Washington football star drawing very early first round NFL draft hype

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It seems unfair to place first-round NFL draft expectations around most rising sophomores who have experienced just one year of college football. However, Washington Huskies offensive lineman John Mills seems to be one of the exceptions to that.

Jedd Fisch’s coaching staff has placed big expectations on the 18-year-old, 6-foot-6, 335-pound lineman and his flowing blonde mullet, since he arrived on campus, and he’s lived up to all of them so far. Even though he was limited by a midseason high ankle sprain, he started nine games at left guard and two at right tackle on his way to Freshman All-American honors while allowing just 8 pressures on the year, according to Pro Football Focus.

That helped give Mills an 80.2 pass blocking grade from the analytics site, the highest it gave to any true freshman offensive lineman in the 2025 season.

Now, with a year under his belt, Mills’ stock has risen significantly, and analysts from all over the country expect the sophomore to firmly establish himself among college football’s best offensive linemen.

“Absurd tape for a true freshman,” former Penn State offensive lineman Landon Tengwall said of Mills on the Locked On Huskies podcast. “There’s no way someone should be playing like this, I think this is a name that the entire college football world is going to know during this season…this is one of the best linemen in football, not just guard, not just tackle, this is one of the best around.”

“The fact that you can go anywhere and ball out, that just means you’re a straight-up stud, and you’re going to be great…you kind of ask the question, ‘What is this kid’s ceiling?’ I think especially, in the future, when this moves on, and he does keep up that high (level of) play down the road, I feel like the future is a top ten draft pick.”

But it’s not all physical. A big part of the NFL’s talent evaluation process goes into the mental side of the game and learning the playbook, which is another thing that Mills has already shown that he excels at, which should do nothing but add to his ceiling as his college career rolls on.

“He’s wicked sharp. He’s really, really smart,” former UW left tackle Carver Willis said on the Locked On Huskies podcast. “Not only is he a smart individual, but he’s also a really smart player, and you can pick up on those things when they show up…in the install process, I genuinely don’t know if he missed a single question, I don’t think he did.”

With Freshman All-America and All-Big Ten honorable mention honors already under his belt, the future appears to be very bright for the young offensive lineman.

This article originally appeared on Huskies Wire: Washington Huskies star drawing very early first round NFL draft hype

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