NFL Draft 2026: 6 prospects we’re all overthinking, including Fernando Mendoza

As much as it kills me to say this, given that there’s less than a week to the start of the 2026 NFL draft, and there are about 200 guys I’d like to watch in that time (ha!), the draft should really start a couple of weeks before it does. Were things to begin, say, in mid-April, think of the noise we wouldn’t have time to hear, because there wouldn’t be as much time to overthink the prospects at or near the top of the board. 

But things are as they are, and we must wait until Thursday, April 23 at 8:00 p.m. ET for the draft to begin. So, we get several more days of analysts, evaluators, and anonymous scouts (my personal favorite) going out of their way to over-analyze top prospects to the point where you think there’s more of a limited future for these players than what the tape actually shows.

So, in the interest of public service, let’s dispel the myths we’re going to hear more and more… that will make less and less sense as time goes along. 

Fernando Mendoza, QB, Indiana: He’s too RPO-dependent! 

Let’s be fair to the naysayers here. Last season, Mendoza did lead the entire NCAA in RPO dropbacks with 103, and with the benefit or those run/pass options, he completed 77 of 97 passes for 687 yards, seven touchdowns, one interception, and a passer rating of 115.9. But without RPOs, Mendoza completed 196 of 282 passes for 2,849 yards, an NCAA-high 34 touchdowns, five interceptions, and a passer rating of 134.3.

The common assumption when it comes to heavy-RPO quarterbacks is that they need this particular schematic constraint because they’re limited in their field-reading overall. Thus, the relatively simple option to read a defender, and decide to hand off or throw to a quick read based on defensive action. ESPN’s Dan Orlovsky is among those who have forwarded this theory in Mendoza’s case, and as much I respect Dan and his process, I’m not seeing it. One of the first things that popped out about Mendoza when I watched his tape was his ability to see the entire field, read the coverage, and throw with anticipation when required.

For one thing, you don’t do as well against disguised coverage as Mendoza did last season without a great deal of mental wherewithal, because there are NFL starting quarterbacks who still struggle with safety switches and whatnot.

Is Mendoza a perfect quarterback prospect? No, because nobody is. But the RPO-dependent narrative has spiraled out of control, and it needs to stop.

Carnell Tate, WR, Ohio State: He’s not a No. 1 receiver! 

At 6′ 2¼” and 192 pounds at the combine, and with a wealth of explosive plays and contested catches on his tape, Carnell Tate certainly looks like a No. 1 receiver to me, but perhaps my definition has been warped by the vagaries of modern NFL offensive design. The days of the stationary X-iso receiver are just about gone — even if you have a Justin Jefferson or Ja’Marr Chase, you want to give them the most possible advantages with condensed formations, pre-snap motion, and 3×1/2c2 receiver sets. Add in the increased use of 12 and 13 personnel throughout the league, where at least one tight end is a primary target, and things can get pretty blurry for defenses. Which is why you don’t often see any team’s best receiver in the same spot even two snaps in a row.

The point is, Carnell Tate doesn’t need to be a 6’3”, 220-pound iso ball-winner to be a team’s No. 1 receiver; he just needs the right system in which to become that. Of his 51 catches on 66 targets for 875 yards and nine touchdowns in the 2025 season, 21 targets were contested, and he brought in 12 of those throws. That is one of the most apparent attributes on his tape.

And on passes of 20 or more air yards, Tate caught 11 on 17 targets for 453 yards and six touchdowns.

Personally, I think the main reason Tate is being undersold as a true alpha dog at the next level is that he did his thing with Jeremiah Smith on the field most of the time, and Jeremiah Smith may well be one of those “annual generational” players when he becomes part of his own draft class. Let’s not have comparison become the thief of joy here.

KC Concepcion, WR, Texas A&M: He’s just a gadget guy!

In today’s NFL, where players are asked to do more things at more positions than ever before, you’d think that versatility would be a strong point. But when Texas A&M receiver KC Concepcion won the 2025 Paul Hornung Award, given annually to the most versatile player in major college football, it seemed to bake in the notion that Concepcion is more of a trick-shot artist than a pure receiver capable of maintaining the force of an entire passing game.

“He’s almost like a gadget guy, the way they play him,” one NFL scout told veteran writer Bob McGinn. “It’s going to be a while before he’s anything. Looks like a track guy. You can tell he can run when things are free. They scheme him up for his production. Doesn’t catch the ball well. Lot of drops around a lot of bodies. Doesn’t have catch radius. They do this slip-screen stuff with him and he has no run after the catch.”

