Prospect Profile: Ty Simpson

Last year, we ended our Prospect Profile series with the 2025 NFL Draft’s most controversial quarterback. This year, we’ll start with one, and no quarterback prospect in the 2026 NFL Draft is driving more controversy right now than Alabama’s Ty Simpson.

While recent highly drafted quarterbacks have been benefactors of the transfer portal, this year’s draft class features some passers who have bucked that trend. Simpson, a consensus five-star prospect that 247Sports ranked as the 29th-best overall recruit and the fourth-best quarterback, committed to the only college he would end up attending when he was just a junior at Westview HS (TN). The two top-ranked quarterback recruits of the class of 2022 — Drew Allar and Cade Klubnik — will also finish their collegiate careers having worn only one logo.

The son of a football coach — specifically, Jason Simpson, who has held the head coaching position at Tennessee-Martin since 2006 — Simpson was receiving college scholarship offers before he even arrived on his high school campus. Michigan offered him as an eighth grader, and Kentucky, Mississippi State (his dad’s alma mater), Tennessee, Vanderbilt, and Baylor all offered him the summer before his freshman year. Over the years, he received every offer a recruit could ever dream of and took unofficial visits to several of those schools, making sure to cover his bases with some in-person research.

It wasn’t until the summer just before his sophomore year that he attended a Crimson Tide summer football camp and received an offer from Nick Saban. He returned in September to attend a home game against Ole Miss, during which he watched Tide passer Tua Tagovailoa complete 72.2 percent of his passes for 418 yards and six touchdowns (five to Devonta Smith). At the end of his junior year, he chose Alabama over Clemson, Ole Miss, and Tennessee, then he proceeded to sign in December and enroll early.

Simpson made his collegiate debut in the Tide’s season opener, appearing for some garbage time snaps as a true freshman. He would appear in three more games that year but be limited to just those games in order to preserve his redshirt. As a redshirt freshman and sophomore, Simpson continued in his garbage-time duties after Jalen Milroe, a four-star recruit from the class before his, took over starting duties. After three years of waiting, Simpson finally got his opportunity to start as a redshirt junior.

After a disappointing (and, in hindsight, shocking) season opening loss to Florida State, in which Simpson would complete only 53.5 percent of his passes and average only 5.9 yards per attempt, Simpson rebounded in a big way. Leaving his performance against the eventual 5-7 Seminoles in the rearview, Simpson established himself as the clear top quarterback through the first nine games of the season. At that point, he had completed 66.9 percent of his passes for 21 touchdowns and only one interception while averaging 273.4 yards per game. The next six weeks saw a stunning decline as he completed only 60.5 percent of his passes for seven touchdowns and four interceptions while averaging only 184.3 yards per game.

Simpson’s deterioration down the stretch of the season could be the result of many factors. The slide started with a loss at home to Oklahoma, a top-seven defense in both points and yards allowed, and many believe the Sooners revealed a blueprint for finding success against the Tide, though that theory would lose credibility once Alabama got revenge in the first round of the College Football Playoff. Others put stock into the players around Simpson, pointing out that a usually potent Alabama rushing unit finished 125th in the FBS in yards per game last season, while freshman phenom wide receiver Ryan Williams developed a bit of a sophomore slump, disappearing for just 13 receptions, 161 yards, and no touchdowns in those last six games.

Simpson’s health may have played into his struggles, as well. It’s believed that he played through a lower back injury and elbow bursitis starting sometime in October, while also suffering from gastritis that caused his weight to dip almost 20 pounds. To top it all off, his season ended with a fractured rib, suffered in a season-ending loss to the eventual champion Hoosiers. Regardless of the exact reason(s), fair or not, the documented struggles will throw up red flags for scouts, either concerning his performance itself, his response to external factors, or his health and durability.

For all his struggles that sit fresh in mind from his most recent performances, Simpson still displayed some draft-worthy traits throughout his lone season as a starter. He’s at his best in the short- to intermediate-game, seeding throws with anticipation, accuracy, and velocity. He can air it out, as well, but the accuracy and timing on deep balls are far less consistent. He’ll need to develop a bit more touch, as well, to really get the most out of his game by implementing different degrees of arc on all levels of throws. Simpson isn’t heavy-footed, and though he doesn’t run much, he uses his feet to extend plays effectively.

One of Simpson’s best assets is his mental game. His ability to read defenses and process coverages pre- and post-snap is a testament to the time he spent sitting and learning before ever starting. He can also be a bit over-aggressive with his first instinct reactions after things go off script, and there’s also been loads of debate and concern over his decision to declare for the draft after only starting one season at the college level. There have been several examples of others doing the same, and the results have often been overwhelmingly more negative than positive.

Regardless, Simpson is widely seen as the QB2 of the 2026 NFL Draft class, behind only presumed No. 1 overall pick Fernando Mendoza out of Indiana. That won’t likely land Simpson as the No. 2 overall pick, though. Over the past several weeks, Simpson’s draft stock as varied wildly, with some projecting him as a top-10 pick and others grading him as a third-round talent or later. The truth likely falls somewhere in the middle and will depend on external factors like the level of need that certain teams will have for his position and the actions of those teams before and during the draft.

The most recent projections have him either getting taken in the mid- to late-first round by a team that likely trades up for him or getting drafted on Day 2. I would be remiss not to remind that Shedeur Sanders held similar projections as the perceived QB2 behind Cam Ward for much of the pre-draft process last year. It will certainly be interesting to see if any other similarities play out from here.