The Top 300 Players in the 2026 NFL Draft
Caleb Downs, Jeremiyah Love, and Sonny Styles headline a deep 2026 NFL Draft class.
Bandit FootballBrad Beatson

Injury Concerns

    • ⛑️ Availability — Injury history collected from SIS and The Athletic

    Top Tight End Prospects

    POS RK Player Grade Achetype Badges
    HTE1 Kenyon Sadiq 76 Receiving
    HTE2 Eli Stowers 73 Receiving ⛑️
    TE1 Sam Roush 70 All-Around TE 🧩
    HTE3 Max Klare 69 Receiving
    HTE4 Dallen Bentley 69 Receiving
    HTE5 Justin Joly 67 Receiving
    HTE6 Tanner Koziol 67 Receiving
    TE2 Jack Endries 66 All-Around TE 🧩
    YTE1 Dae'Quan Wright 66 Blocking
    HTE7 John Michael Gyllenborg 66 Receiving ⛑️
    HTE8 Jaren Kanak 65 Receiving ⛑️
    HTE9 Marlin Klein 64 Receiving
    HTE10 Michael Trigg 64 Receiving
    YTE2 Will Kacmarek 62 Blocking
    TE3 Joe Royer 62 All-Around TE 🧩 · ⛑️
    HTE11 Eli Raridon 62 Move ⛑️
    YTE3 Riley Nowakowski 61 Blocking
    TE4 Josh Cuevas 61 All-Around TE 🧩
    TE5 Oscar Delp 59 All-Around TE 🧩 · ⛑️
    YTE4 D.J. Rogers 54 Blocking
    TE6 Matthew Hibner 53 All-Around TE 🧩
    YTE5 Bauer Sharp 52 Blocking
    YTE6 Nate Boerkircher 51 Blocking
    TE7 Lake McRee 50 All-Around TE 🧩 · ⛑️
    FB1 Max Bredeson 49 Fullback
    HTE12 Khalil Dinkins 42 Receiving
    HTE13 Miles Kitselman 40 Receiving
    HTE14 RJ Maryland 27 Receiving

    Most of the receiving tight ends profile as big slot receivers who aren't sufficient blockers early on in their NFL career. This could—and likely will—limit their overall involvement in the offensive gameplan on a weekly basis.

    Raw Prospect Scores

    • 🧰 Production Component
      • Source: PFF Weekly Grades — Stresses the importance of game-to-game, play-to-play consistency while adjusting for variance. Accounts for every game played during the tight end's final two seasons in college.
      • Apply Critical Minimum — Weekly grades below 60.0 cannot be smoothed over by two-year average. Instead, once the acceptable threshold for "below-the-line" grades has been crossed, the prospect's production grade is capped and trends toward more of a boom-bust profile.

    • 🔬 Film Component
      • Source: SIS Scouting Reports — Watch a minimum of 3-5 games per prospect and assign a grade, from 1 (reject) to 9 (rare), to each of their three critical traits and half-dozen or so positional factors. Assign a final grade that projects how the prospect will stack up at their position by the beginning of their second season in the NFL.
      • Apply Critical Minimum — Mediocre traits cannot be smoothed over by average. Instead, once the acceptable threshold for "below-the-line" grades has been crossed, the prospect's scouting grade is capped and trends toward more of a boom-bust profile.

    • ⚖️ Weighting the Two: 80% Prospect Score
      • Position Specific — Some positions have stronger signal in production than film or vice versa and so they are individually weighted to reflect that.
      • Receiving Tight End: 65/15 Production — Receiving tight ends get absolutely nuked by film grades if they're a mediocre or poor blocker. To respect their big slot potential, their prospect score is heavily weighted toward production.
      • Blocking Tight End: 50/30 Production — Just because they're a blocking tight end doesn't mean they can't catch. The defense needs to respect their ability to run routes and not just treat them like a 6th offensive linemen. Because of that, production still gets the edge over film in the prospect score.

      Prospect Chips

      • 🔵 Blue Chip Potential 75+ production & 75+ film
      • 🟢 Solid Contributor — 75+ in prod. or film & 68+ in the other
      • ⚪ Situation Dependent — Everyone else

    Player Production Film Chip
    Kenyon Sadiq 75.2 79.8 🔵
    Eli Stowers 78.4 29.0 ⚪
    Sam Roush 69.9 63.3 ⚪
    Max Klare 74.8 69.7 ⚪
    Dallen Bentley 74.3 57.0 ⚪
    Justin Joly 75.3 64.5 ⚪
    Tanner Koziol 78.6 28.1 ⚪
    Jack Endries 74.7 54.5 ⚪
    Dae'Quan Wright 74.2 54.5 ⚪
    John Michael Gyllenborg 74.1 66.2 ⚪
    Jaren Kanak 72.4 59.2 ⚪
    Marlin Klein 70.5 57.0 ⚪
    Michael Trigg 75.1 68.2 🟢
    Will Kacmarek 76.4 38.3 ⚪
    Joe Royer 71.9 58.7 ⚪
    Eli Raridon 71.9 58.5 ⚪
    Riley Nowakowski 73.4 38.3 ⚪
    Josh Cuevas 73.3 54.5 ⚪
    Oscar Delp 70.6 58.7 ⚪
    D.J. Rogers Inc. Inc. ⚪
    Matthew Hibner Inc. Inc. ⚪
    Bauer Sharp 67.3 25.6 ⚪
    Nate Boerkircher Inc. Inc. ⚪
    Lake McRee 71.0 37.5 ⚪
    Max Bredeson 70.9 37.5 ⚪
    Khalil Dinkins Inc. Inc. ⚪
    Miles Kitselman Inc. Inc. ⚪
    RJ Maryland Inc. Inc. ⚪

