For years, I've tried to update the top five NFL prospects at each position, for both the junior and senior classes, each week from the beginning of the college football season right up until the draft. Enough of that. This year I decided to do something different. I'll now be ranking the top 10 NFL draft prospects at each position -- with all draft-eligible players included in the same ranking -- just a few times during the season.
For one, it's more helpful to see the juniors, seniors and occasional draft-eligible sophomores all together, just as you see them in the NFL draft. Second, trying to watch enough football and talk to enough evaluators to readjust the rankings every week just got ridiculous.
So here goes with the first version for the 2013 season. The Big Board, of course, will still be updated each week. Below, you have the tight ends.
Note that one asterisk denotes a junior; two asterisks denote a draft-eligible sophomore.
1. *Austin Seferian-Jenkins, Washington Huskies
Major matchup headache: uses his elite size (6-foot-6, 265 pounds) to block as well as to overwhelm smaller defenders as a pass-catcher. Can be split out. Extremely productive, Seferian-Jenkins had 109 catches in his first two years in college and already holds the school record for catches, touchdowns and receiving yards by a tight end.