Oregon
Oregon Ducks Recruiting: Local Specialist Staying in Eugene
Although Oregon Ducks coach Dan Lanning has said being in the Big Ten Conference helps with recruiting nationwide, winning over recruits at home is good too.
Rocco Graziano announced Friday afternoon via social media that he had committed to Oregon. Scouts have been raving about Graziano’s kicking ability. He is ranked by “Chris Sailer Kicking” as the No. 59 kicker in the class of 2025. He also participated in July’s Saturday Night Live football camp.
Graziano has a strong leg and easily has a 50-yard-plus field goal range. Additionally, he has been a great punter for Sheldon.
Oregon coach Dan Lanning must have liked what he saw from the Eugene product and gave Graziano an offer late last month. With his commitment earlier today, Graziano is set to be staying in town and suiting up for the Ducks next year.
For the past five seasons, the Oregon Ducks have relied on kicker Camden Lewis for field goals, extra points, and kickoffs. Last season, Lewis became the all-time scoring leader in the history of Oregon Ducks football. With Lewis now out of the picture, the Ducks will need to replace him.
Junior Atticus Sappington, senior Andrew Boyle, freshman Grant Meadors, and freshman Gage Hurych are the four Ducks placekickers on the roster for the 2024-25 season. It is expected that Sappington will be the one to primarily take field goals and extra points. For Oregon State last season, he was 13-for-14 on field goals and 49-for-50 on extra points.
When Graziano joins the team in 2025, he will have no shortage of competition if he wants to become the starting kicker. As Oregon and college football fans know, having a reliable kicker is hard to come by. Time will tell if any of these players can step up and take on the pressure of kicking for a team vying for a College football playoff spot year in and year out.
If Oregon is going to get over the hump and win its first football national championship, having a glaring hole at any position is unacceptable. One position that has haunted the Ducks in the past has been kicker.
Having a shaky kicking game can be detrimental to a football team. It will do more than take three points off the board on missed field goals. It can cause coaches and players to second-guess every decision on a drive. If there is no confidence in a kicker to knock it through the uprights, the play calling will get ultra-aggressive. Sometimes, this can lead to successful conversions. However, it also leads to empty drives and the kicker on the sideline during a fourth down thinking about how his team doesn’t believe in him. When he gets called upon later in the game or season, that thought can creep right back into his head in the biggest moment.
Having an unreliable kicking game is a big obstacle to overcome. The Ducks hope to have found a kicker in Rocco Graziano that will give them confidence every time he steps out onto the field.
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The Jets, with their 16th pick of Thursday’s first round of the NFL Draft, might have been tempted to move up to grab one of the set of hands that appealed to them in this draft class. But the Green & White remained patient and stayed put at 16 and were rewarded by being able to select Kenyon Sadiq, the draft’s top tight end out of Oregon.
“It’s unreal, man. Need to be the Jets. It’s special,” said Sadiq of being selected 16th overall and by the Green & White. “My sister currently lives in New York, so I’m happy to get down there. But great interactions with all the staff, in meetings and everything. So I’m beyond excited, super grateful.
“David Bailey said it already,” Sadiq added about Bailey, the Texas Tech edge taken second overall. “This organization is trending in the right direction. And I’m just a piece that can help and I’m ready to help. Whatever the team needs me to do, I’m going to do it.”
Sadiq, known by some as “Sadiq the Freak,” put his athleticism and receiving skills on full display last season with an Oregon single-season tight ends record of 51 catches for 560 yards and 8 receiving touchdowns, which led all FBS tight ends. He was named a second-team All-American and the Big Ten TE of the Year and was a finalist for the John Mackey Award, which goes to the nation’s top tight.
After the season’s end, Sadiq went to the NFL Combine in February and demonstrated some of that freakishness in dominating his position. He turned in a 4.39-second 40, best among TEs not only this year but for the past 14 Combines. He also notched a 43.5-inch vertical leap, an 11-1 broad jump and 26 reps in the bench press, all second at his position.
“I’ve got all the attributes,” he told the Jets media Thursday. “I mean, the Combine showed that.”
