NFL Draft 2026: Arch Manning Scouting Report, Two Months in as a Texas Starter

Texas QB Arch Manning is in concussion protocol after his head hit the turf late in Saturday’s OT win at Mississippi State.

Manning threw for 166 yards and 2 TD in the fourth quarter to spur a furious comeback that ultimately became the first 17-point fourth-quarter comeback in the SEC in over a decade. He finished 29-for-46 for a career-high 346 yards with 4 total TDs and one INT.

Manning did not practice on Monday. HC Steve Sarkisian calls him questionable for this weekend’s pivotal game against No. 9 Vanderbilt. We have all week for that to play out. As we wait, we wanted to take a look back at Arch Manning’s first two months as starter to get a status check on his developmental progress through 382 career dropbacks.

NFL Draft 2026: Arch Manning Two Months as the Texas Starter

We all know how the season started: Offensive ineptitude in the opener against Ohio State was followed two weeks later by Manning inexplicably struggling to move the ball against lowly UTEP. You might recall the public criticism Manning took a week later when he flexed over a Sam Houston defender that he had run over at the goal line.

Consistency has been a problem, with Manning seemingly alternating good games with bad games. In four games, Manning has thrown for more than 260 yards with three-or-more total TD. In four others, he’s thrown for less than 200 yards with multiple turnovers.

Manning has struggled to repeat his throwing mechanics—and at times has entirely eschewed them—leading to up-and-down accuracy and placement. Manning throws out of several arm slots, and appears to have at times adopted Quinn Ewers’ side-arm flicks, including the habit of using it off slap-bang decisions without his base set.

Manning’s 60.9% completion rate is poor, and his 71.5% adjusted completion rate ranks No. 100 amongst FBS qualifiers. He likes to take chances. Manning is currently top-40 among qualifying FBS quarterbacks in PFF big-time throw rate, PFF turnover-worthy play rate and aDOT.

Manning has not appeared as comfortable in the pocket, and he doesn’t appear to be reading the field as quickly. Are these systemic issues of his game, or experiential things that will improve with time?

Cutting Through the Hype

Years ago, I was in a vocal minority arguing against the hype Drew Lock and Zach Wilson were getting during their respective pre-draft processes.

I used a simple system to illustrate why I ranked them lower than the rest of the media: I split apart their performances against good college teams and bad college teams. Both struggled in college against the former, while fattening up their stats against the latter.

Arch Manning’s sample size remains exceedingly small, but let’s put his career through the same lens for the sake of comparison (note: TD% includes rushing TDs):

*10 attempt minimum for W/L record, must have thrown a pass to qualify
Arch Manning vs. P5 non-bowl/G5s under 9 wins
Date	Opponent	W/L	%	Com	Att	Yds	TD	Int	Run Yds	Run TD
2024-08-31	Colorado State	W	83.3	5	6	95	1	0	0	1
2024-09-14	UTSA	W	75	9	12	223	4	0	53	1
2024-09-21	Louisiana-Monroe	W	51.7	15	29	258	2	2	-4	0
2024-09-28	Mississippi State	W	83.9	26	31	325	2	0	33	1
2025-09-06	San Jose State	W	63.3	19	30	295	4	1	23	1
2025-09-13	UTEP	W	44	11	25	114	1	1	51	2
2025-09-20	Sam Houston	W	85.7	18	21	309	3	0	11	2
2025-10-04	Florida	L	55.2	16	29	263	2	2	37	0
2025-10-18	Kentucky	W	44.4	12	27	132	0	0	-1	0
2025-10-25	Mississippi State	W	63	29	46	346	3	1	6	1
	Total	8-1	62.5	160	256	2,360	22	7	209	9
	YPA: 9.2, TD: 12.1%, INT: 2.7%
Arch Manning vs. P5 bowl/G5s 9+ wins
Date	Opponent	W/L	%	Com	Att	Yds	TD	Int	Run Yds	Run TD
2024-10-19	Georgia	L	50	3	6	19	0	0	5	0
2024-11-09	Florida	W	50	3	6	19	0	0	0	0
2025-08-30	Ohio State	L	56.7	17	30	170	1	1	38	0
2025-10-11	Oklahoma	W	77.8	21	27	166	1	0	34	0
	Total	1-1	63.8	44	69	374	2	1	77	0
	YPA: 5.4, TD: 2.9%, INT: 1.4%

When Manning is at his best, he offers an explosive dichotomy: He attacks down the field, and he’s able to run for yard—Manning has 4.5s speed and a big, burly frame—when his primary options are taken away. From the treetops, it’s a Jayden Daniels-lite playing style.

