Aaron SchatzMar 29, 2026, 06:40 AM ET
- Aaron Schatz is an NFL analyst for ESPN.com. He has more than 20 years of experience working in NFL analytics and is the creator of the DVOA and DYAR metric. He also serves as the Chief Analytics Officer at FTN Network.
It used to be rare for a rookie wide receiver to make a big impact, but that paradigm is clearly changing. A first-year pass catcher with 1,000 receiving yards might now be a perennial occurrence. Every NFL draft since 2019 has seen at least one wide receiver hit 1,000 yards as a rookie. (Tetairoa McMillan just hit this benchmark last year with 1,014 yards.)
Which prospects in the 2026 NFL draft class project to have instant impact in the pros? We used Playmaker Score to find out. Playmaker Score analyzes the player's peak college season along with other variables -- including ESPN's Scouts Inc. rankings -- to project a player's receiving yards per year in his first five NFL seasons. You can see the full explanation all the way at the bottom of this story.
Below, we look at Playmaker's top prospects in the 2026 draft, along with some similar prospects from previous drafts (players who were similar in their Playmaker statistics but not necessarily in physical traits). Overall, this is a better class than last year but not as good as 2024. In 2024, we had 13 receivers with a Playmaker Score of at least 400. Last year, that was down to four. This year, it is at eight.
Jump to a section:
Top eight WRs
Day 2 sleeper pick
Day 3 sleeper pick
Full Playmaker Score rankings
Methodology: How it works
1. Makai Lemon, USC
Playmaker Score projection: 671 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 13
Similar historical prospects: Sammy Watkins, Brandin Cooks
Lemon is a fairly typical first-round wide receiver prospect. He had plenty of yards (1,156) and touchdowns (11) in 2025. He also had nine carries and two rushing touchdowns, which is a good indicator for future performance even if Lemon didn't have many yards on those carries (four).
He's coming out as a junior, and the best prospects usually enter the draft with eligibility remaining. (The top eight receivers listed here all have eligibility remaining.) He also gets a bit of a bonus for sharing the field with another draft-eligible receiver who is expected to go in the middle rounds, Ja'Kobi Lane. Nothing stands out as exceptional, but everything here is very good.
2. Omar Cooper Jr., Indiana
Playmaker Score projection: 668 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 23
Similar historical prospects: Justin Jefferson, Ike Hilliard
Cooper is interesting for a couple of reasons. First, his conventional numbers are deceptively low because Indiana had relatively few pass attempts in 2025. He had 69 catches for 937 receiving yards. Second, he had a very high touchdown total (13) compared to his yards per reception (13.6), although he had a much higher yards per reception figure in his sophomore year (21.2). Cooper was a full-time slot receiver for the Hoosiers in 2025 but can play outside as well.
3. Jordyn Tyson, Arizona State
Playmaker Score projection: 637 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 12
Similar historical prospects: Mike Evans, Troy Williamson
Tyson's projection comes out a little bit lower than Lemon and Cooper because he missed time last season with a hamstring injury. But it's easy to make the case that Tyson would have been the top receiver in Playmaker Score without that injury. Through nine games in 2025, he caught 61 receptions for 711 receiving yards and eight touchdowns. He didn't miss a game in 2024 and had 1,101 receiving yards on 75 catches with 10 touchdowns.
Even still, he comes out with a higher projection than our 2025 draft No. 2 receiver, Tetairoa McMillan, who was projected to have 625 yards/season. Tyson is a strong route runner who can also excel on contested catches at 6-foot-2, 203 pounds.
0:24
Jordyn Tyson scores a tying TD on fourth-and-goal
Sam Leavitt hits Jordyn Tyson on fourth down to tie the score 24-24.
4. Denzel Boston, Washington
Playmaker Score projection: 597 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 19
Similar historical prospects: Andre Johnson, Koren Robinson
Boston is coming off two similar seasons with the Huskies: 834 yards and nine touchdowns in 2024, and then 881 yards and 11 touchdowns in 2025. That's more impressive than you might think because Washington significantly dropped how often it passed the ball from 2024 to 2025 once players such as Rome Odunze and Ja'Lynn Polk moved onto the NFL.
Boston is very big at 6-4 and 212 pounds, and scouting reports generally praise him for his toughness and ball skills more than his speed and ability.
5. Carnell Tate, Ohio State
Playmaker Score projection: 586 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 11
Similar historical prospects: A.J. Green, Laquon Treadwell
Wait, what is the consensus top receiver in the draft doing all the way down here -- ranked fifth? Tate did in fact record 51 receptions for 875 receiving yards with nine touchdowns in 2025. But the problem with his projection is the variable that gives receivers a bonus if they have to share the field with another talented teammate who is drafted in the same year. It's hard to put up legendary statistics if you have to play with another superstar like unanimous All-American Jeremiah Smith.
