2025 NFL Scouting Combine Winners and Losers: Wide Receivers
The 2025 wide receiver class is nowhere near as coveted as last year’s amazing 2024 class that featured Marvin Harrison Jr, Malik Nabers, Rome Odunze, Brian Thomas Jr, and Ladd McConkey. However, this crop of prospects still put together an impressive day with some fast 40 times and outstanding explosive jump measurements.
Let’s break down a few of the winners and losers from the 2025 WR class.
Winners
Matthew Golden, Texas
Golden has steadily risen up draft boards since the end of the college football season thanks to his impressive performance in the College Football Playoff. He climbed up to the top of the second round and was even getting some first round buzz heading into the combine.
Golden showed up and ran the fastest 40-yard dash of anyone at the event with a 4.29-second race. Golden’s 10-yard split was also tied for the fastest time at the event. While that was the only testing event Golden participated in, he did incredibly well in the onfield wide receiver drills. With his showing this weekend, he’s essentially clinched a spot in the first 32 picks and may even rival Tetairoa McMillan for WR1 in the class.
Iowa State Wide Receivers
It’s hard to decide which of Jaylin Noel or Jayden Higgins had a better performance this weekend so we can just talk about both of them. Both Noel and Higgins were seen as round three or round four options, but after they dominated the testing events, they now seem like easy top-50 picks.
Noel posted a 9.71 RAS while Higgins posted a 9.85. Higgins recorded a 4.47-second 40-yard dash with a 39-inch vertical and 10’8” broad jump. Noel’s testing was even better with a 4.39-second 40-yard dash, 41.5-inch vertical, and 11’2” broad jump. Both of these guys also have the production to support these athletic tests.
Elic Ayomanor, Stanford
Ayomanor had a weird profile heading into the NFL combine. He missed his entire freshman season thanks to a knee injury but followed that up with 125 catches, 1,844 yards, and 12 touchdowns over his last two seasons in Palo Alto.
Courtesy of RAS.
There were some concerns about Ayomanor’s athleticism and movement as a bigger-body receiver, but Ayomanor did his best to put those to bed when he took the field in Indianapolis. Ayomanor’s 4.44-second 40-yard dash was pretty surprising for his size and then he dominated the explosive events.
Losers
Isaiah Bond, Texas
It’s hard to call a 4.39-second 40-yard dash disappointing but Bond found a way to make that happen by running his mouth before running the race. He claimed he was going to break Xavier Worthy’s record and run a 4.1 but Bond did neither of those things and came up well short of breaking any records. Bond’s performance was so disappointing that the spectators in Indy started booing him after his run.
This was unfortunate for Bond because people were already starting to poke holes in his production profile and the one thing he had going for him was his speed. He didn’t necessarily run slowly, but if that’s your only skill, you can’t fall that far short of expectations and run slower than your teammate Matthew Golden.
Tez Johnson, Oregon
Another player who wasn’t slow but whose 40-time was substandard was Johnson who ran a 4.51-second 40-yard dash. Just like Bond, that time wasn’t bad at all. However, Johnson only weighed in at 154 which made him one of the lightest WRs in combine history.
His agility and explosive numbers were really good, but that 40-yard dash is going to be a red flag for many NFL front offices at that weight. He was probably an early, day-three pick heading into the draft but this performance pushes him closer to the end of day-three and potentially an undrafted candidate. I don’t think Johnson is a viable dynasty asset at this weight and speed.
Ricky White, UNLV
The final loser at the wide receiver position is White, who was a huge disappointment. White was a sleeper candidate in a weak WR class after he finished second in the country in yards per route run in 2023 and followed that up with 78 receptions, 1,032 yards, and 11 touchdowns in 2024.
Courtesy of RAS.
Unfortunately for White, his athletic testing was awful. He weighed in at only 184 pounds and still wasn’t able to post a respectable 40-yard dash and instead finished with only a 41st percentile time. His explosive testing was only marginally better with middling numbers in both the vertical and broad jumps.
