People sometimes ask me who the best football player on the Tennessee Titans roster is behind Jeffrey Simmons.

I don’t find that answer very difficult right now. It’s Peter Skoronski.

The starting left guard and former first-round pick has blossomed over the past couple of seasons into one of the best guards in the NFL, and the league is starting to take notice.

ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler released the interior offensive line installment of his Top 10 series, in which an anonymous group of dozens of executives, scouts, and coaches around the league vote on the best players at each position. After earning an honorable mention in 2024, Skoronski landed at No. 9 heading into a season in which he’s expected to get paid big time.

Where Skoronski landed on the list

The full top-nine rankings from the ESPN piece: Cowboys guard Tyler Smith at No. 1, Colts guard Quenton Nelson at No. 2, Chiefs center Creed Humphrey at No. 3, Broncos guard Quinn Meinerz at No. 4, Bears guard Joe Toney at No. 5, Falcons guard Chris Lindstrom at No. 6, Kansas City guard Trey Smith at No. 7, Raiders center Tyler Linderbaum at No. 8, and Titans guard Peter Skoronski at No. 9.

Skoronski’s highest ranking was first, meaning at least one evaluator in the league considers him the best interior offensive lineman in football. His lowest was unranked on at least one voter’s list.

The ESPN article noted that playing on a bad offense over three seasons hasn’t stopped Skoronski’s ascension, that he has improved in each of his first three years — finishing fourth among guards in pass block win rate in 2025 at 96.0% — and that while the early knock on him was that he lacked explosiveness and power, evaluators say he has improved in that area.

There’s no doubt Skoronski is the best offensive lineman on Tennessee’s roster. His high-end ability paired with his consistency on the field throughout his entire career (outside of an appendectomy that was completely out of his control) makes the contract question less about “if” and more about “when.” LINK

The contract question is a matter of when, not if

An anonymous NFC executive put it bluntly in the ESPN piece: “He’s absolutely jumped to elite status. He’s going to get paid a lot more money than people think.”

That’s absolutely true. The only real question is where Skoronski will fall in the pecking order of the highest-paid interior offensive linemen in the NFL. Earlier this spring, Linderbaum signed a deal with Las Vegas worth $27 million APY, comfortably the richest contract at the position in the entire league. Then there’s Trey Smith, who got a $23.5 million APY deal from Kansas City last summer. Everybody else lives below that mark.

Will Skoronski come in between those two figures? Will he reset the market himself? All I know for sure is that the longer Titans general manager Mike Borgonzi waits to sign Skoronski, the more expensive he gets. LINK

Every piece of recognition like this ESPN ranking gives the Skoronski camp more firepower at the negotiating table.

I expect this deal to get done this summer or early into the regular season. Borgonzi is a sharp enough executive to understand that waiting only drives the price up, which is why I think he’ll move on this swiftly.