to 4-5 and keep bowl hopes alive. Nice second-half improvement from Mark Stoops’ Wildcats.
Moving down
Here are the five teams whose ratings fell the most:
San Diego State: down 4.5 points (ranking fell from 44th to 56th)
Navy: down 4.0 points (from 50th to 63rd)
Florida: down 3.1 points (from 39th to 48th)
Nevada: down 2.8 points (from 123rd to 128th)
BYU: down 2.8 points (from 16th to 22nd)
In my Friday preview, I wrote that if BYU’s Bachmeier was ever going to look like a freshman, it was going to be against a hostile crowd and hostile defense in Lubbock. He didn’t completely implode by “freshman implosion” standards, but he averaged just 4.7 yards per dropback, found no room to run, threw what amounted to a game-clinching interception in the third quarter and lost a late fumble for good measure. Tech was too good, and BYU’s offensive SP+ ranking fell from 25th to 39th.
Who won the Heisman this week?
I am once again awarding the Heisman every single week of the season and doling out weekly points, F1-style (in this case, 10 points for first place, nine for second, and so on). How will this Heisman race play out, and how different will the result be from the actual Heisman voting?
Here is this week’s Heisman top 10:
1. Diego Pavia, Vanderbilt (25-for-33 passing for 377 yards and 3 touchdowns, plus 114 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Auburn).
2. Emmett Johnson, Nebraska (28 carries for 129 yards and a touchdown, plus 103 receiving yards and 2 TDs against UCLA).
3. Jake Retzlaff, Tulane (16-for-23 for 332 yards and 3 touchdowns, plus 53 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against Memphis).
4. Byrum Brown, USF (14-for-15 for 239 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 109 non-sack rushing yards and a TD against UTSA).
5. Ashton Daniels, Auburn (31-for-44 for 353 yards and 2 touchdowns, plus 103 non-sack rushing yards and 2 TDs against Vanderbilt).
6. Bryun Parham, UConn (16 tackles, 1.5 TFLs, 1 sack, 1 forced fumble and 1 interception against Duke).
7. Julian Sayin, Ohio State (27-for-33 for 303 yards, 1 TD and 1 INT against Purdue).
8. Isaiah Smith, SMU (nine tackles, four sacks against Boston College).
9. Beau Sparks, Texas State (10 catches for 186 yards and a touchdown, plus a 49-yard TD run against Louisiana).
10. Antwan Raymond, Rutgers (41 carries for 240 yards and a touchdown against Maryland).
Vandy’s defense is running on fumes, and Auburn’s offense showed up for just about the first time all season, but the Commodores’ playoff hopes remain alive because Diego Pavia pulled another Diego Pavia. Vanderbilt trailed by 14 early and nearly blew it at the end of regulation, but Pavia’s third TD pass of the evening, to Cole Spence in overtime, saved the day and put him atop this list.
Honorable mentions:
• Sieh Bangura, Ohio (17 carries for 102 yards and a touchdown, plus 30 receiving yards and a 97-yard kick return TD against Miami of Ohio).
• Jacob De Jesus, Cal (16 catches for 158 yards and a touchdown against Louisville).
• Phillip Dunnam, UCF (four tackles and three interceptions, including a pick-six, against Houston).
• Nate Frazier, Georgia (12 carries for 181 yards and a touchdown against Mississippi State).
• Makai Lemon, USC (five catches for 166 yards and a touchdown against Northwestern).
• Jayden Maiava, USC (24-for-33 for 299 yards, 2 TDs and 1 INT, plus 19 non-sack rushing yards and 1 TD against Northwestern).
• Josh Moten, Southern Miss (six tackles, three interceptions and 1 pass breakup against Arkansas State).
• Mason Posa, Wisconsin (11 tackles, 2.5 sacks, 1 forced fumble, 1 fumble recovery and 1 pass breakup against Washington).
• Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele, Cal (30-for-47 for 323 yards and 2 touchdowns against Louisville).
• Gunner Stockton, Georgia (18-for-29 for 264 yards and 3 touchdowns, plus 31 non-sack rushing yards against Mississippi State).
Through 11 weeks, here are your points leaders. Where there’s a tie, I’ll use players’ points from the past four weeks as a tiebreaker.
1. Julian Sayin, Ohio State (29 points, 20 in the past four weeks)
2. Ty Simpson, Alabama (29 points, zero in the past four weeks)
3. Taylen Green, Arkansas (27 points)
4. Trinidad Chambliss, Ole Miss (25 points)
5. Diego Pavia, Vanderbilt (24 points)
6. Demond Williams Jr., Washington (21 points)
7. Gunner Stockton, Georgia (19 points, 10 in the past four weeks)
8. Fernando Mendoza, Indiana (19 points, nine in the past four weeks)
9. Luke Altmyer, Illinois (16 points)
10. Jake Retzlaff, Tulane (14 points)
I understand that it’s my own damn fault for bringing stats to the vibes-based Heisman race, but I’m never going to fully understand Heisman odds. Sayin entered the week as the Heisman betting favorite and went 27-for-33 for 303 yards, a touchdown and an interception. His Total QBR for the week was 89.2, he kept his season completion rate above 80% — a ridiculously high number — and his interception happened when the Buckeyes were up 21.
Fernando Mendoza, meanwhile, went just 19-for-30 for 218 yards against a Penn State defense that Sayin just torched. He averaged 6.1 yards per dropback with a 75.0 Total QBR, both his worst numbers since Week 1. He threw a devastating fourth-quarter pick that could have cost the Hoosiers the game. But then he rallied, making a couple of lovely throws on Indiana’s game-winning drive, and receiver Omar Cooper Jr. made maybe the greatest TD catch of the season — or the 2020s? The 21st Century? Ever? — to save his team.
