by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/19/2026 Photo by Brian Murphy/ Icon Sportswire via Getty Images 1. Kenyon Sadiq 6'3" - 245 lbs Oregon Big Board Rank: 6 Pro Comparison: Trey McBride The last two years have seen Tyler Warren, Brock Bowers and Colston Loveland go in the first round and I'm not too sure Kenyon Sadiq isn't the best of the bunch. Certainly the best athlete, Sadiq put up one of the bets Combines of any Tight End in history and has shown to be a good enough athlete

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/19/26 We're FINALLY here! Before the first round starts today at 12:15 between Ohio State and TCU lets dive into the bracket as a whole and even some of the more exciting matchups! The tightest matchups are of course between the closest seeds, with 8 Utah State - 9 Villanova and 7 Miami - 10 Missouri having the closest spreads with Utah State -1.5. In total, 3 of the 8-9 matchups, 3 of the 7-10 matchups and 2 of the 6-11 matchups have a sprea

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/18/26 Photo by Jeff Bottari/ Zuffa LLC 1. Islam Makhachev Lightweight Record: 16-1 Championship Record: 5-0 Best "Prime": 16-0 [2016-Pres.] The big debate will be between Islam and Khabib for the #1 spot of the division and while Khabib was the bigger star because of McGregor, I have Islam by a hair. Now that he's Welterweight Champion It's likely we've seen the last of Islam at Lightweight where his final records include a 15-fight win strea

by Zak Drapeau, Matt Hylen, Joel Piton and Elias Meredith Sportz Nation - 3/18/2026 Graphic by NCAA.com Zak Drapeau - Winner: Duke Final Four: Duke , Purdue , Houston , Virginia It should be noted that I'm not an expert in college basketball and more or less hadn't paid attention to the sport besides some NBA Draft prospects until late February. Duke is the clear favorite to win it all but will have to contend with the strongest quarter of the bracket in the East to even make

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/18/26 All odds courtesy of Caesar's Sportsbook as of 3/17 Photo by Ethan Hymen/ Yahoo Sports To Win NCAA Championship : 1. Duke +300 2. Arizona +350 3. Michigan +370 4. Florida +700 5. Houston +1100 6. Iowa State +1600 7. Purdue +2000 8. Illinois +2200 9. UConn +2200 I have Duke winning this year and by a comfortable margin. I really like Houston, Purdue and Arizona as well after their runs in their respective confer

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/17/2026 Photo by Kirby Lee/ Imagn Images 1. Makai Lemon 5'11" - 192 lbs USC Big Board Rank: 9 Pro Comparison: Emeka Egbuka Makai Lemon might be the most dangerous receiver after the catch I've seen in years. Always falling forward and having the agility of players like Barkley and Gibbs, Lemon will be a premier slot receiver from the first day he's drafted. His ceiling as a boundary, X-receiver may be limited which prevents him from being hig

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/17/26 Photo by Jarod C. Tilton/ Getty Images 16 UMBC vs 16 Howard to face 1 Michigan Tuesday at 6:40 pm One of the only 2 teams to ever win a March Madness game with a #16-ranking, UMBC faces off against Howard in the first First Four game. As a slight favorite vs Howard, UMBC is led by their back court pairing of Jah'Likai King and Ace Valentine who together average 27-7.5-5.5 on 44% shooting. Together with some great role playing from forwar

by Zak Drapeau and Matt Hylen Sportz Nation - 3/16/26 Photo by Chris Unger/ Getty images Kevin Vallejos vs Yair Rodriguez Zak Drapeau - Vallejos has shown me enough that he should be taken seriously and given a top fight, and Yair Rodriguez seemingly has nothing else going on. A step up to #3 may be a bit soon for the 23-year-old, but after dispatching Chikadze and Emmett in the fashion he did, I'm ready to get a better look at what this phenom can do against a higher-qualit

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/16/26 Photo by Sam Navarro/ Imagn Images After one of the best baseball games I've watched in a long time, the United States have moved on to the Finals of the World Baseball Classic and will face either Italy or Venezuela on Tuesday night. In the semifinals game, the heroes for the USA were Red Sox outfielder Roman Anthony and Pirates Pitcher Paul Skenes. Anthony has been one of the hitters since the tournament started and leads the team in R

by Zak Drapeau and Matt Hylen Sportz Nation - 3/13/2026 In our UFC 326 Predictions from last week which you can find here, Zak went 3-3 with 2 methods for 5 points. Matt went 2-4 with 2 methods for 4 points. Points to Date: Zak: 41 (27-11) Matt: 37 (24-14) _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ *All odds are courtesy of Ceasar's Sportsbook as of 3/13 Graphic by UFC via Official Poster of Fight Night Emmett v Vallejos 11 Josh Emmett vs 14 Kevin Vallejos (Vallejos - 600) Zak Dra

