Cam Ward finished a distant fourth in the 2024 Heisman Trophy voting, but he’s more than likely going to finish first where it really counts: the NFL Draft. Shedeur Sanders was once considered the belle of the 2025 NFL Draft class ball. However, his stock has plummeted in recent weeks, while Ward’s status has risen in conjunction.
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Ward faced better competition than Sanders—his Miami Hurricanes had a better record than Sanders’ Buffaloes, and Ward’s numbers are slightly better across the board apart from accuracy, which is Sanders’ strongest suit.
Ward has those traits you can’t teach, like arm strength and elite mobility—traits Sanders doesn’t have. Improving a quarterback’s accuracy is much more realistic than increasing their arm talent or foot speed at this stage in their athletic careers.
The chasm between Ward and Sanders has really grown, and NFL on ESPN analyst Louis Riddick wholeheartedly agrees with that development. When asked which word he would use to describe the unlikely scenario of Sanders being selected ahead of Ward, Riddick responded with: “shocking”.
“It would be shocking… I think Cam Ward is uniquely qualified to be a franchise QB. Both in terms of his mental makeup, his story, what he has been through, the resilience he has shown. And then let’s just get to the football part. You wanna talk about a guy who has a lot of mental horsepower, who has the quickest release in college football, who can see the entire field and touch the entire field as well as any QB in this draft.”
When you’re talking about a franchise QB, you’re talking about a lot more than arm talent and mobility, as Riddick pointed out. Ward also has a mental toughness that most signal callers can’t match. He had to play at Junior College before transferring to Washington State and then Miami. He’s been through a lot, and that will only serve to supplement his versatile QB skill set.
“And he did it at a consistently high level as measured by every metric. Whether it be in the pocket outside the pocket, against pressure, clean pocket. He aced them all this year. This is his time,” Riddick added.
Shedeur Sanders’ situation, meanwhile, seems to be much more uncertain. Some believe he’ll go in the top five, others see him landing at No. 6 or No. 7 with the Las Vegas Raiders or New York Jets, while some even mock drafts have him falling into the 20s to the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Much has been made of Sanders’ confidence at the podium at the Combine by the media. However, according to ESPN pundit Kimberley A. Martin, most of the NFL execs she has talked to are very high on him from a mental and “character standpoint”. It’s his physical deficiencies on the field that hold them back on him as a prospect.
“I think now we’re seeing a lot of the commentary about [Shedeur’s] personality. Talking to people, I’ve heard that he’s brash. I’ve also talked to a lot of people that are very high on him from a character standpoint,” Kimberley said.
“This kid, he’s Deion’s son, so he’s very confident, but if you want a QB to turnover your franchise, that’s a good thing… On the field, can he be the difference-maker? Most teams I speak to say that Cam is the guy they have more faith in,” she continued.
When New York Jets alum Bart Scott was asked if his former employer should take Shedeur, he said yes, with a caveat. He suggested that the Jets would prefer a Mason Graham or a Cam Ward to fall to them. However, it would also be hard to pass up the value of Shedeur there at No. 7.
“If he falls to them at that value at 7, I think they can’t pass him up… The question about Shedeur isn’t about the talent, the poise, the professionalism, it’s his size. It’s his ability to push the ball down the field, the arm strength, we know that everything about the shoulders is elite, but he’s not the greatest athlete, kind of like Geno Smith.”
Shedeur could go anywhere in the top seven. But, it seems pretty locked in that Cam Ward will be the No. 1 pick. Whether the Tennessee Titans take him outright or trade the pick to another team, whichever team moves up for the top selection is doing so to nab Ward.
