Week 8 Takeaways: The Ty Simpson Anomaly, QB Quick-Hitters, Prospect Stock Watch, and My Updated CFP Rankings

It’s the morning after in college football, and I’ve got you covered with my biggest takeaways from Week 8.

But first, three quick housekeeping notes before we dive in:

All right, let’s get to it.

The Ty Simpson Anomaly: How has the Alabama quarterback gotten this good, this quickly?

Three QB Quick-Hitters: Notes on Gunner Stockton, Julian Sayin, and Carson Beck

Prospect Watch: Thoughts on two underrated edge defenders, a breakout wide receiver, and both position groups as a whole

My Updated CFP Top 12: Who’s in the title bubble? Who’s on the outside looking in? I share my playoff tiers heading into Week 9

YouTube Poll of the Week: Who should be the Heisman favorite?

Ty Simpson’s excellence continued on Saturday against Tennessee, when he threw for 253 yards and two touchdowns en route to a 37-20 win. 

Simpson’s doing everything I thought LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier was going to do this season. He’s controlling the line of scrimmage with pre-snap reads; he’s checking and killing at the right time; he’s showing poise in the pocket and using his eyes to move safeties. He simply looks like the most NFL-ready quarterback in the nation right now. 

The Tennessee win aside, I want to zoom out for a second and appreciate how we got here. 

Alabama’s QB entered the year as the biggest question mark on that team. He had no starting experience, an underwhelming scouting profile based on what I saw at the Manning Passing Academy, and was getting nowhere near the preseason hype of some other signal callers in his conference. 

After a disappointing season-opening loss to Florida State, he’s now the Heisman favorite, my QB3 for the 2026 NFL draft, and the main character on a team that’s won six straight—including four straight over ranked SEC opponents—and charging toward the College Football Playoff.  

How did this all happen so fast? 

I don’t have the answer to that question, but the growth and rapid ascent I’m seeing from him is like nothing I’ve witnessed in almost three decades of covering college football.

Gunner Stockton, Georgia: I thought Stockton was more of a system/culture fit than a difference-maker through Georgia’s first six games, but he absolutely carried the Dawgs down the stretch against Ole Miss. Stockton went 12-for-12 in the second half on Saturday and helped Georgia climb back from a nine-point fourth-quarter deficit to score 17 unanswered and send the Rebels packing. My opinion changed on him after this game—the Dawgs have a dude at QB! 

Julian Sayin, Ohio State: Sayin went 36-of-42 passing against Wisconsin with 393 yards and four touchdowns against Wisconsin yesterday. That’s hard to do on 7-on-7, let alone against a Big Ten rival. The receivers are putting up big numbers and the offense is opening up and revealing its true potential. The former five-star recruit has gone from game manager to asset overnight, and it’s a development that further entrenches the Buckeyes as the top team in the nation. Don’t look now, but the training wheels are off in Ohio State’s offense.

Carson Beck, Miami: After Miami’s loss to Louisville on Friday—in which Beck threw for zero touchdowns and four interceptions—he went to the podium and threw one of his receivers under the bus. I’d been encouraged by the reports of Beck’s leadership coming out of Miami, but some of my off-field concerns were renewed when I saw this clip. At the first sign of adversity, this is how he responds? On-field play aside, this is exactly what scouts don’t want to see from him.

The depth of this edge class is pretty astounding, especially after a 2025 class that had 14 prospects selected in the first three rounds. 

Rueben Bain Jr., Keldric Faulk, and T.J. Parker are my top three at the position right now, followed by fast-rising Texas A&M edge Cashius Howell, who might also end up making my top 32 big board. But yesterday I couldn’t help but notice the impact of a couple other potential top-100 edge guys, and figured it’d be a good time to highlight them.

Oklahoma edge R Mason Thomas (6-foot-1, 249 pounds): He had another 1.5 sacks on Saturday and now has 5.5 through 6.5 games (he missed half a game for targeting). He helped hold the South Carolina offense to just seven points, which required discipline in rush lanes to keep QB LaNorris Sellers in check as a runner. Thomas isn’t the biggest edge but he’s quick, explosive, and does a nice job tying his feet and hands together as a rusher.

Michigan edge Derrick Moore (6-foot-3, 265 pounds): Speaking of discipline against a mobile QB, Moore and the Wolverines’ defense held Washington’s Demond Williams Jr. to –19 yards rushing. Moore also flashed his pass-rushing skills with a pair of sacks, including a strip-sack that generated a turnover. After a slow start to the season, he now has five tackles for loss and 4.5 sacks over his last four games.

Louisville WR Chris Bell: This guy continues to shine. He entered the weekend fourth nationally in receiving yards per game (106.3) and that average went up after his nine-catch, 136-yard, two-touchdown performance in Louisville’s upset at Miami. He’s on an absolute heater right now and will be competing with Jordyn Tyson, Makai Lemon, Carnell Tate, and Chris Brazzell II in the top five of my WR rankings. 

Each of those players will be on my big board this week and could all wind up being first-round picks. There are a bunch of other guys vying for the top 50 as well, including Denzel Boston, KC Concepcion, Zachariah Branch, Ja’Kobi Lane, Antonio Williams, and Ian Strong, to name a few. 

It’s shaping up to be a really good group—far better than I anticipated in the summer.

Tier 1: Title Bubble

1. Ohio State (Bye)
2. Indiana (vs. UCLA)
3. Alabama (at South Carolina)
4. Texas A&M (at LSU)

Tier 2: Next in Line

5. Oregon (vs. Wisconsin)
6. Georgia (Bye)
7. Miami (vs. Stanford)

Tier 3: In the Hunt

8. Notre Dame (Bye)
9. Ole Miss (at Oklahoma)
10. Georgia Tech (vs. Syracuse)
11. Oklahoma (vs. Ole Miss)
12. Vanderbilt (vs. Missouri)