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The 2025 wide receiver class is nowhere near as coveted as last year’s amazing 2024 class that featured Marvin Harrison Jr, Malik Nabers, Rome Odunze, Brian Thomas Jr, and Ladd McConkey. However, this crop of prospects still put together an impressive day with some fast 40 times and outstanding explosive jump measurements.
Let’s break down a few of the winners and losers from the 2025 WR class.
Winners
Matthew Golden, Texas
Golden has steadily risen up draft boards since the end of the college football season thanks to his impressive performance in the College Football Playoff. He climbed up to the top of the second round and was even getting some first round buzz heading into the combine.
Golden showed up and ran the fastest 40-yard dash of anyone at the event with a 4.29-second race. Golden’s 10-yard split was also tied for the fastest time at the event. While that was the only testing event Golden participated in, he did incredibly well in the onfield wide receiver drills. With his showing this weekend, he’s essentially clinched a spot in the first 32 picks and may even rival Tetairoa McMillan for WR1 in the class.
Iowa State Wide Receivers
It’s hard to decide which of Jaylin Noel or Jayden Higgins had a better performance this weekend so we can just talk about both of them. Both Noel and Higgins were seen as round three or round four options, but after they dominated the testing events, they now seem like easy top-50 picks.
Noel posted a 9.71 RAS while Higgins posted a 9.85. Higgins recorded a 4.47-second 40-yard dash with a 39-inch vertical and 10’8” broad jump. Noel’s testing was even better with a 4.39-second 40-yard dash, 41.5-inch vertical, and 11’2” broad jump. Both of these guys also have the production to support these athletic tests.
Elic Ayomanor, Stanford
Ayomanor had a weird profile heading into the NFL combine. He missed his entire freshman season thanks to a knee injury but followed that up with 125 catches, 1,844 yards, and 12 touchdowns over his last two seasons in Palo Alto.
Courtesy of RAS.
There were some concerns about Ayomanor’s athleticism and movement as a bigger-body receiver, but Ayomanor did his best to put those to bed when he took the field in Indianapolis. Ayomanor’s 4.44-second 40-yard dash was pretty surprising for his size and then he dominated the explosive events.
Losers
Isaiah Bond, Texas
It’s hard to call a 4.39-second 40-yard dash disappointing but Bond found a way to make that happen by running his mouth before running the race. He claimed he was going to break Xavier Worthy’s record and run a 4.1 but Bond did neither of those things and came up well short of breaking any records. Bond’s performance was so disappointing that the spectators in Indy started booing him after his run.
This was unfortunate for Bond because people were already starting to poke holes in his production profile and the one thing he had going for him was his speed. He didn’t necessarily run slowly, but if that’s your only skill, you can’t fall that far short of expectations and run slower than your teammate Matthew Golden.
Tez Johnson, Oregon
Another player who wasn’t slow but whose 40-time was substandard was Johnson who ran a 4.51-second 40-yard dash. Just like Bond, that time wasn’t bad at all. However, Johnson only weighed in at 154 which made him one of the lightest WRs in combine history.
His agility and explosive numbers were really good, but that 40-yard dash is going to be a red flag for many NFL front offices at that weight. He was probably an early, day-three pick heading into the draft but this performance pushes him closer to the end of day-three and potentially an undrafted candidate. I don’t think Johnson is a viable dynasty asset at this weight and speed.
Ricky White, UNLV
The final loser at the wide receiver position is White, who was a huge disappointment. White was a sleeper candidate in a weak WR class after he finished second in the country in yards per route run in 2023 and followed that up with 78 receptions, 1,032 yards, and 11 touchdowns in 2024.
Courtesy of RAS.
Unfortunately for White, his athletic testing was awful. He weighed in at only 184 pounds and still wasn’t able to post a respectable 40-yard dash and instead finished with only a 41st percentile time. His explosive testing was only marginally better with middling numbers in both the vertical and broad jumps.
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