Ty Simpson has long had his heart set on entering the 2026 NFL Draft. But there was one particular offer that nearly made the former Alabama quarterback reconsider everything.
Ahead of what will undoubtedly be the most consequential week of his football career, Simpson has been participating in a bit of a media blitz. That included a recent appearance on David Pollack‘s See Ball, Get Ball podcast, where the projected first-round pick opened up about an alleged $6.5 million offer from Miami that had him seriously considering forgoing the draft and entering the NCAA Transfer Portal.
“I think the last offer was definitely one that I just had to sit down and consider, because it would’ve been life-changing money,” Simpson told Pollack on Friday. “It would’ve made me the highest-paid player in college, and it was something that I was like, ‘Alright, I can’t just ignore this. I have to sit down and think about it.’ That’s kind of how I am — I don’t want to do anything sporadic. I want to sit down and think it all out. And it really just came down to how I wanted to be remembered and what I wanted to do.”
Simpson first revealed the eye-popping $6.5 million offer from Miami in an exclusive interview with On3‘s Chris Low in mid-January, just two weeks removed from Alabama’s season-ending 38-3 loss to eventual College Football Playoff national champion Indiana in the Rose Bowl CFP quarterfinal. Simpson revealed he actually received multiple $4 million offers from Ole Miss, Miami, and Tennessee before the Hurricanes upped the ante to record-setting figures.
It was at that point that Simpson sought counsel from legendary Alabama head coach Nick Saban, who still has an office inside Bryant-Denny Stadium two years into his retirement from coaching. And, as usual, college football’s only seven-time national champion put everything into perspective.
“I actually talked to Coach Saban about this, and the things he was talking about were: ‘Do you want to play football in college, or do you want to play football professionally?’ And he was like, ‘Take the money out of it, take the rounds out of it, what do you want to do next year?’” Simpson recalled. “And without a doubt and without hesitation, I said, ‘I want to play professional football.’ And he was like, ‘Well, there’s your answer.’
“It was something that I’ve always dreamed of (doing), and I felt that I was ready to take that next step and be the face of a franchise and lead a locker room.”
Simpson is widely considered the unquestioned No. 2 quarterback in this year’s draft class, behind only Hoosiers QB Fernando Mendoza, the overwhelming favorite to be the No. 1 overall pick of the Las Vegas Raiders when the 2026 NFL Draft kicks off Thursday night in Pittsburgh. While there’s debate regarding where in Round 1 that Simpson could be selected, the prevailing expectation is that some QB-needy team will pull the trigger at some point on Day 1, even if it means trading back into the bottom of the round.