Way-Too-Early Frontrunners to Be Selected First Overall in the 2027 NFL Draft

The 2026 College Football season is almost here, and it’s the Ohio State Buckeyes who have opened as the team nobody wants to play against in November. They famously stormed to the Natty for the first time in a decade back in 2024 and were the overwhelming favorite to defend their title in 2025, only to see their repeat bid shockingly ended by the number ten-ranked Miami in the Cotton Bowl. 

Contenders Ready Ahead of 2026 

Still, they have brought Jeremiah Smith back anyway. A roster this complete, returning a receiver this good, doesn’t usually get a second crack at the thing it just missed. Notre Dame, still angry about their January snub, are also considered national championship frontrunners, despite withdrawing from their own bowl bid rather than play out a season the committee had already decided didn’t matter. CJ Carr has heard about that all offseason, and he is primed and ready to make the doubters eat their words. 

Texas thought it finally had its quarterback 12 months ago, only for the superstar Arch Manning to falter out of the blocks. The nephew of Super Bowl-winning uncles Eli and Payton would rally down the stretch, however, finally looking at home in a Longhorns side that online betting outlets think is primed and ready to contend. Indeed, some crypto sports betting sites already have their week 1 games priced up, as well as their National Championship futures, and Texas is locked inside the top three for most of them. 

But what of the players themselves? It’s only been a month since Fernando Mendoza was selected first overall in the 2026 NFL draft, and already, fans, media, and the bookies are speculating as to who might follow in his footsteps in 2027. Here are the way-too-early consensus frontrunners, even though the 2026 season hasn’t yet gotten underway. 

Arch Manning

Picture it: 2 a.m., Texas facilities, Arch Manning replaying a freshly slaughtered season opener on a loop. 14-7. Ohio State. The kid who didn’t ask for the Heisman buzz or the No. 1 overall talk sat there anyway, inheriting the moment he took over for Quinn Ewers. The sloppy outing against UTEP didn’t help. Neither did the two picks at Florida. For a few weeks, the loudest name in the sport was its biggest letdown, and you could feel the program bracing for an ugly fall.

Then came Red River, and it played out like an exorcism — 21-of-27, a 23-6 strangling of Oklahoma that wasn’t pretty so much as final. Command replacing caution looks like fewer hitch throws into traffic, a quarterback who stops flinching at pressure he used to invent in his own head. Texas rode that version home, closing 10-3 with a Citrus Bowl win over Michigan, Manning finishing at 3,163 yards, 26 touchdowns, seven picks, nearly 400 yards on the ground. The uncomfortable truth for Texas: his September turnover rate matters more than his ceiling, because evaluators don’t draft based on potential alone.

Dante Moore

Nobody in Eugene was supposed to know what they had. Then the kid who redshirted behind Dillon Gabriel started carving teams up — 74.6 percent completions, 14 touchdowns, one interception through five starts, the kind of stretch that makes scouts nervous about regression that somehow never came. Dante Moore closed at 296-of-412 for 3,565 yards and 30 touchdowns, a 71.8 completion rate among the best in school history. The only blemish was Indiana — and after Moore torched Texas Tech 23-0 in the Orange Bowl for Offensive MVP, that same Hoosier defense buried Oregon 56-22 in the Peach Bowl semifinal.

He had the NFL waiting. He was projected second overall in the most recent draft. But knowing that the Jets were likely to bring him into their dumpster fire of an offense, Moore decided to walk back into a building that had just been run over on national television. His decision to remain at Oregon rather than secure multi-millions in guaranteed money matters more than any throw he made in September, because it tells every other draft-eligible quarterback watching that the calculus has changed — that “good enough to leave” and “good enough to finish the job” aren’t the same résumé anymore.

Jeremiah Smith

The receiver good enough to make people forget receivers don’t usually win this argument. Jeremiah Smith rewrote Ohio State’s freshman record book in 2024 — 76 catches, 1,315 yards, 15 scores, Rose Bowl MVP in a national title win — and then somehow topped the moment without topping the numbers, going unanimous All-American in 2025 with 87 grabs, 1,243 yards, and 12 touchdowns, the fastest player in school history to 1,500 career receiving yards. The team around him still came up short, run over by Indiana in the Big Ten title game and bounced by Miami in the Cotton Bowl.

So, what does it actually take for a wideout to out-argue two blue-chip quarterbacks for top-of-the-draft buzz? Volume that can’t be ignored, and a deep run that finally arrives. The tools have been generational since day one. The moment just hasn’t shown up yet.