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/14/2026 On Friday, March 13th Matt Hylen and myself did our first Mock Draft together of the 2026 season. Follow us on X for in podcast form if you want to listen in live as we'll do several more of these before the actual draft. This Mock Draft was an exercise we wanted to do because of Free Agency. While the period only technically started 2 days ago, "legal tampering" started Monday and we've seen the majority of the bigger moves take place

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/12/2026 Photo by Rick Kimball/ ISD 1. Jeremiyah Love 6'0" - 212 pounds Notre Dame Big Board Rank: 2 Pro Comparison: Christian McCaffrey Jeremiyah Love is different from the other Top-End RB prospects before him like Jeanty and Robinson. While he is not a RB you can depend to get you 4-5 yards every carry, he may be the best "Home Run hitter" we've seen at the position in a VERY long time. As athletic and agile as we've seen in a 215-pound RB,

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/11/2026 Photo by Josh Hedges/ Zuffa LLC via Getty Images 10. Jessica Andrade UFC Record - 17-13 Championship Record - 1-3 Holder of the most fights and wins of any Woman in UFC history, Andrade is one of the most underappreciated fighters in history. Her famous slam knockout of Rose Namajunas was her only title win in 4 tries but her 13-year career in the UFC when she was almost entirely within the Top-10 deserves a spot on this list. 9. Car

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/10/2026 Photo by Darron Cummings/ Associated Press 1. Fernando Mendoza 6'5" - 236 lbs. Indiana Big Board Rank - 7 Pro Comparison: Trevor Lawrence Mendoza's stock may have risen with his National Championship performance but I'm still not sold on him as a #1 prospect even though he'll go #1 overall. Mendoza is by far the best of a bad QB class and has a lot of what you're looking for in a Franchise QB. Mendoza has the size, the accuracy, a goo

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/10/2026 Best Moves Photo by Timothy T. Ludwig/ Getty Images - Tyler Linderbaum - Raiders 3yr/ $81 Million Spending 27 Million a year on a Center is unheard of and $9 Million per year more than the next highest but Linderbaum is worth it. Especially to a team like the Raiders that has struggled to build an O-line and has a Franchise RB to build around. Linderbaum was a Captain for Baltimore's O-line for years and now comes to Vegas as THE capt

by Zak Drapeau and Matt Hylen Sportz Nation - 3/9/2026 Photo by Jeff Bottari/ UFC/ Getty Images Charles Oliveira vs Armen Tsarukyan 2 Matt Hylen - It may not have been in the typical BMF-style fans expect, but Charles Oliveira was absolutely dominant. In what could be considered the best performance of his career, a title eliminator should be next. Charles deserves a get-back fight against Armen Tsarukyan. With the Lightweight title already booked, the winner of this fight

by Zak Drapeau and Matt Hylen Sportz Nation - 3/6/2026 In our predictions from last week which you can find here for Moreno v Kavanaugh, Zak went 5-1 with 3 methods right for 8 points. Matt went 5-1 with 3 methods right for 8 points. Points to Date: Zak: 36 (24-8) Matt: 33 (22-10) _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ *All odds courtesy of Caesar's Sportsbook as of 3/6/2026 Graphic by UFC via UFC.com 3 Charles Oliveira vs 4 Max Holloway (Holloway -225) Zak Drapeau The B

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/5/2026 Graphic by NFL via steelers.com 1. Fernando Mendoza Las Vegas Raiders Big Board Rank: 7 Mendoza is the clear pick here for the QB-needy Raiders. The top Quarterback by a landslide in his class, this pick is al but decided already. 2. Arvel Reese New York Jets Big Board Rank: 4 And now the NFL draft starts, (or so they say.) Arevll Reese has gathered the most hype around his potential so he should be the pick here. As a hybrid off ball l

by Zak Drapeau Sportz Nation - 3/4/2026 Honorable Mention - Jon Jones Jones is unquestionably the greatest combat athlete of all time in my opinion but with greatness does not always come popularity. In Jon Jones record-17 PPV Main Events he has never sold over 1,000,000 buys. Photo by Carmen Mandato/ Getty Images 10. Jorge Masvidal The owner of what may be the most viral moment in UFC history Jorge Masvidal, had a 3-year stretch between 2019 and 2022 that included the knee

by Zak Drapeau and Matt Hylen Sportz Nation - 3/2/2026 Photo by Jeff Bottari/ Zuffa LLC Lone'er Kavanaugh vs Brandon Royval The performance Lone'er Kavanaugh just put on in enemy territory is inspiring. To beat up a former champion and tough guy like Brandon Moreno was awesome to see and should earn him a Top-8 ranking among the Flyweights. For his next fight, I can see him fighting either Brandon Royval or Amir Albazi. With both men on two-fight skids, I'd normally side with