Garrett Nussmeier leaves NFL scouts surprisingly split after Senior Bowl as a polarizing NFL Draft prospect
Garrett Nussmeier shined at Senior Bowl, but will that be enough to offset some question marks from scouts?
The 2026 NFL Draft has a major quarterback problem, but Garrett Nussmeier is doing his best to remedy that. Fernando Mendoza (Heisman Trophy winner, national champion with Indiana) likely stands alone as the only surefire bet to be a round one quarterback this year. Ty Simpson (Alabama) and Trinidad Chambliss (Ole Miss) are both pushing for consideration there (if Chambliss doesn’t get his waiver for an additional year of college eligibility), but the quarterback class desperately needs some depth.
Nussmeier was easily the best quarterback throughout the entirety of Senior Bowl week (the premier college football all-star game), and won the Senior Bowl MVP in the official game. Is that enough to push him up the NFL Draft board? Scouts and media were torn following an impressive showing in Mobile, Alabama.
Former LSU QB Garrett Nussmeier set to be a polarizing NFL Draft prospect
Garrett Nussmeier sat patiently behind multiple quarterbacks (including Washington Commanders QB Jayden Daniels) at LSU before taking over and immediately shining for the Tigers in 2024. He threw for over 4,000 yards passing and 29 touchdowns in his first full season as a starter with LSU, leading many in the scouting community and media to believe that he had a bright NFL future ahead of him.
Unfortunately this past year didn’t go as LSU planned. LSU Tigers head coach Brian Kelly was fired. Nussmeier was fighting through injury all last fall, and eventually had to shut things down, missing the end of his final season. Not great.
However, the Senior Bowl offered the perfect opportunity to prove that the star everyone saw back in 2024 was still exactly who we thought he could be. Nussmeier weighed in at a rather light 202 pounds with sub-nine-inch hands, so things started out rough for the former LSU Tigers quarterback, at least on paper. But then Nussmeier’s play on the field and his confident interviews demonstrated that he might just have the goods to make it in the NFL.
Nussmeier was slicing and dicing in Senior Bowl practices to wrap up January, looking like a far more healthy version of himself. He consistently connected with his fellow LSU stars Barion Brown and Aaron Anderson, Ted Hurst of Georgia State, and especially Ja’Kobi Lane of USC (as you can see a sample of in my post below).
Then when it came time to step off the field and speak to the media, Nussmeier was the ultimate professional. He went out of his way to talk up his teammates. He opened up on his health situation from last fall. In fact, when Nussmeier spoke at his standalone podium time with the media, it became clear that his injury situation that led to his struggles was perhaps more intense than reported by the LSU Tigers program last fall:
“Halftime of the Alabama game, [the coaching staff] obviously decided to try something different. Things weren’t working. If you saw the game, or saw me on the sideline, I was still me. I had a responsibility to still be that guy…That Tuesday in practice I tried rip a throw and re-injured my ab — at the time, we still thought it was a core injury, right? We never fully knocked it out. From there, we tried week to week to try to get me able to play…The play where I decided, ‘I can’t do this’, I was throwing a front-side shallow. Which, if you know ball, that’s an eight yard throw. Immediately, after I threw it, I bent over in pain. At that point, I knew. If I can’t throw a front-side shallow, I’m not effective. I can’t help my team win. From there, it wasn’t really a decision to be able to play. It was kind of forced upon me [to shut it down].”
Nussmeier’s 2025 was a constant struggle, fighting through his abdominal strain. He went on to share at the Senior Bowl that the LSU staff and experts close to him had considered surgery to fix the issue, but ultimately decided against it. He apparently will not need surgery now either, since he’s nearly back to full strength.
Still, there are clearly questions with Nussmeier as NFL Draft season truly begins. Yes, he dominated in practice at the Senior Bowl. His leadership, poise, accuracy, and surprising mobility were all on full display. However, he does have a somewhat limited resume of high level success. Nussmeier did struggle to stay healthy last fall. And he is a bit undersized with small hands. Will he actually rise up the NFL Draft board, giving the 2026 class another top QB to consider? I asked one NFL scout with an AFC team present for Senior Bowl, and here’s what he had to say:
“You saw it at LSU when he was playing his best ball…Everybody was down [on Nussmeier] after that messed up year at LSU, but he wasn’t [healthy]. After [how he performed in] Senior Bowl practices, some NFL team’s definitely taking him earlier than you think.”
This sentiment was shared by many I spoke to at the Senior Bowl. Nussmeier just looked the part more so than any other quarterback prospect present. He was looking like the same Nussmeier that made some wild pro-level throws at times for LSU.
Some media members, agents, and NFL staff I spoke to at the Senior Bowl still had their doubts given Nussmeier’s size and inconsistency at the college level. However, the overwhelming majority still believes that in a shallow quarterback class, Nussmeier is quite likely to hear his name called on the second day of the 2026 NFL Draft.
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