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First Draft

Mel Kiper & Field Yates' TOP-5 QUARTERBACKS of 2026 NFL Draft

First Draft

ESPN Radio

Sports

4.21.4K Ratings

🗓️ 13 August 2025

⏱️ 40 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Welcome back to "First Draft." Hosted by Field Yates and Mel Kiper Jr., we're breaking down the top-five quarterback prospects of the 2026 NFL Draft, featuring Texas QB Arch Manning, South Carolina QB LaNorris Sellers and Penn State QB Drew Allar. (0:00) Welcome to First Draft (2:30) Texas QB Arch Manning (9:01) South Carolina QB LaNorris Sellers (13:24) Penn State QB Drew Allar (17:44) Clemson QB Cade Klubnik (20:53) Arizona State QB Sam Leavitt (24:13) Indiana QB Fernando Mendoza (27:40) LSU QB Garrett Nussmeier (32:57) Potential NFL teams in QB market in 2026 (38:15) Thank you for watching! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Come on in to the first draft QB room.

0:03.4

Mel Kuyper Jr. Mefield, Yates are breaking down the best quarterback prospects in the

0:07.4

2026 NFL draft class.

0:09.4

That is coming up.

0:10.6

Plus, we're responding to your questions, your takes, and your draft dreams live as first

0:15.4

draft starts right now.

0:18.1

Welcome back into first draft.

0:19.7

You know him already.

0:20.6

He is Mel Kuyper Jr. He is an NFL on ESPN YouTube channel. Sensation. I am field. Yates. We're available today on ESPN 2 wherever you get your podcast or on YouTube, Mel. What's happening, my friend? I'll tell you what. Quarterbacks front and center today. They always are field. You talk about what it means in the national football, like it's most important position in all the sports. And we have seven guys field, seven, okay? They could end up being QB1 if you take Arch Manning out. And we know Arch Manning's one, right? That's no surprise. But will he prove to be as good as advertised and live up to the height? So there's a lot of fascinating storylines developing with all these quarterbacks this year. Yeah, we're diving into not just the top quarterbacks you need to know today, but also the teams, and not to get too far ahead of ourselves, but to get very far ahead of ourselves. We're taking a look at some of the teams that might be in the quarterback market next year, Mel, teams that could be like where

1:11.9

the Titans were and where the Browns were and other teams at the top of the draft board,

1:15.5

the New York Giants were this past April.

1:18.5

A reminder, though, from now until New Year's Day, first draft is with you every Wednesday

1:23.0

at noon on the NFL on ESPN YouTube channel, as well as on ESPN2 later that day.

1:29.0

You might see us on ESPN News occasionally.

1:31.7

We are all over the map.

1:33.3

And for all of our breakdowns so far this season, and this is episode three, scan that QR

1:38.0

code, which is on your screen, to access the entire YouTube playlist.

1:43.3

We've already broken down some of the most intriguing players for the draft this year,

1:46.9

Mel, some of the best.

1:48.1

But we're going to go and we're going to do our top five quarterbacks.

1:51.2

And Mel, I was thinking about this.

1:53.1

I think the way to go about it is sort of present strengths and limitations,

...

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