The thing you appreciate about the times he has stepped up in competition is that Manning is clearly more careful with the ball. His interception against Ohio State was Texas’ only turnover that day, and Manning’s 170 passing yards, in hindsight, wasn’t the disaster that it appeared to be in the moment (only one opponent has topped 175 passing yards against Ohio State this year).

Manning’s performance against Oklahoma in the second half is some of the best football we’ve seen from him. The Longhorns trailed 6-3 at halftime, but outscored the Sooners 20-0 in the second half, in part due to seven consecutive third-down conversions.

But we’ve seen a clear play-style shift in Manning depending on the opponent. Against bad teams, he’s free to play as he likes, a style that leverages his superior physical gifts—testing the third sector of the field regularly, trying to fit balls into windows and freely using his legs against inferior athletes.

Why was Manning the consensus QB1 over the summer, beyond his recruiting pedigree and last name? Because he ripped up UL-Monroe and Mississippi State—two bad defenses— in his only two starts last year.

Against good teams, the Texas staff slaps restrictor plates on Manning, asking Manning to manage games as opposed to winning them. So while it's promising that Manning’s interception rate is slashed in half against good teams while his aggregate accuracy improves (on a lower aDOT), the accompanying precipitous fall-offs in his YPA and TD% show that he’s not ready yet to take over college games against quality competition.

Hard Habits to Break

Against better competition, I’ve noticed two habits that must be addressed. First, Manning needs to start trusting his receivers enough to unload balls at the route break, so that it will arrive when they’re leaving it.

Manning has been late this fall waiting out confirmation of a receiver breaking free—if this isn’t fixed prior to leaving for the NFL, it’s going to become an even bigger problem at the next level, where margins shrink.

The other thing that you see against better competition is Manning dropping his eyes under duress, which leads him to bail the pocket prematurely, and/or miss targets that run themselves open on a scramble drill. This was an issue with Jayden Daniels early in his career that was ultimately corrected in his fifth year on campus, his last at LSU.

Lastly, mechanics. When Manning shows fealty to his technique, he has an NFL-caliber marriage of his upper- and lower-halves. But he eschews them too often, with deleterious effects to his placement.

This happens more often under duress—and against better competition—but it’s unfortunately not solely isolated to that. Manning can get haphazard with his technique even in clean pockets on simple quick concepts. He simply must clean up this unforced error.

One More Year?

We won’t find out until later this week if Manning will be able to go against 7-1 Vanderbilt on Saturday. The Commodores rank No. 32 SP+ defensively. After that, both 6-1 Georgia (No. 19) and 8-0 Texas A&M (No. 21) have top-25 SP+ defenses. Texas’ only remaining plum matchup is against a 2-6 Arkansas team that doesn’t play defense (No. 91).

Texas’ dreams of qualifying for the SEC title game and the CFP berth are both on life-support, but not dead. Each will require the Longhorns to go 4-0 down the stretch. If nothing else, Manning will get a chance to start his first career bowl game.

Manning will almost assuredly announce his return to college football in 2026 around the date of that game. Next summer, he will almost assuredly be ranked as a top-5 quarterback in the 2027 NFL Draft class.

It would be nice if Manning had staff continuity into next fall. If you believe Sarkisian, he will have it. Over the weekend, Sarkisian called a report that his representatives will listen to NFL offers “absolutely ridiculous.”

It turns out that the Manning family’s inclination to play out four years of college is going to be of big benefit to Arch. While he needs another year (at least), Manning’s physical tools are simply too good to throw on the discard pile right now.

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