2025 NFL Draft: San José State's Nick Nash among three underrated WR prospects

With Rotoworlds Kyle Dvorchak covering the 2025 NFL Drafts best wideout options , I thought Id scroll down and sometimes up on my spreadsheets and find some underrated wideouts who thrived at smaller schools at advanced ages, the stuff that does not make a sparkling prospect profile.

I enjoy writing about ugly duckling prospects.

Its my thing.

Day Three prospects deserve love too.

And if you vehemently disagree with anything/everything I say here, I will reiterate that Im only asking questions .

Below are three wide receivers with what I consider to be intriguing metrics profiles, guys who posted gaudy efficiency numbers in their final collegiate seasons, even if it came against defenses we might not deem elite.

Eric Froton , Eric Froton , Nick Nash, San Jose State Im begging you not to look up Nashs age.

Please dont do it.

He may or may not be 26 years old.

Hes had his drivers license since 2015.

He should be entering his fifth NFL season.

He started playing college football before COVID.

Nash, who converted from quarterback to wideout, is old.

If you can get over that, somehow, some way, Nashs analytical profile is something to behold for any spreadsheet warrior.

Nashs 171 targets in 2024 led college football by a healthy margin; no other pass catcher in the nation had more than 143 looks.

Operating almost exclusively as a big slot receiver Nash is 63 and 205 pounds he led the nation in receiving yards, receptions, and receiving touchdowns last season in the vaguely run-and-shoot San Jose State offense.

Nash, amazingly, was only the fourth college player in history to earn the receiving triple crown.

Nash was not just a creature of unspeakable volume though.

He was efficient, ranking 11th among wideouts in yards per route run with an average depth of target (aDOT) of 13.3.

In other words, Nash was not a check-down merchant.

Another metrics box checked by Nash in his breakout sixth college season: He was targeted on a whopping 33.5 percent of his routes, the highest rate among receivers who saw at least 75 targets in 2024.

It was, admittedly, quite the departure from his 2023 targets per route rate of 20 percent.

Nash didnt just beat up on lesser opponents in his final season at San Jose State.

Against an Oregon State defense that held opponents to 212 passing yards per game in 2024, Nash racked up six grabs on 13 targets for 161 yards and a touchdown.

He saw a target on 41 percent of his routes that day.

Nash managed eight receptions for 91 yards and a score against a Fresno State defense that ranked 40th out of 134 teams in passing yards allowed per game.

The Athletics Dane Brugler wrote that Nash doesnt have the explosive speed to be a high-end separator, but he plays well to his strengths and has the ball skills and physicality that will translate.

This could make Nash not unlike Devaughn Vele, a big slot guy who last year with the Broncos led all pass catchers in EPA per target on his way to 41 receptions over 11 games.

Vele, however, did not have nearly the college profile Nash is sporting ahead of the 2025 draft.

Ricky White, UNLV White, who sat behind future NFL players Jayden Reed and Jalen Nailor at Michigan State before transferring to UNLV, proved to be an analytics darling in his final collegiate season.

White, as you might know, is old for a prospect: He turned 23 in February.

The first UNLV receiver to ever post back-to-back 1,000-yard receiving seasons, White in 2024 ranked second in yards per route run from the slot, trailing only Tet McMillan.

The versatile wideout White played on the boundary at a 70 percent rate at UNLV was tenth among all college wideouts in yards per route run in his final collegiate campaign.

Eleven percent of Whites 2024 routes went for first downs in the up-tempo UNLV offense.

Only five wideouts had a higher rate last season.

White was a highly consistent receiving option in 2024.

He had less than 88 receiving yards in just five games, and managed at least seven catches in half of his outings.

That White was targeted on 34 percent of his 2024 pass routes makes him one of the most intriguing target earners in this years draft class.

That he made most of his statistical hay against lesser opponents Hawaii, San Jose State, Utah State should factor into how we evaluate his NFL prospects.

How much we grade on a curve because of this lesser competition is up for discussion.

Whites breakout age (18.5 years) is in the 96th percentile among recent NFL receiver prospects and his 40-yard dash time (4.49) was in the 73rd percentile.

White, in short, checks a lot of boxes on the various spreadsheets.

He could be a useful receiving option on the next level (and a superb special teamer to boot).

Tory Horton, Colorado State Horton was top five among all college pass catchers in both receptions and first downs from the start of the 2022 season to the end of the 2023 season before sustaining a serious, season-ending injury early in 2024, his fifth year of college ball.

Horton seemed to be on his way to another hyper-efficient campaign before that knee injury.

He was fifth among all receivers in yards per route run, seeing a target on a ridiculous 40 percent of his pass routes in the Colorado State offense.

Horton, like White and Nash, was unquestionably a target-commanding wideout in college.

In 2023, his best collegiate season, Horton drew a target on 33 percent of his routes.

Running 36 percent of his routes from the slot in his shortened 2024 season, Horton has proven explosive from anywhere and everywhere on the field.

Only six wideouts in all of college football had more receptions of over 20 yards during the 2022-23 seasons; Horton caught three of nine deep targets in 2024 for 110 scoreless yards.

Horton at the NFL Combine appeared fully recovered from his 2024 knee injury.

He notched a 4.41 40-yard dash time, a 93rd percentile mark.

His speed score was in the 87th percentile.

What Im saying is that Horton is fast, real fast, and could be an immediate contributor for a receiver-needy NFL offense..

This article has been shared from the original article on nbcsports, here is the link to the original article:

https://www.nbcsports.com/fantasy/football/news/2025-nfl-draft-san-jose-states-nick-nash-among-three-underrated-wr-prospects