We are officially into draft season and I have Andrew Mott here right now and we're here to give you six of the biggest sleepers heading into the 2026 NFL draft right here on the brand new draft nerds pod.

Welcome to the draft nerds pod. As I said, my name's Jagger May. That is Andrew Mott. We're giving you six sleepers, kind of deep cuts. Some of these aren't so deep as we get into draft season. Like I'm only just now getting the tape on some of these guys. So I'm excited. Andrew, we're going to kick it off with your first one.

You have Emmett Johnson running back from Nebraska, 5-11, 200 pounds, his 2025 season, 251 carries, 1,451 yards, and 12 touchdowns.

That's productive.

Nebraska wasn't bad.

They weren't terrible unless you're Dillon Riola, who has recently left.

Give us your thoughts on them.

Why was he your biggest sleeper?

Or is he your biggest sleeper?

Yeah, I mean, he's the best guy that I think we're going to talk about here, at least in my list today.

He's a player that I cut the tape on yesterday.

He was kind of watching some of the All-22, watch some games versus Michigan, some games versus USC, some other teams. Kid's good, man. Kid is really good. He pops out on tape for me. Has a lot of nice burst. He has a ton of acceleration, home run speed. He has a lot of wiggle in his game, kind of guy that'll make you miss, guy that's going to hit you with the juke stick. Like everything in between he has it in his repertoire. I think he's got this elite change of direction to his game that is just, it feels almost shady McCoyish. Like, when you watch him, and that's very high praise for a guy that I think is probably not going to be a first round pick or a second round pick, but that's the nature of this running back class, right? Like, we don't necessarily think that this running back class is going to be elite, for the most part, maybe outside of Jeremiah, I love. But the biggest thing with Emmett Johnson that I felt like made the big difference for me and why I think he can be really fantasy football relevant for us is he's very underrated as a receiver. He had 46 receptions, 370 receiving yards and three

receiving touchdowns last year for Nebraska, 9.9% target share there at Nebraska. And he was running

legitimate routes. They were lining him up out wide at times. It was just, he's being used all over the field.

Now, you mentioned 5-11, 200 pounds.

He's a little bit lighter, and it showed up sometimes.

That smaller frame showed up when he was in pass protection.

That may take him off of the football field every once in a while.

And I do think he can get a little bit too creative with the jukes when he's in between the tackles. I think it gets him some happy feet sometimes. But overall, a very solid player, a player that I really liked, I think at the next level, probably going to end up as like a high-end change of pace running back, probably a player who could have some upside if given a full workload. I think of player comparisons that we've seen just this year. Guys like Chase Brown, you know, not a guy that we projected as a bell cow, but once he was given the role, you kind of saw the production follow. And a guy like Rico Dowdell as well, like for the Carolina Panthers. I feel like he kind of looks like both of those players when he plays. And I could see the pathway

being similar to those players as well. And what you describe me, too, it reminds me maybe even

better than Woody Marks kind of as well, you know, just like, because his usage at USC is a big

time receiver. And like, as you mentioned, there's Jeremiah I love in, I think RB2 is wide open.

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