NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah Reacts to How the Top of the NFL Draft Unfolded

The 2026 NFL Draft was less about quarterbacks than about teams already committed to one, NFL Network's Daniel Jeremiah told Rich in a Day After breakdown of the first round, arguing the through-line of the weekend was franchises building scaffolding around young passers rather than shopping for new ones.

"This draft was a lot about teams helping their quarterbacks," Jeremiah said. "A lot of times it's teams shopping for quarterbacks. This year it felt to me like this was teams that have their young quarterback or they're waiting for their next quarterback. So they're building up what they have around their existing guy or they're trying to set the table for the guy that could be coming next year."

The Cardinals at three and the Jets at four set the tone, Jeremiah said, with Arizona resisting the pull of running back Jeremiah Love and the contract debate that came with him. "They could have taken Jeremiah Love and gave him the most guaranteed money of any running back, and that was where the conversation was, and not just positional value, but the money situation there. And they decided he's the best football player, we're going to keep it simple, and we've got a new head coach, we're going to give him a very dynamic weapon."

Rich framed the pattern as a decade-long pattern across the league, ticking through the Bengals taking Ja'Marr Chase the year after Burrow, the Jaguars pairing Travis Etienne with Trevor Lawrence, the Panthers landing Tetairoa McMillan two years after Bryce Young, and Caleb Williams getting Rome Odunze and Colston Loveland in Chicago. The Titans picking Carnell Tate to pair with Cam Ward, he said, was simply the latest entry on the list.

Jeremiah agreed and pushed the logic further, saying the surrounding talent buys front offices a clean read on the player they actually drafted. "You want to be able to help them so that you can win," he said. "But what it also does is it provides a window of evaluation. The worst thing that can happen, and we've seen it with some of these quarterbacks that bounced around in different places, is that hey, the quarterback had the talent, we just didn't give him a chance with the infrastructure. So we decided to move on from the quarterback, but we didn't even really know what we had because we didn't have everything set in place for him."

He pointed to a pre-draft conversation with Cardinals head coach Kellen Moore as the cleanest articulation of the philosophy, citing Arizona's decision to draft tackle Banks before Tyler Shough last year and to add Jordan Tyson this spring. "You want in those first three years of your rookie quarterback, Rich, not only do you want to win, but you also want to just have a fair evaluation, so when it comes time to make that decision on fifth-year options and such, you feel like you know what you got."