Diego Pavia expresses confidence he’ll be taken in 2026 NFL Draft
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Diego Pavia might not be long on height, something he can never change.
But the former Vanderbilt star has never been short on confidence. In fact, when it comes to that department, he might as well be 7-feet tall. The latest example of Pavia’s height-confidence paradox has come this week at the Senior Bowl in Mobile, Ala., where Pavia is being tested and measured just like all of the other NFL Draft prospects.
Speaking of those measurements, Pavia’s height has come under the microscope this week in the leadup to Saturday’s latest edition of the Senior Bowl, which kicks off at 2 p.m. ET at Hancock Whitney Stadium. Pavia tried to make the whole height thing a bit of a joke with ESPN after he was measured at 5-foot-8 and 7/8 of an inch.
Pavia said the person measuring him this week “kind of screwed me. I was 5-10, I promise.”
He finished a dazzling 2-year run at Vanderbilt by throwing for 3,539 yards this past season with 29 touchdown passes and only 8 interceptions. Pavia also rushed for 862 yards and 10 more TDs, and he was there in New York City in mid-December as a Heisman Trophy finalist. Ultimately, Pavia finished 2nd in the Heisman race, and when he was asked by ESPN this week about that collegiate brilliance translating to the NFL, the young man who’s never short on confidence displayed his bravado once again.
“A hundred-percent,” said Pavia on being drafted. “When has the last SEC Player of the Year not been drafted? You know what I mean?
“I feel like you go watch, the tape number speaks for (itself). Everything speaks for themselves. I feel like I’m the best player in the country, and I still believe that. That’s just the ultimate confidence that I’ve had.”
This spring at the draft in Pittsburgh, we’ll find out if some NFL team wants to cash in on that confidence.
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