And after all that … Mendoza became the Heisman betting favorite? Cooper’s amazing catch became Mendoza’s Heisman moment because Sayin’s team won too easily? Do I have that right? Mendoza winning the Heisman would be a spectacular story (just add it to Indiana’s list of spectacular stories at this point), but if anything happened Saturday, it should have been Sayin solidifying his lead.
My 10 favorite games of the weekend
1. No. 2 Indiana 27, Penn State 24. Regardless of my confusion toward Heisman odds, this was a brilliant football game. Penn State reminded everyone of its talent, the Nittany Lions’ home crowd came through, and Indiana drove 80 yards in 1:15 for a glorious game-winning TD. Brilliant stuff, with a brilliant in-game win probability chart.
2 and 3. Division II: No. 1 Ferris State 51, Saginaw Valley State 45 (2OT); No. 6 Colorado State-Pueblo 41, Colorado Mines 34 (OT).
Division II brought it Saturday. Ferris State won its first nine games by an average of 54-15, but redshirt freshman Wyatt Bower, Trinidad Chambliss’ successor, looked incredibly freshman-like Saturday, throwing three picks on eight passes and losing two fumbles. With the Bulldogs trailing 24-7 early in the third quarter, backup QB Chase Carter keyed a 31-7 run, but SVSU tied the game on a Mason McKenzie-to-Zarek Zelinski touchdown pass with 1:55 left. FSU missed a 39-yard field goal at the buzzer and couldn’t seal the deal until Taariik Brett’s 12-yard touchdown run in the second OT. If not for the Mendoza-to-Cooper touchdown, this would have easily been the No. 1 game of the week.
Meanwhile, after coming back from 21 points down to beat a top-10 Western Colorado team last week, CSU-Pueblo spotted rival Colorado Mines a 28-6 lead late in the first half, then slowly clawed all the way back. Roman Fuller found Marcellus Honeycutt Jr. for a tying 32-yard touchdown with 56 seconds left, then hit Reggie Retzlaff for the go-ahead score in OT. Peyton Shaw then sealed the ThunderWolves’ win with an interception.
4. Delaware 25, Louisiana Tech 24. The Blue Hens led 16-10 with under four minutes remaining, but Louisiana Tech scored twice in 46 seconds, first on a short TD run, then on a Jacob Fields pick-six, to take a 24-16 lead. Delaware’s Nick Minicucci rebounded with a TD pass to Elijah Sessoms with 34 seconds left, then the Blue Hens recovered an onside kick and set Nate Reed up for a game-winning 51-yard field goal.
1:16
Louisiana Tech Bulldogs vs. Delaware Blue Hens: Full Highlights
Louisiana Tech Bulldogs vs. Delaware Blue Hens: Full Highlights
5. No. 9 Oregon 18, No. 20 Iowa 16. Iowa proved its top-20 bona fides, Dante Moore and Oregon proved their playoff chops and Atticus Sappington nailed a huge field goal. Just a great game in November Iowa weather.
SAPPINGTON CONNECTS FOR THE DUCKS! pic.twitter.com/8QZdcfVMhW
— CBS Sports College Football 🏈 (@CBSSportsCFB) November 8, 2025
6. No. 16 Vanderbilt 45, Auburn 38 (OT). Indiana’s win probability chart was a classic of one genre (blow it, and then save yourself). Vandy’s was a classic in another (rally, then nearly fall apart multiple times).
7 and 8. FCS: No. 2 Montana 29, Eastern Washington 24; No. 1 North Dakota State 15, No. 15 North Dakota 10. Top-ranked teams struggled in the FCS as well. NDSU, barely challenged all year, trailed its in-state rival 10-9 heading into the fourth quarter. The Bison finally took their first lead on Cole Payton‘s 8-yard touchdown with 2:22 remaining, but UND drove inside the NDSU 30 in the closing seconds before Anthony Chideme-Alfaro made a lunging interception to seal the win.
0:31
Picked! Anthony Chideme-Alfaro hauls in the interception
Picked! Anthony Chideme-Alfaro hauls in the interception
Of course, we’ve seen game-sealing picks before. Have you ever seen a game-sealing fumbled spike?
0:23
Eastern Washington loses on fumbled spike attempt
Jake Schakel fumbles the spike attempt, and the Grizzlies’ defense recovers it.
Unbeaten Montana took a 29-14 lead early in the third quarter but shifted into cruise control too early, allowing 4-6 EWU to score twice, recover a late onside kick — it was a great week for successful onside kicks, by the way — and drive inside the 10 with eight seconds remaining. But Jake Schakel, who shined in his first career start, let the ball slip out of his hands on a spike, and the Griz survived.
9. UConn 37, Duke 34. There were 12 scores in this game; 10 gave a team the lead, including all six in the second half. Skyler Bell‘s 19-yard touchdown catch gave UConn the advantage with 1:58 remaining, but the game wasn’t iced until Trent Jones II recovered a sack-and-strip of Darian Mensah with 18 seconds left.
10. Sam Houston 21, Oregon State 17. Oregon State has been utterly snake-bitten this season, but this one takes the cake. The Beavers led 17-0 midway through the second quarter, but thanks to an interception (which set up a 35-yard touchdown pass), a kick return touchdown to open the second half and a blocked punt return score with 8:29 remaining, SHSU somehow came back to win its first game of the season despite a yardage disadvantage of 474-157. Shocking stuff. And you know what? Good. I ache for Beavers fans this year, but fielding even a bad team is so difficult, and every team deserves to celebrate at least one win. Now we just need to get 0-9 UMass off the schneid at some point in the next three weeks.