    🦺
    Players with incomplete scores had missing data points and will be revisited after the draft. Bandit Football regrets the error.
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    Athleticism, Positional Value, Intagibles

    • 🏅 Athleticism
      • Source: Next Gen Stats — Assigns a 1-10 grade on athletic profile for every player at the Combine. In some cases, NGS estimates the scores if the prospect didn't test in Indianapolis or at their college pro day.
      • RAS, MockDraftable, Football Sheets — I've added these sources to my database for future use. Many prospects had incomplete scores due to lack of testing numbers, so it made more sense to use NGS in this iteration of the model because every prospect ended up with a data point.

    • 📊 Positional Value
      • Source: Spotrac — Analyzing the rookie contract scale and how much guaranteed money each pick receives against the Top 100 cap hits in the NFL by position over the next three seasons. Takes into account the Top 10 highest paid players at their position and the relative cost savings a rookie contract could provide.
      • Additive Bonus — Each player was scored on a 1-10 scale using the consensus big board as a guide for projected savings. Fernando Mendoza was the only player to receive a 10 because starting QBs make anywhere from $30-50 million per season. Other positions, like RB, TE, LB, and S were capped at a maximum 5 points.
      • TE Positional Value
        • 1st Rd: Top 15 pick — 5
        • 1st Rd: Pro Bowl upside — 4
        • 1st Rd: Reliable starter — 3
        • 1st Rd: Situation dependent — 2
        • 2nd Rounder — 2
        • 3rd Rounder — 1
        • Projected Day 3 Pick — 1

      • 🌹🥀 Intangibles
        • Source: Dane Brugler — The Beast prospect guide includes strengths and weaknesses for every player on the big board. Includes off-the-field concerns, quotes from scouts and coaches, and non-negotiable traits for the position.
        • My Judgment — Each player was evaluated based on the additional information, including: injury history, work ethic, football iq, off-field concerns, and non-negotiables for their position. For tight ends, my non-negotiable is football intelligence.

        Badges

        • 💰 Positional Value — Prospect earned a 5.0 or higher based on the potential value of their rookie contract.
        • 💎 Strong Character — Prospect assigned a 5.0 or higher in their intangible score.
        • ⚠️ Investigate Further — Prospect assigned a -5.0 or worse in their intangible score.

        Player Athleticism POS Value Intangibles Badges
        Kenyon Sadiq 9.9 5.0 -2.0 💰
        Eli Stowers 8.6 3.0 4.0
        Sam Roush 8.8 1.0 3.0
        Max Klare 6.9 2.0 -1.0
        Dallen Bentley 8.5 0.0 2.0
        Justin Joly 5.7 1.0 0.0
        Tanner Koziol 7.4 0.0 2.0
        Jack Endries 6.7 1.0 3.0
        Dae'Quan Wright 7.7 0.0 0.0
        John Michael Gyllenborg 8.3 0.0 0.0
        Jaren Kanak 7.0 0.0 0.0
        Marlin Klein 6.9 0.0 1.0
        Michael Trigg 7.2 1.0 -5.0 ⚠️
        Will Kacmarek 6.8 0.0 4.0
        Joe Royer 7.0 1.0 -1.0
        Eli Raridon 7.5 1.0 -2.0
        Riley Nowakowski 6.2 0.0 5.0 💎
        Josh Cuevas 6.2 0.0 0.0
        Oscar Delp 8.9 1.0 -4.0
        D.J. Rogers Inc. Inc. Inc.
        Matthew Hibner Inc. Inc. Inc.
        Bauer Sharp 7.7 0.0 1.0
        Nate Boerkircher Inc. Inc. Inc.
        Lake McRee 5.2 0.0 -1.0
        Max Bredeson 5.0 0.0 2.0
        Khalil Dinkins Inc. Inc. Inc.
        Miles Kitselman Inc. Inc. Inc.
        RJ Maryland Inc. Inc. Inc.

        Head back to the Big Board:

        The Top 300 Players in the 2026 NFL Draft
        Caleb Downs, Jeremiyah Love, and Sonny Styles headline a deep 2026 NFL Draft class.
        Bandit FootballBrad Beatson
        Will Kacmarek (L) and Eli Stowers (R) profile as the top two blocking and receiving tight ends, respectively, in the 2026 draft class.