Smith is just a sophomore, so he isn't eligible for the draft until 2027. If we plug Smith into the system as a projected first-round pick in this year's draft, Tate jumps up to a projection of 649 yards per season, which would put him third right below Lemon and Cooper.
6. KC Concepcion, Texas A&M
Playmaker Score projection: 521 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 40
Similar historical prospects: Michael Thomas, Tee Higgins
Concepcion starred as a freshman at NC State with 839 yards and 10 touchdowns in 2023. Then he had a down year in 2024, with just 460 yards, before rebounding in 2025 with 919 yards after a transfer to the Aggies.
He tied Tennessee's Chris Brazzell II (who is coming up below) for the SEC lead with nine receiving touchdowns last season. Concepcion depends on his quickness to get open against close coverage, so having a career like Thomas would truly be a best-case scenario for him.
0:16
KC Concepcion skies for Texas A&M TD
Marcel Reed connects with KC Concepcion on a 17-yard touchdown to put Texas A&M up 28-20 over Arkansas.
7. Zachariah Branch, Georgia
Playmaker Score projection: 496 yards/season
Scouts Inc ranking: 39
Similar historical prospects: Nico Collins, Justin Hunter
Branch had just six touchdowns last season and just nine in his entire three-year college career, which is very low for a highly-touted wide receiver prospect. However, he led the SEC with 81 receptions for the 2025 Bulldogs and had to share the field with another prospect in Colbie Young. He also recorded 811 receiving yards.
Stylistically, Branch is more of a gadget slot receiver who moves with quickness but can make explosive pass gains. So he's not particularly similar to the players with the most similar Playmaker metrics such as Collins.
8. Chris Brazzell II, Tennessee
Playmaker Score projection: 451 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 50
Similar historical prospects: Reche Caldwell, Anthony Gonzalez
Brazzell had 62 catches for 1,017 yards and nine touchdowns for the 2025 Volunteers. He's 6-4 and 198 pounds, with long arms. He also has long strides when he stretches the field and ran a 4.37-second 40-yard dash.
DAY 2 SLEEPER
Elijah Sarratt, Indiana
Playmaker Score projection: 390 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: 85
Similar historical prospects: Anthony Miller, Kevin Lockett
Somebody pull the Cris Carter alarm, because all Sarratt does is score touchdowns. He led FBS with 15 of them for the 2025 Hoosiers, combined with 65 catches for 830 receiving yards.
That total is even more absurd when you consider that Sarratt had to compete for touches with Cooper, although it is partly explained because they were playing with the likely No. 1 pick in this year's draft, quarterback Fernando Mendoza. Sarratt has this year's highest projection for a player who is coming out without college eligibility remaining.
DAY 3 SLEEPER
CJ Daniels, Miami
Playmaker Score projection: 136 yards/season
Scouts Inc. ranking: N/A
Similar historical prospects: Ty Montgomery II, Jalen Hurd
Daniels is an example of something we're going to need to study with the rise of players transferring from Group of 6 schools to Power 4 schools for a final year of eligibility. The Playmaker Score system finds that a player's peak season is more predictive than their most recent season, but what do we do when those two seasons are played at different levels?
Daniels had 55 catches for 1,067 yards and 10 touchdowns for Liberty University in 2023, but he hasn't been as productive the past two years playing in Power 4 conferences. He had 480 yards and zero touchdowns for LSU in 2024, and then 557 yards and seven touchdowns for Miami in 2025. After six years of college eligibility, Daniels probably doesn't have much growth potential, but he could be a useful depth receiver for the next couple of seasons and should be available late in the draft.
One last note: I also have a tight end projection system that I call "Travis." It is not as well developed as the Playmaker Score, but Oregon tight end Kenyon Sadiq has the highest projection in the history of the system at 603 yards per season.
Methodology
Playmaker Score projects NFL success for wide receivers based on a statistical analysis of Division I wide receivers drafted in the years 1996-2022 and measures the following:
The wide receiver's projected draft position from ESPN's Scouts Inc. ranking.
The wide receiver prospect's best or "peak" season for receiving yards per team attempt (i.e. a wide receiver with 1,000 receiving yards whose team passed 400 times would score a "2.50").
The wide receiver prospect's peak season for receiving touchdowns per team attempt.
The difference between the prospect's peak season for receiving touchdowns per team and the prospect's most recent season for receiving touchdowns per team attempt (this factor is simply "0" for a player whose peak season was his most recent season).
A variable that rewards players who enter the draft as underclassmen and punishes those who exhaust their college eligibility.
The wide receiver's rushing attempts per game during their peak season for receiving yards per team attempt.
A factor that gives a bonus to wide receivers with teammates who played for the same college team, entered the draft for the same year and are projected to be drafted.
Playmaker's primary output (Playmaker Score) projects the average total of regular-season receiving yards that the wide receiver will gain per year over the course of his first five NFL seasons. The secondary output (Playmaker Rating) reflects how well the receiver does compared to historical benchmarks without considering projected draft position.