Honorable mention:
• Division II: Chadron State 27, No. 11 Western Colorado 24 (OT)
• FCS: No. 10 Mercer 49, No. 24 Western Carolina 47
• FCS: Mercyhurst 16, Saint Francis 15
• Missouri State 21, Liberty 17
• Ohio 24, Miami (Ohio) 20 (Tuesday)
• Division II: Ouachita Baptist 42, SW Oklahoma State 38
• Tulane 38, Memphis 32 (Friday)
• FCS: William & Mary 30, Campbell 27 (OT)
• Wisconsin 13, No. 23 Washington 10
• Division III: No. 14 Wisconsin-Platteville 24, Wisconsin-Stout 23
One last special shoutout: Army’s 14-13 win over Temple didn’t quite make the list, but Army’s last drive — an epic, 18-play, 9:53 clock killer — deserved to.
The midweek playlist
Ohio at Western Michigan (Tuesday, 8 p.m., ESPN2). One week into our midweek MACtion slate, the conference title race is as blurry as ever. Ohio’s win over Miami gave the Bobcats the slightest of edges, but it could disappear this week. Current MAC title odds, per SP+: Ohio 22.2%, Toledo 20.2%, Western Michigan 20.1%, Miami 19.2%, Buffalo 16.7%. What a race! The winner of this one should inch ahead in the odds.
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NBA star hits back at NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani for blaming him over expensive playoff tickets
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The New York Knicks and the Atlanta Hawks are set to play in the first round of the NBA playoffs and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani was asked why it is so much more expensive to attend Knicks’ playoff games compared to the Hawks.
Mamdani jokingly cited Knicks’ foe Trae Young, who starred for the Hawks when they beat the Knicks in the first round of the 2021 playoffs, as the reason for the expensive tickets.
“I would say that I blame Trae Young, and I think it’s always important to blame Trae Young,” Mamdani said at a press conference.
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(Left) Washington Wizards guard Trae Young (3) stands on the court against the Utah Jazz in the second half at Capital One Arena in Washington, District of Columbia, on March 5, 2026. (Right) New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani attends a press conference that discussed New York City’s first-quarter crime statistics in New York, New York, on April 2, 2026. (Geoff Burke/Imagn Images;Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)
Mamdani put the blame on Young, who was traded to the Washington Wizards in January. Even though Young isn’t with the Hawks, he caught wind of Mamdani’s remarks and fired back at the mayor.
“Remember what happened the last time the Mayor of that City has my name in his mouth during a time like this. #DontBlameMeWhenItHappensAgain,” Young posted to X with a laughing crying emoji and a hand emoji.
Regardless of whether Mamdani knows Young is no longer a member of the Hawks, it is not the first time the mayor of New York City has shaded Young, as Bill de Blasio told Young to stop hunting for fouls during that 2021 playoff series.
New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani delivers remarks at the Service Employees International Union 32BJ SEIU rally on Park Avenue in Manhattan on April 15, 2026. (Selcuk Acar/Anadolu)
The Hawks defeated the Knicks 4-1 in that series. The Knicks lost that series as the No. 4 seed, while the Hawks were the No. 5 seed.
This time around, the Knicks are the No. 3 seed, and the Hawks are the No. 6 seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs.
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Washington Wizards guard Trae Young (3) meets with the media during his first return to play the Atlanta Hawks at State Farm Arena on Feb. 24, 2026. (Dale Zanine/Imagn Images)
Mamdani said he is “still confident and hopeful” of the Knicks winning a championship this season, and wishes the playoff tickets were more affordably priced.
The Knicks play the first game of the series against the Hawks at Madison Square Garden at 6 p.m. ET on Saturday.
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We’ve reached the point of the Premier League season where things start to look more like a knockout competition. There are only so many games remaining, and things such as systems, cohesion and managerial decisions don’t matter as much as they do over the course of the whole year. From here, individual brilliance — a great save, a perfect pass, a fantastic finish — takes on an outsize role in determining how things will shake out.
That’s true at the top of the table, where the gap might only be three points (and a game in hand) for Manchester City up to Arsenal if Pep Guardiola’s side win their head-to-head this weekend. It’s definitely true in the Champions League race, where eight points separate third from eighth. And it’s clearly true at the bottom, where 18th-place Tottenham trail 17th-place West Ham by two points and 16th-place Nottingham Forest by three.
So, what players will have the biggest say in how things go from now until the end of the season? We’ve got another edition of ESPN’s Premier League Top 50 to answer that exact question.
How we rank, and who isn’t eligible
I say this every time, but ranking players with any degree of confidence is impossible. And if I really just wanted to identify the true talent of every Premier League player, I’d probably defer to the market, which means the majority of the list would be made up of players from all the best teams.
But I’d rather reward a star at Brentford instead of a squad player at Arsenal, so the rankings are intended to be something of a balance between the two: your talent in a vacuum and how much value you’ve actually provided so far this season. The rankings are definitely weighted toward attackers, and attackers are the highest-paid players in the world because they’re the most important players in the world, but I’m using a midfielder who produces like an attacker, or a defender who does things that no one else at his position can do, as they will also grade out highly.
In each edition, anyone who is out with a long-term injury will also be removed from the list. So Hugo Ekitike — who would’ve been pushing toward the top 10 but just ruptured his right Achilles — isn’t on the list. All injuries are awful, but this one was particularly brutal.
All right, enough throat-clearing. Onto the list!
