Arizona State’s Sam Leavitt was highlighted as one of four elite quarterback prospects in the 2026 NFL Draft by ESPN’s Field Yates and Mel Kiper Jr.

Leavitt was the fourth quarterback in the rundown on ESPN’s “First Draft,” with Texas’ Arch Manning, South Carolina’s LaNorris Sellers and Clemson’s Cade Klubnik getting the earlier billing.

Yates pointed out Leavitt’s confidence and “moxie,” which grew with each game he started after entering 2024 without a start in college. By season’s end, he held his own in the Peach Bowl against a Texas defense filled with future NFL players.

“He has got some big gamer energy,” Yates said. “That team last year punched above its weight in large part because of Sam Leavitt and Cam Skattebo.”

A game-winning drive against Kansas in ASU’s fifth game was a milestone for how Leavitt displayed calm in a huddle before dicing up the Jayhawks’ defense for a win.

It came right after a bye week, and he seemed to take a step after each off week. The next bye coincided with rehab from a rib injury suffered when facing Utah, and he pulled back a bit on the running to keep his body further away from harm going forward.

“This kid can run with the football. He runs hard, he runs with determination. Good mechanics throwing the football,” Kiper said.

Kiper expressed concerns about how Leavitt deals this season with higher external expectations and the loss of Skattebo, noting there’s a chance he doesn’t enter the 2026 draft because of remaining eligibility.

Leavitt, now listed at 6-foot-2 and 205 pounds, went about his first season as a starter trying to do too much, he admitted Wednesday.

“Last year, I was kind of trying to prove to the team that I can go play some ball,” Leavitt said. “And this year it’s really just becoming the best quarterback possible.”

ESPN’s NFL comp for Arizona State QB Sam Leavitt

Yates picked a fitting comparison for Leavitt in a signal caller ASU head coach Kenny Dillingham previously coached at Auburn and Oregon.

“Little bit of Bo Nix to him when it comes to the razzle-dazzle ability,” Yates said.

“Not as sudden as Bo was. … But I really thought there was something to the toughness, the intangibles of Sam Leavitt, good arm, good size, good mobility that I don’t think it’ll be easy to repeat their success from last year, but this certainly is the kind of kid that can give you some confidence that Arizona State will be a force in some way this season.”

Dillingham said Tuesday the comparisons between Nix and Leavitt are vast.

“They’re both great kids off the field. They’re both plus athletes … they’re both physical kids,” Dillingham said. “They’re both super hard studiers, they love to know the game and they want control. And that’s not even including … (they’re both) really good at throwing the deep ball.

“And then they both were kind of wild cards earlier in their career, in terms of they played off platform all the time.”

The next step in Leavitt’s progression, Dillingham said, is showing he can play on schedule instead of as a wild card. That’s what Nix showed in his final season at Oregon when he set the single-season record for completion percentage across the nation (77.4%).

The coach added both could feasibly play safety, which is especially appropriate for Leavitt considering his older brother, Dallin, played safety in the NFL for six seasons.

With an entire season to go before the draft, it’s worth noting much will change and some players will perform above expectations while others will fall below. “Uncertainty” was the word Kiper used to describe a group of quarterbacks Yates said could be much better than the 2025 class.

“It feels like the number of quarterbacks right now … that could credibly be top-5 or top-10 prospects by the time it’s all said and done is a much larger group compared to where we were last year,” Yates said. “This year may not have 10 can’t-miss quarterbacks, but there might be 10 guys who could grow to that level pretty early on this season.”