Sadiq joins a tight ends room that is now brimming with talent. Mason Taylor, last year’s second-rounder (42nd overall) out of LSU and Jeremy Ruckert, their 2022 third-rounder (101st) are already there and the group will be helpful not only to new/old veteran starting QB Geno Smith but also the Breece Hall-lead running game.
What exactly will Sadiq add to the room, the offense and the ’26 Green & White?
“I think it’s versatility, speed and toughness, bro, seriously,” he said. “I think I can help in the running and passing game on top of that. I’m sure I’m on special teams as well. That’s what I did at Oregon, and that’s what I’ll continue to do. I can create separation, but I can also go hit someone. Obviously, the NFL is different. I’m going to have to clean some things up. But, man, I’m going to go hit somebody. I’m not going to be scared.”
Sadiq is only the fourth Oregon player to be drafted by the Jets and the first in 20 years, since QB Kellen Clemens came to the Green & White in 2006 in Round 2. Other Ducks to become Jets through the draft were DB Reggie Grant in Round 9 of the 1978 draft and TE Blake Spence in the fifth round in 1998.
And the choice may well extend the Green & White’s track record of taking good to very good TEs in Round 1. Johnny Mitchell got the ball rolling in 1992 and was followed by Kyle Brady in 1996, Anthony Becht in 2000 and Dustin Keller in 2008.
The good times keep on rolling for the Oregon Ducks in the recruiting world. Dan Lanning and the Ducks scored a massive commitment from five-star quarterback Will Mencl out of Chandler, Arizona.
Oregon had been rumored to be leading the race for Mencl’s services for months, but the No. 1 quarterback in the country, per Rivals, cleared the air and committed to the Ducks on Wednesday evening. Mencl chose the Ducks over Auburn and Penn State, both of which battled hard for him down the stretch.
However, Mencl has been connected to Oregon for a long time. While he was offered last fall before breaking out in his junior season, Mencl has been a fan of the program long before he popped up on the Ducks’ recruiting radar. In a post shared by Rivals recruiting expert Steve Wiltfong, Mencl was announced as a quarterback for the Ducks when he was a kid at the 2019 NFL Draft fan experience in 2019.
Now, Mencl is ready to don the green and yellow for real and make his childhood dreams come true. The Ducks have made a point to get Mencl on campus as often as possible and as recently as last week. The continued connection between both sides is ultimately what made the decision easy for the nation’s top passer. Mencl said he told Lanning and the Oregon staff about his decision on Sunday.
“The biggest thing was the relationship with the staff,” Mencl said after committing. “I feel like that continued to grow over time, especially when I first got there last spring. Being able to sit down with Coach Koa, really being an underlooked guy at that time, and kind of blowing up my junior season. And then, the path to the NFL. You can’t deny what they do with quarterbacks and the type of scheme they run. I felt like that was the best fit for me and my family to get to the next level.”
Koa Ka’ai, Oregon’s new quarterback coach, made waves earlier in the offseason after his recruiting test about ice cream flavors went viral, but that doesn’t appear to have scared Mencl off. In fact, the two have a close connection that Oregon hopes will translate to success on the field in the near future.
“My relationship with Coach Koa, I feel like that is super, super strong,” Mencl told Rivals. “I’ve had a lot of discussions with Coach Lanning about the culture there and how they’re going to continue to sustain greatness throughout the program.”
Mencl exploded onto the national recruiting scene with a massive junior season for Chandler. He completed more than 70% of his passes for 3,815 yards and 33 touchdowns against five interceptions in his junior season, leading Chandler to a state title berth. He also rushed for 741 yards and an additional 17 touchdowns.
The Ducks expect to have some competition for Mencl to compete with when he joins the team for the 2027 season, with Dylan Raiola and Akili Smith Jr. already on the roster and competing for a role as the backup. Oregon has gone to the transfer portal as well in recent seasons, finding success with Bo Nix, Dillon Gabriel, and now Dante Moore.
Oregon has recruited well at quarterback in the past, establishing an NFL pedigree that attracted Mencl. Maybe he will be the one to buck the trend and give the Ducks a true, homegrown product under center.
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