He’s experiencing one of the biggest late-career drop-offs we’ve ever seen from one year to the next. And despite that, among players with at least 1,500 minutes played this season, only Erling Haaland, Hugo Ekitike, Bruno Fernandes and Bukayo Saka are generating more non-penalty expected goals+assists per 90 minutes.
49. Matheus Nunes, fullback, Manchester City
48. Eberechi Eze, attacking midfielder, Arsenal
46. David Raya, goalkeeper, Arsenal
44. Morgan Gibbs-White, attacking midfielder, Nottingham Forest
Goalkeeping performance is a notoriously volatile thing to measure. What Gradient Sports found is that the percentage of mistakes a keeper makes on shots faced is the most stable number from season to season. It measures this through its grading system, and every time a keeper receives a negative grade, it’s considered a mistake.
Verbruggen has only made a mistake on 1.5% of the shots he has faced this season — the second-best mark in the Premier League.
1:14
Laurens: Top clubs will want Andoni Iraola this summer
Julien Laurens explains why Andoni Iraola has chosen now to leave Bournemouth and what club he could end up at in the summer.
34. Casemiro, midfielder, Manchester United
33. Bernardo Silva, midfielder, Manchester City
31. Igor Thiago, forward, Brentford
Donnarumma has faced 93 shots this season and made a total of one mistake, according to Gradient. That’s the best mistake-less rate in the league.
1:15
Would signing Anthony Gordon make sense for Bayern Munich?
Gab Marcotti & Julien Laurens discuss reports linking Bayern Munich with Anthony Gordon.
29. Anthony Gordon, winger, Newcastle United
26. Ezri Konsa, center back, Aston Villa
25. Marcos Senesi, center back, Bournemouth
You know how there are certain positions under certain managers or clubs that just seem to produce? Strikers at Eintracht Frankfurt, attacking midfielders under Gian Piero Gasperini, every attacker who has ever played for Hansi Flick and now, maybe center backs for Andoni Iraola?
Last year, Dean Huijsen and Illia Zabarnyi played well enough to secure moves to Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain, respectively, and now Senesi is having a kind of season I’m not sure I’ve really seen before. He’s one of the best attacking passers in the Premier League despite playing as a center back.
Now, ball-playing center backs have always been a thing, and they tend to be cornerstones of all the best teams in the world. But Senesi isn’t just playing line-breaking passes into the feet of his midfielders. No, he is creating opportunities like he is an attacking midfielder. And I don’t mean this hyperbolically.
If we look at the expected possession value created from open-play passes this season — in other words, how much your passes have increased your team’s chances of scoring a goal — then there are seven players who have generated at least five goals worth of value: Jérémy Doku, Adam Wharton, Cody Gakpo, Morgan Rogers, Pedro Neto and Senesi. Five attackers, one incredibly aggressive midfielder and one central defender.
Senesi’s contract expires after the season. It’ll be fascinating to see if someone recognizes this special skill set and figures out a way to use it.
24. Rodri, midfielder, Manchester City
23. Morgan Rogers, attacking midfielder, Aston Villa
22. Florian Wirtz, attacking midfielder, Liverpool
Rogers and Wirtz don’t look that similar in how they move across the field or even stand still. But I think these two are quite similar players.
Below is a plot of what I’m calling “good passes” and “good receptions.” These are passes made or received that increased the team’s expected possession value by somewhere between 1% and 9%. Increasing xPV by 10% or more with a single action is rare, so we can think about what we’re seeing here as players who consistently add marginal value to possessions.
Rogers and Wirtz are alone at the top of both metrics. It’s funny because even though we’re quantifying it, I’d call this a kind of version of hidden value. It’s not goals and assists or even expected goals and assists, but neither player is an under-the-radar prospect. Wirtz is the second-most-expensive player in the history of the Premier League, and Rogers burst into the wider consciousness this season with all the goals he was scoring.
The promise for each player, then — as they’re both still in their pre-prime years — is that they keep doing all these little things and they start to create and score more goals.
21. Marc Guéhi, center back, Manchester City
19. Reece James, fullback/midfielder, Chelsea
18. Nico O’Reilly, fullback/midfielder, Manchester City
16. Elliot Anderson, midfielder, Nottingham Forest
15. Adam Wharton, midfielder, Crystal Palace
Adam Wharton is the Marcos Senesi of midfielders. I know if you throw enough chimpanzees behind a typewriter, you’ll get “War and Peace” or whatever, but I’m pretty sure I’m the first person to say those eight words together.
I mean, look at this!
Crystal Palace play a chaotic style that encourages Wharton to play aggressive passes all game, but those grades wouldn’t be so high if he wasn’t constantly making the big plays. His security under pressure and his defensive ability are the big question marks for whomever signs him, but he’s so good with the ball at his feet — in pretty much any situation — that it might even be worth it for the biggest clubs in the world to build their midfields around his passing and do whatever else they need to do to cover up his deficiencies.
If João Pedro played a different sport with the same name as the one he’s currently paid millions of dollars to play, then we would hear commentators saying the same thing every Sunday: This João Pedro guy? He’s just a FOOTBALL player.
What the heck are they talking about? NFL commentators, yes, will frequently refer to a football player as “a football player” as a means of describing what type of football player that football player is. They are not just citing biographical details, and their brains are not short-circuiting. What they mean — as I’ve gleaned from hearing the phrase hundreds of times now — is that these “football players” don’t necessarily have any flashy attributes to their games, but that they tend to do all of the little things right. Their innate understanding and technical skill sets make it seem like they were almost born to play football.
