The Rich Top 5: NFL Players Who Could Have the Biggest Surprise Impacts This Season

This list started as a suggestion from Coop, who proposed a top five most surprising players of the coming season, then helped pick one candidate from every team before Rich began winnowing.

Every time Rich second-guessed a cut, he got the same answer.

"It's your list."

**5. Jacoby Brissett.** Rich wanted a quarterback here. He thought about Malik Willis and did not know. He thought about Geno Smith and could not. So he landed on Brissett in year 11, and the reason is everything in front of him: Marvin Harrison Jr., Michael Wilson, Trey McBride, Jeremiah Love, Tyler Allgeier, James Conner coming back, and Mike LaFleur dialing it up. The surprise inside the surprise is that Rich thinks Brissett keeps Carson Beck off the field entirely. It may not be pretty. It is going to be Big 12 nuts.

**4. Jihad Campbell.** A second-year defender whose first season was quiet, and who turned out to have a shoulder problem that needed cleaning up. Rich concedes the consensus in Philadelphia is that Jeremiah Trotter Jr. is the better player at that spot, and that the preseason has not shown otherwise. But there are flashes in practice, and with Zack Baun wearing the green dot, it would be the most Eagles thing imaginable for this one to come loose.

**3. Jaishawn Barham.** Rich texted about this one on draft night, live, while NFL Network was on the air. Barham was Michigan's best defensive player and its fastest, and Rich saw a young man playing with bad intentions. He is not hedging much either, floating defensive rookie of the year and then wondering aloud whether he is overextending.

**2. Jonathan Brooks.** The first running back taken in 2024, three games in before blowing out his knee, and barely seen since. Rich cannot fully explain the hunch. Brooks was really good in college and has simply not gotten a break. Rico Dowdle is gone, Chuba Hubbard is still there, and Rich likes Brooks for a nice run of it, literally and figuratively.

**1. Jadarian Price.** The pick comes with a specific prediction attached, which is that Price gives his college teammate a run for offensive rookie of the year money. Zach Charbonnet is not ready to go. Price was under the radar in college and under the radar in the draft, and he landed on the defending Super Bowl champions, who Rich hears are going to throw to the backs more. His forecast is that people will start saying this is why they let Kenneth Walker walk, and he wants it noted in advance that this would be irrational, since Seattle let Walker go long before drafting anybody.

Then he added a sixth, and this one was personal.

Odell Beckham Jr. for the Giants, with the caveat that Rich does not know whether he makes the team and may simply be trying to speak it into existence. The opening comes from Calvin Austin blowing out his knee, which Rich hated to see. Austin showed up at St. Jude this year for the 40-yard dash run, on his own offseason time, and gave Rich tips both men knew would be useless.

"Good dude, doesn't deserve this," Rich said.

The whole exercise, he freely admits, is a dart throw. And then he noticed something after the list was already finished.

Every single name starts with the letter J.

Jacoby, Jihad, Jaishawn, Jonathan, Jadarian. If Sesame Street wants the sponsorship, it is available.

Rich looked at Coop when he realized it. He got the same answer he got all week.