Okay, so the hands need help. Concepcion had seven drops last season, but I saw as much or more focus issues (gotta catch the ball before you look to turn and run, dude) than the idea that he dries up and blows away with defender around him. Last season, the 6’0”, 196-pound Concepcion caught 61 passes on 101 targets for 919 yards and nine touchdowns, and while he did have a lot of screen and hitch targets, his average depth of target was 12.3 yards, and he also put up a ton of big plays on longer-developing routes. You don’t catch eight passes of 20 or more air yards on 21 targets for 240 yards and two touchdowns if all you’re doing is gimmicky YAC stuff.

Moreover, Concepcion has added to his route palette, and he knows how to get open just about everywhere on the field. So, just because he’s a jack of all trades doesn’t mean that he’s a master of none.

Eli Stowers, TE, Vanderbilt: He doesn’t block! 

The aforementioned rise of 12 and 13 personnel (two and three tight ends on the field) also means that not all of your tight ends have to be created out of the same mold. Sean McVay didn’t win over and over with his hilarious 13 personnel uptick last season because he had three big blockers on the field, per se — it also worked because he had different kinds of tight ends for different purposes. Do you want good blockers on the edge of the formation? Sure. But does it also help to have tight ends who are just great pass-catchers?

It certainly does. Go figure.

So, when we discuss Vanderbilt’s Eli Stowers, does it matter that he’s not a great blocker yet? I mean, you’d want a bit more than what was shown in the 2025 season, but if you’re crossing him off your list because he’s not Peak Gronk as a tough guy, maybe you’re missing the point.

Last season, Stowers caught 62 passes on 85 targets for 769 yards and four touchdowns, and if anything, I think that his NFL team will be able to make more of his vertical juice than the Commodores did. It’s also important to mention that Stowers is a converted quarterback, who only started playing tight end with New Mexico State in 2023 after he suffered a throwing shoulder injury early on in his time with Texas A&M. This is a player where you have to look at the developmental curve and what can be done, as opposed to what’s still in the incubator.

Kadyn Proctor, OT, Alabama: He’s an out-of-shape bust! 

When Alabama’s Kadyn Proctor showed up at the scouting combine standing 6′ 6 ⅝” and weighing 352 pounds, you could hear the entire Draft Industrial Complex (and a lot of NFL teams) breathing a rather large sigh of relief. Because Proctor’s weight has been an issue in the past. It’s one reason why, in 2023, Proctor looked like a whale out of water as the Crimson Tide’s left tackle. That’s when he allowed 12 sacks and 36 total pressures in 408 pass-blocking snaps, and if you told me at that point that he was a future first-round pick, I would asked you for some of what you were smoking.

That has seemed to stick with Proctor to a point, even though his blocking and conditioning have improved exponentially over the last two seasons. In 2025, he gave up two sacks and 21 pressures in 611 pass-blocking snaps (by far his career high), and he was much more forceful and agile overall.

Jeremiah and Brooks know what they’re talking about, and they both talk to NFL teams, so this is still a thing. I’m not as worried about the weight fluctuation because it’s been overplayed to a degree overall, and given the fact that Proctor had multiple plays last season in which he exceeded 16 miler per hour on the move, he’s clearly done some work. It will be on his NFL team to make sure the work is consistently done.

Caleb Downs, DB, Ohio State: He’s not fast enough!

Caleb Downs is one of the best defensive prospects in this class — one of the best overall — but it may be that he has the curse of making everything look too easy. I can think of no other reason why Downs’ on-field speed would be the issue it has become.

Karim Kassam, vice president of product at the data company Teamworks, recently told ESPN’s Kevin Seifert that based on his company’s AI modeling and evaluation, Downs’ play speed is a problem.

“They might see that his [particular obstacle] is going to be his athleticism, that he’s not going to be able to run with receivers the way that some other safeties can,” Kassam said. “… Based on the numbers, you might not see him as someone that can flex outside and cover even a premier tight end, or be a center-field-safety type that’s going to cover a lot of ground. That might not be his thing. He’s going to be more of a box-slot type of safety.”

Well, there’s that… and then, there’s the tape. Last season, Downs played 54% of his snaps in the deep third as either a single-high or two-deep safety, and overall, he allowed 25 catches on 38 targets for 168 yards, 92 yards after the catch, no touchdowns, two interceptions, one pass breakup, and an opponent passer rating of 53.4.

My NFL comparison all along for Downs has been Xavier McKinney, who came out of Alabama in the 2020 draft after running a 4.63-second 40-yard dash (Downs didn’t run at his combine or pro day), but became an amazing top-down defender at multiple positions because his anticipation skills were and are so great. No, Downs isn’t a “unicorn” like Kyle Hamilton or Nick Emmanwori, but if you fast-forwarded to a future in which Downs became the next Brian Branch or Derwin James, I wouldn’t blink an eye. Whichever NFL team that drafted him would probably be pretty happy with that outcome.