I feel the same way about João Pedro, who doesn’t stand out in any particular way. He’s not a goal-scoring striker. He’s not a creative midfielder. He’s not a dribbling winger. But he can score goals, he can press, he can defend one-on-one, he can receive passes under pressure, he can make the necessary passes, and he can win headers. He is, quite simply, a football player.
2:28
Burley: Liverpool didn’t get embarrassed by PSG
Steve Nicol and Craig Burley react to Liverpool’s Champions League exit vs. PSG.
12. Bryan Mbeumo, forward, Manchester United
10. Gabriel, center back, Arsenal
Earlier this week I wrote about how Tottenham’s obsession with acquiring athletic players created a massive blind spot in their team-building approach. The immediate result: a team where no one can pass. The longer-term result: a team that’s incredibly expensive and would be relegated if the season ended today.
Part of the issue, and something I didn’t touch on much in the piece, is that being fast and being good at passing have something of a negative relationship. Perhaps when you’re younger and fast, you don’t need to worry about being a good passer since you’re always running by everyone. And maybe great passers at a young age never really need to develop speed because, well, the ball moves faster than the man. Or maybe the power needed for high-speed running actively works against the subtle movements needed to place a pass.
Anyway, all this is to say that players such as Dominik Szoboszlai are incredibly rare. He’s the only player in the Premier League who ranks in the top 30 both for the maximum speed he has reached in a match this season and for his passing grade.
7. Jérémy Doku, attacking midfielder, Manchester City
6. Rayan Cherki, attacking midfielder, Manchester City
Here’s how everyone in the Premier League stacks up, according to open-play expected assists. In other words, who is creating the greatest combined quantity and quality of shots for their teammates:
The main piece of context you need to better understand this chart is that eight of these 10 players have played at least 2,000 minutes in the Premier League this season. The other two haven’t even reached the 1,400-minute mark, and those two players play for the same time: Manchester City’s Rayan Cherki and Jérémy Doku.
5. Bukayo Saka, winger, Arsenal
You could probably say this is the first season of stagnation or regression in a career that has pretty much been on an upward trajectory from the moment Unai Emery started playing Bukayo Saka at left back. He made a leap two seasons ago up into the star level of goal creation, averaging around 0.7 non-penalty expected goals+assists per 90 minutes across 2023-24 and 2025-26.
This season, he has dropped back down 0.54, though some of that can be attributed to the league-wide trend where almost all individual attacking performance is down. And some of it is because of the issues with how Arsenal were built: There’s very little creative passing to get him the ball, especially when Martin Ødegaard is injured, and then their new starting striker, Viktor Gyökeres, just isn’t very good.
There was a world where Saka developed into the kind of attacker who would thrive despite unfavorable context, but he’s still the best attacker on the team that is still favored to win the Premier League. And even if he’s not scoring and creating, he’s always doing a little bit of everything else, too.
3. Declan Rice, midfielder, Arsenal
Last week, Gradient released what it is calling “overall grades.” It looks at each position, determines what the main requirements for that position are, weighs its various grades for each player across those facets and then puts it all together to come up with a single metric to assess player performance. Obviously, there is no one true number to assess player performance (and it knows this), but it’s still a useful exercise.
If you’ve read this specific column before, you know that I write the same thing about Declan Rice every time. Mainly: He’s good at everything. Well, now I have another number to back up that claim. He’s currently Gradient’s highest-graded player in the Premier League, at an 89.8 out of 100.
Across Europe’s Big Five leagues, only four players have grades of 90 or better: Bayern Munich‘s Harry Kane and Michael Olise, RB Leipzig‘s Yan Diomande and humanity’s version of cheese and/or wine, AC Milan‘s 40-year-old Luka Modric.
2. Erling Haaland, forward, Manchester City
If you want to be bullish on Arsenal holding off City’s looming title challenge, then take a look at this chart:
That’s how it looks when you compare the non-penalty xG for each five-game bucket of his season: Games One to Five, Two to Six and on and on. He has been a below 0.5 xG player for all of 2026. He’s averaging 0.72 xG per game for his City career.
If you want to be bullish on City catching Arsenal, then, well, Manchester City have rounded into form and started to close the gap despite the best per-game goal scorer in Premier League history going through his least-productive stretch since he came to England. This City team simply hasn’t been as good as the other City teams that have caught Arsenal, but if Erling Haaland starts playing like Erling Haaland again, then they could easily win their last seven matches.
1. Bruno Fernandes, attacking midfielder, Manchester United
He might set the assist record. He leads the league in expected assists. He leads the league — by a massive margin — in through balls completed. He’s second behind Haaland in combined non-penalty goals+assists, and among players with at least 20 starts, he’s also second behind Haaland in non-penalty goals+assists per 90 minutes.
The difference between Haaland and Bruno is twofold: 1) Haaland plays on a better team, and 2) Bruno spent half of the season playing as part of a two-man midfield.
Perhaps you could argue with the idea that he’s the best player in the Premier League, but I don’t think there’s really any argument to this: Bruno Fernandes is the most important player in the Premier League.
Midway through college and high school baseball seasons, the 2026 MLB draft picture is starting to come into focus.
We’re getting to the part of the spring when players are falling into consensus tiers for evaluators, and when I see MLB crosscheckers and scouting directors, they ask me when my first mock is coming out. This year’s class has a clear No. 1 player followed by a pretty clear next-best prospect and then the potential shuffling picks up at No. 3, with several college players and a few standout prep prospects all in the mix to go in the top 10 picks.
The players below were ranked using the FV (future value) system that I applied for pro prospects. Here are my preseason MLB prospect rankings to see where these players would rank if they turned pro now, though the grades will change (and generally improve as we gain more information and certainty) throughout the spring.
