Senior Bowl director Jim Nagy: Ole Miss has '20 draftable grades' after overhauling roster through the transfer portal

Ole Miss took in 24 transfers this offseason in one of the larger, and certainly most significant, portal classes this cycle. Those pickups paired with their returning players has pieced together a collection of talent in The ‘Sip that has put them right on the radar of Jim Nagy.

Nagy, the Director of the Senior Bowl, spoke about the Rebels during an appearance on ‘Andy Staples On3’ on Thursday. He discussed how their work in the portal was the most notable in the conference and among the most notable in the nation since the end of last season.

“Ole Miss this year, we talked about it, you know, when we got here to Dallas. You and I connected and we talked about it. They hit the portal hard,” said Nagy from SEC Media Days. “I mean, of the SEC teams, it was Ole Miss. Around the country, Louisville hit it hard, Ohio State hit it hard, Miami hit it hard. But, in the SEC, it was Ole Miss.”

With those additions, Nagy considered Ole Miss to have the roster that has the most pro prospects this season. He noted that 20 players will be on their watchlist for the 2025 NFL Draft which, among all programs nationally, is likely to be right around the most.

“Right now, we’ve got over 20 draftable grades there,” Nagy stated. “You’re thinking, ‘There’s only 22 spots?’. Well, it’s guys that are transferring from other schools.

“We’re getting ready to push our watchlist out on August 21st. It’s going to be way bigger than I’d like it to be. I like that thing to be around 400. But, because this is the last year of the extra COVID year, it’s going be over 700 names. Ole Miss is probably going to have the most.”

The Rebels added the No. 3 portal class in the country per On3’s 2024 Team Transfer Portal Rankings. That includes a dozen in the Top-250, with five featured in the Top-100 and three in the Top-25, of On3’s 2024 Transfer Portal Top Players.

The highlights of that group are DL Walter Nolen (No. 2 overall, No. 1 DL) and DE Princely Umanmielen (No. 12, No. 2 DE). Both of those came from within the conference with Texas A&M and Florida respectively. With them paired with the rest of that unit for the defensive line, Nagy is high on what Ole Miss can do in that phase of the game.

“For Ole Miss to add two guys that can get to the quarterback? One on the edge and then the other guy inside? Like, that’s two massive gets for them,” Nagy said.

“JJ Pegues seems like he has been there forever. Jared Ivey was here yesterday at media days. That’s a good group. They’re better in the trenches than they’ve been in a long time.”

This team at Ole Miss has high expectations for what they can achieve this fall. From there, it, per Nagy, projects as though several of them will be able to accomplish even more as top pro prospects for the next NFL Draft.