NFL Mock Draft: 1 Week to Go!

https://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/article/2026-nfl-mock-draft-8-point-one-212231505.html

#1: Las Vegas Raiders — Fernando Mendoza, QB, Indiana

NFL’s newest buddy cop film, “Kirk & Fernando,” will begin filming at the end of the month when the Raiders take Mendoza to be their new franchise quarterback. If Kirk Cousins is willing to play mentor role once the season gets going, this is a nice setup for Mendoza. Given his age, Cousins was fine last year for the Falcons and can’t claim that he didn’t know the team he signed with wasn’t going to pick a QB this time.

2. New York Jets — Arvell Reese, Edge/LB, Ohio State

After a midseason fire sale, the Jets desperately need needle movers on defense. Reese aligned around the front seven for Ohio State and was asked to impact the game in a variety of different roles. And boy did he.  Reese can play off the ball or on the edge, and his pass rush ability is just getting tapped into. Defenses, and the roles they ask players to fill, have become more varied in today’s NFL. Reese is a modern day weapon that every defensive play caller would love to get their hands on.

3. Arizona Cardinals — Monroe Freeling, OT, Georgia

Surprise? There’s going to be a couple unexpected picks this month, so let’s take a stab at one here. The Cardinals have launched a rebuild in the roughest, toughest division around. If new head coach Mike LaFleur is going to have a chance to see this reset through, Arizona needs to get as stable as possible as fast as it can. In a year like this one, drafting an offensive lineman might be the move. There isn’t a player with more upside this year at the position than Freeling, who could easily land as a long-term right tackle across from Paris Johnson Jr. as the Cardinals figure out what’s next.

4. Tennessee Titans — Sonny Styles, LB, Ohio State

The Titans really need to keep adding to their offensive skill players and continue to add speed around Cam Ward. And I’m sure new head coach Robert Saleh would love to keep adding to the defensive line after a flurry of moves this offseason, just like the defenses he’s helmed in the past have had. What those 49ers defenses also had that allowed Saleh to live in zone coverages was the game’s premier linebacker in Fred Warner. (His Jets defenses also had a strong duo in C.J. Mosley and Quincy Williams, too). Styles has the talent, smarts, and skills to be that man in the middle to solidify the whole unit. Ward still needs help, but the thought of Styles flying around behind Jeffery Simmons and John Franklin-Myers has me giddy.

5. New York Giants — Jeremiyah Love, RB, Notre Dame

John Harbaugh loves to have a team that can run the ball and being able to pair Love in the backfield with Cam Skattebo and Jaxson Dart would accomplish that. Skattebo is coming off a major injury to his leg from last season, giving the Giants a reasonable opportunity to add Love to the roster without overloading at the position. If Malik Nabers can pick up where he left off and get back to his rookie-level production, the Giants would have a talented group of young playmakers to try and be competitive with.

6. Cleveland Browns — Carnell Tate, WR, Ohio State

Offensive tackle and wide receiver. I think the Browns’ paths for their two first-round selections is pretty straightforward to address two of their biggest roster needs (outside of gestures in general direction of the quarterback room assembled in Cleveland). We’ve gone offensive tackle in the past in these mocks, but with Freeling swooped up, the other potential candidates don’t fit so cleanly in the Browns’ reworked offensive line room. This might be a little rich for Tate, but he is as reliable as they come at the wide receiver position. He can be a winning player in a variety of roles. So no matter how else the Browns continue to fill out their pass-catching room and offense in general, Tate and Harold Fannin Jr. are a young combo that will give whoever is going to be throwing passes sound surroundings to build alongside.

7. Washington Commanders — David Bailey, Edge, Texas Tech

There might not be a more Dan Quinn-coded pass rusher in this class than Bailey, who thrives with his speed to hawk down quarterbacks off the edge in a way that should translate cleanly to the NFL. However, there’s plenty of room for him to improve as a run defender and to get stronger in those areas, which may be a liability early in his pro career. Still, Bailey is not completely hopeless in that area and should be a high impact player who racks up pressures and sacks.

8.New Orleans Saints — Mansoor Delane, CB, LSU

The Saints could go in a few different directions and it would make sense. Wide receiver to give Chris Olave that desperately needed running partner was tempting here. But instead, the Saints go with Delane to not only shore up a glaring hole in Brandon Staley’s sneaky good defense from last year (11th in FTN’s weighted defensive DVOA metric), but turn a below-average spot into an outright good one with Delane, whose intelligence, ball skills and twitch would flourish in a zone-heavy defense that likes to mix it up.

9. Kansas City Chiefs — Caleb Downs, S, Ohio State

Downs is arguably the best player in this year’s draft class, so getting him with the ninth pick to bolster a secondary that lost some talent would be a smart play. He’s the exact kind of talent that would thrive in Steve Spagnuolo’s defense as playmaker wherever he’s asked to play. He can instantly be one of the best safeties in the league, a necessary weapon for a weaker Chiefs secondary to have as they retool.

10. Cincinnati Bengals — Rueben Bain Jr., Edge, Miami

The Bengals go with the antithesis of their first-round selection from a year ago, trading the high-end tools and low-end production of Shemar Stewart with the top-end production and effort but lack of ideal length of Bain. Jermod McCoy is another player I thought about here to help add a playmaker onto a defense that really needs it. But the Bengals instead look at Bain to be a tone-setter on their defense for the future, provided they’ve done their due diligence on recent reported off-field issues. If Stewart taps into even a small portion of his talent and with Boye Mafe joining in free agency, the Bengals’ edge spots could be more impactful in a hurry and feel a lot different soon.