We’ve all waited long enough, so it’s time for a fresh rankings update and a mini-mock draft of the first 13 picks.
Jump to: Mini-mock | Draft rankings
Mini-mock draft: Projecting the first 13 picks
1. Chicago White Sox: Roch Cholowsky, SS, UCLA
This already seems to be down to Cholowsky and Grady Emerson. I think Cholowsky has a notable lead, but it isn’t a slam dunk just yet.
Since almost everyone in baseball has the same report and outlook for Cholowsky, this pick then comes down to exactly what you think Emerson’s potential is and if he’s a quick mover. Some evaluators think Emerson has higher upside and if you think he’ll also move quickly (Konnor Griffin debuted as a 19-year-old, Jackson Holliday at age 20, Kevin McGonigle at 21) then he could also look like a superior prospect in the minors within a year or so.
If he’s both things and he comes at some bonus savings vs. Cholowsky, you can logically justify picking Emerson. Some teams I’ve spoken with see this decision as close enough to really dig in and the White Sox might be one of those teams.
We’ll learn a lot more in the coming weeks; I heard a big White Sox scouting contingent, including GM Chris Getz, was in to see Emerson this week.
2. Tampa Bay Rays: Grady Emerson, SS, Fort Worth Christian HS (Texas)
This is a pretty common connection, especially in light of the Rays pick history and the industry’s read of the first pick. Some rival clubs picking in this area think the Rays will seriously consider Vahn Lackey and Jackson Flora if they get a sizable bonus savings, with those two prospects seen as the other players within the top group before things really open up.
Given the variability in evaluating high school players and how the Rays covet MLB-ready prospects, I buy the Flora/Lackey buzz, both as earnest interest and possible negotiating leverage with Emerson. I can’t imagine Cholowsky gets past this pick if he doesn’t go No. 1.
3. Minnesota Twins: Vahn Lackey, C, Georgia Tech
There’s still a bit of an empirical bias against pitchers at the top of the draft if talent seems to be similar between two players. Lackey seems to have a slight edge over Flora for most evaluators, due in large part to this, but both are common third- and fourth-ranked players on boards.
I think the Twins would take Emerson if he’s available here, I think Flora would also get a long look, and there’s some buzz Chris Hacopian would be an option here on a deal.
4. San Francisco Giants: Jackson Flora, RHP, UC Santa Barbara
The Giants would really like to get a shot at Emerson and I think they’d be happy to get Lackey or Flora, but they’re also taking a very long look at Jacob Lombard, younger brother of Yankees’ top prospect George Lombard Jr.
Lombard is polarizing in a very similar way to Ethan Holliday last year — both have notable pro fathers and brothers, big power and struggled during the summer showcase circuit — and accordingly, some teams have Lombard in the back half of the first round while others think he’s a clear fit in the top 10 or even top five. It’s safe to project that the Giants take the last of the top tier of four here, but there’s a real chance for something more intriguing.
5. Pittsburgh Pirates: Jacob Lombard, SS, Gulliver Prep HS (Florida)
This is perceived to be one of those landing spots for Lombard, along with the first spot for another toolsy prep hitter in Eric Booth Jr.
I don’t know if it’s perception or reality but after Konnor Griffin’s swing adjustment went so well so quickly, teams think the Pirates will take another prep hitter with big upside and a swing/contact question. I think this is the floor for Lackey or Flora if there’s a deal cut in the top four.
6. Kansas City Royals: Liam Peterson, RHP, Florida
Things start to open up here, as the top tier of four is almost certainly selected by now and the Royals have an extra pick at No. 30, so they could opt for an underslot deal here to spend more later. The Royals are always trying to compete and it wouldn’t surprise me if they went with a potential quick-mover on a deal at this pick to then set up more typical high school picks down the board.
Peterson has been rising of late, but his sweet spot might be a few picks after this. I think this is also the first pick in which you could see a high school pitcher (Gio Rojas or Logan Schmidt) and that would also be on a cut-rate deal.
7. Baltimore Orioles: Justin Lebron, SS, Alabama
Lebron had stealth 1-1 buzz entering the spring because of his big tools, but it was stealth because of contact questions; he’s hitting .230 in SEC play and .270 on the season.
He fits Baltimore’s style (multiple sources said he was a “great fit” at this pick as their first response to this mock) and probably shouldn’t last much beyond here or the next couple of picks. Booth also fits Baltimore’s style if Lebron goes earlier.
8. Athletics: Eric Booth Jr., CF, Oak Grove HS (Mississippi)
Booth has had a ton of heat all spring as he has added significant strength (one scouting director compared his physique to that of an SEC running back) with plus bat speed and raw power along with plus-plus foot speed.
I see Booth’s floor is No. 14 to Miami, but I think he’ll go a good bit earlier than that. This is about the juncture of the draft where the next cut of college hitters start to fit: Hacopian, Ryder Helfrick, A.J. Gracia and Drew Burress.
9. Atlanta Braves: Chris Hacopian, SS, Texas A&M
Hacopian has one of the best hit/power/position combinations in the draft class, though he’s probably a third baseman. He probably lands somewhere in the top 10 with Booth and Burress (Atlanta tried to sign him out of high school) both fitting here, too, and I think there’s a shot that a prep pitcher (again, Rojas and Schmidt) also could be a cut-rate option.
10. Colorado Rockies: Drew Burress, CF, Georgia Tech
Burress should land somewhere around picks eight to 13. Some teams have soured a bit this spring as a harsher scouting report would have Burress moving to right field with 20-homer upside at 5-foot-9 while the rosier view would point out that he has hit 51 career home runs for the Yellow Jackets and never batted below .333 in any of his three seasons. The new Rockies regime is a little hard to read, but the belief is the team will go with an accomplished college player so Peterson also makes sense.
11. Washington Nationals Ryder Helfrick, C, Arkansas
Helfrick has dramatically improved his contact rates, sliding in just behind Lackey as the second catcher expected to go in the top half of the first round.
The Nats also have a new regime entering its first draft, but the decision-makers largely came from Boston, so rival teams are expecting Washington to follow what has worked for the Red Sox in recent drafts. The bat speed of Booth and intriguing two-way potential of Jared Grindlinger could also fit that approach.
12. Los Angeles Angels: Cameron Flukey, RHP, Coastal Carolina
It’s hard to not just give the Angels a quick-moving college player given their run of pushing players quickly to the majors. Depending on how he looks in a return from a February ribcage injury, Flukey could go in the middle of the top 10 or a bit lower than this, but he is a polished potential midrotation arm regardless. Gracia, Eric Becker, Chris Rembert and rising RHP Logan Reddemann could also fit.
13. St. Louis Cardinals: Jared Grindlinger, RF/LHP, Huntington Beach HS (California)
I’ll cut things off at this pick as the group of names in contention is ballooning. Grindlinger just turned 17 and is within a few weeks of being the youngest early-round prospect in the draft (just behind Rocco Maniscalco). He’s a real first-round caliber outfielder with plus bat-to-ball ability and above-average power/speed potential, along with a pitching evaluation somewhere in the top two rounds. There is still some disagreement on this report and where he goes as Grindlinger was only seriously scouted starting this spring after he reclassified late in the process.
By drafting him, a team would basically get two elite prospects in one and probably would let him do both (with a lean toward hitting) for a couple of seasons to see how things break. That appealing risk profile means I don’t think he gets much past this pick even with the abbreviated eval period. The Cards are also tied to prep OF Trevor Condon, who is also rising up boards as he had been red-hot the last few weeks.
Top 85 MLB draft prospects
60 FV
1. Roch Cholowsky (21.3), SS, UCLA
Cholowsky is still the top prospect in the draft for the vast majority of teams. He’s an above-average hitter for average and power with a good approach and an above-average glove at shortstop who has been productive for three college seasons (1.081 OPS and 44 homers in 154 career games) after getting multimillion dollar interest out of high school in the loaded 2023 draft class.
If you were going to pick nits (scouts are as good at this as anyone), he’s not the long, lean type of athlete you’d prefer and you could argue he has a bunch of above-average to plus tools, but no plus-plus, standout ability. Dansby Swanson and Alex Bregman are the names that come up most often as comparable players. The downside for Cholowsky is basically a really solid 2-3 win player who never has that breakthrough season, but there’s legit 5-win upside, which would make him a franchise player. It’s really hard to pass on that high of a floor with perennial All-Star upside.
You don’t see this kind of prospect every year, so the top two players in this draft make it a great year to be picking really high. That said, the depth beyond that is lacking a bit, so it’s a tough break if you’re picking later in the top 10.
55 FV Tier
2. Grady Emerson (18.4), SS, Fort Worth Christian HS (TX), Texas commit
Emerson has been the top prep prospect in this draft class basically since anyone has been paying attention. The track record of that kind of prospect, especially when it’s a left-handed hitting shortstop, is quite good. Scouts have Emerson as an above-average to plus hitter with above-average to plus power, along with a solid approach and feel to get to power in games. At this age and as a shortstop, that puts him right on the borderline of future star, depending on what side of that standard report you land.
He isn’t the size of Corey Seager (Emerson is listed at 6-2, 180 pounds), but there are some evaluators who think Emerson’s upside could be a player of similar value. With how quickly polished elite high school position players can move through the minors (Griffin, Holliday, McGonigle are the three I noted above in the mock), you wouldn’t be doing your job as a scout if you didn’t take a long look at putting Emerson at the top spot on your list; you can certainly imagine how that could be a common opinion a year from now.
50 FV Tier
3. Vahn Lackey (21.0), C, Georgia Tech
This is the tier that runs roughly 40 through 120 on a minor league prospect top 100 ranking, for reference. Lackey has been a revelation this year, posting a 1.274 OPS heading into this weekend’s series with tools to match: an above-average runner with a plus arm who will stick behind the plate and has above-average power, pitch selection and bat control as a hitter.
There’s not a 70-grade tool, he’s new to being this elite, and catchers often take non-linear developmental roads, but Lackey is very easy to pick for any team no matter their preference in prospect style.
4. Jackson Flora (21.1), RHP, UC Santa Barbara
Flora was a common pick-to-click this spring because of his combination of lively stuff, clean arm action and a loose, projectable frame. He made the leap this spring with improved strike quality while still sitting 94-98 and hitting 100 mph, with an above-average changeup, and slider that’s almost a sweeper at 83-87 mph.
He could be in a big league rotation pretty quickly and every team is looking for rotation depth; Flora is also a fit for almost every team.
5. Justin Lebron (21.7), SS, Alabama
Lebron is hard to rank because he still has above-average power, plus speed and an above-average glove at shortstop (a rare combination in college) but his in-zone miss rate and overall feel to hit have continued to be below average.
Some teams look more for traits than polish in position players because they think they can teach/mold a swing and approach more than others; Lebron fits well with a team like that.
6. Chris Hacopian (21.9), SS, Texas A&M
Hacopian has a track record of strong contact and strong production with plus raw power. The hesitations are that he’s more of a third baseman than shortstop, he’s not an elite athlete, he’s older than the other college position players in this area of the draft (which empirically does matter), and his flatter swing plane means his power production doesn’t match his exit velos right now. Translation: There’s a pretty high floor but a more limited upside.
45+ FV Tier
7. Eric Booth Jr. (18.0), CF, Oak Grove HS (MS), Vanderbilt commit
8. Drew Burress (21.6), CF, Georgia Tech
9. Liam Peterson (21.1), RHP, Florida
10. Cameron Flukey (21.2), RHP, Coastal Carolina
Booth has been steadily rising all spring, with plus bat speed/raw power and plus-plus foot speed. There are two concerns: He’ll need to tweak his setup/hand move a bit (seems doable to me) and he’s patient to the point that if he’s getting pitched around (which has happened a good bit), scouts need to go back for a second day to write a report. In the game I saw him this spring, he had three walks and a hit by pitch in a five-inning run-rule game. Luckily, I got to watch him hit off of a machine in the cage for a few rounds and he fouled off a few pitches in game, but I would’ve liked to have seen more that day. Some teams see the premium tools and salivate at what player development could do, while others see risk of the unknown they’d rather avoid at a premium pick.
The next three players are much more consensus talents and reports across all 30 teams. Peterson is 6-5, has an above-average fastball/slider combo headlining a four-pitch mix, projects as a starter and has been famous to scouts for about five years. Burress has been super productive, but his swing/contact rate regressed a bit early this year, his 5-9 stature limits his power upside and he is on the center/right-field spectrum for some. Flukey is a steady starter with a plus fastball and among the best starter traits in the draft. He also has two fringy breaking balls to the eye that play up a bit due to his other abilities, and his solid changeup isn’t used much. He is expected to return from a rib cage injury next week.
45 FV Tier
There’s not a lot of quality depth to the prep hitter demographic so Lowrance and Comeau are common picks to fill that vacancy in the 20s and 30s behind the Grindlinger/Condon/Lombard/Booth group. There’s a lot of conversation about Grindlinger, Condon and Lombard as opinions on them vary widely, as mentioned in the mock draft above.
Lombard’s summer contact rate trips up some models to where he doesn’t project as a premium pick. Grindlinger simply hasn’t been scouted anywhere near as much as the others in this range and has a two-way evaluation, so teams just haven’t reached internal consensus, and Condon is a lower-variance type that teams just tend to value differently. Some whisper the name McGonigle when watching Condon.
Reddemann has been red-hot of late and seems to be the player currently filling the college pitching vacancy behind the Flora/Peterson/Flukey group with Dietz also rising (but with an injury history). Waechter and Hirschkorn seem to be the prep arms rising a bit from the jumbled group in the 30-50 area. The next tier of prep arms will often get pushed into the later rounds as overpays, but Waechter and Hirschkorn feel like players that a team will have in mind for their second pick when making an underslot first pick. The college hitter class is quite jumbled with medium-upside types that are performing well; teams aren’t thrilled at the lack of upside after pick 15 or so with all of the position players.
40+ FV Tier
Bumila is 6-8 and has been regularly up to 100 mph this spring with interesting shapes delivered from a lower slot, but there are still questions about secondaries and quality of strikes. He has thrown only a handful of times this spring but could still rise from here. Duncan is a more polished prep lefty and has also been rising of late, getting into the mid-90s and mixing in a plus changeup.
I must mention that yes, Landon is the son of Hall of Famer Jim Thome. I’ve written about Contreras this spring and will continue to because he’s polarizing with scouts in part because he’s such a fascinating scouting and development theoretical question; I’ll go into more detail on this soon. Blair is another intriguing talent who throws from a distinctive arm slot (almost sidearm) with distinctive shapes and elite control: 55⅓ innings, 38 hits, five walks, 71 strikeouts this spring. Williamson has one of the more pronounced bat wraps (coiling his arms around his head as he loads up to swing) but scouts think it’s fixable and love his potential everyday tools.
40 FV Tier
I cut it off here with the idea being this represents the full first two rounds plus comp rounds, which is 75 picks, plus a handful more to make up for the high school players I have ranked who won’t sign. This also feels around the area where you start getting lots of tough-to-sign high school players who all feel pretty similar in talent but some just aren’t being scouted anymore and opinions vary a lot from team to team.
I’m not sure what it means but somehow, there’s five LSU commits in my next 11 ranked high school players. One team gave me feedback on the last 10-15 players I have ranked and this team has two of them in the fifth round or later, then another team said I must leave them where they are because they’re both easily getting seven-figure bonuses. That’s how ranking high school players is, especially at this juncture of the spring, once you get out of the top 50 players or so.
Opinions are quite split on Maniscalco, originally a 2027 prospect who reclassified and is the youngest player in this ranking, narrowly ahead of Grindlinger. He wasn’t very good at the plate early in the spring when I and many others piled in for first looks; many teams buried him in the third round, where he’s likely not signable. Some teams are still considering him inside the top 30 picks, though, fueled by models that love young-for-the-class, switch-hitting shortstops.
It’s worth noting in this section that the automated ball-strike system (ABS) changes in the big leagues will affect the draft. Getting a raw receiver, framer, and blocker who has the athleticism to block pitches is totally fine at a higher pick. Having a plus arm is more important, but the release time and accuracy can be coached whereas arm strength cannot. So if a college catcher doesn’t call pitches and isn’t a polished defender but is an above-average athlete behind the plate and has a plus arm, teams aren’t that bothered about the finer points; some big league teams are calling pitches just like most colleges are. This generally helps Jackson, Tinney, and Brock (ranked 185th last year out of a junior college in this space), along with a sleeper name that’s below them, but rising: George Washington C Robbie Lavey.
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