On Thursday, the American Bowl will be broadcast on NFL Network and the East-West Shrine Bowl will begin its week of events leading up to their game on Tuesday, January 27th. That’s right, folks, it’s full-blown draft season. It’s time to preview our second all-star game of this cycle. If you want to read our American Bowl preview, you can find it HERE.
We’re going to take you position-by-position through the Shrine Bowl, noting which players have draftable grades at each spot per the up-to-date consensus
draft board. We’ll also mention general drafting trends and needs that the Green Bay Packers have, so we can slim this board down a bit. Draft season is all about not drinking water through a fire hose.
Quarterback
- #161 on the consensus draft board, Cade Klubnik, Clemson
The top quarterback in this game is Clemson’s Cade Klubnik, who came into the year with some first-round hype. The Packers did a pretty good job of covering their bases at quarterback with the additions of Desmond Ridder and Kyle McCord in recent weeks, but maybe they’ll add Klubik to the competition if he slips a bit on draft day.
Running Back
- #136 Demond Claiborne, Wake Forest
- #197 Roman Hemby, Indiana
- #242 CJ Donaldson, Ohio State
- #250 Robert Henry Jr., UTSA
All four of the Packers’ top backs this year were listed at at least 219 pounds in 2025. It’s been a general trend in the Matt LaFleur era that Green Bay’s offensive players, specifically, have gotten much bigger to fit in with his inside run-leaning scheme (mixed results). That’s before you even include AJ Dillon, at 247 pounds, into the mix, too.
Generally, the Packers are in the market for bigger backs now. That sort of rules out Claiborne (estimated 195 pounds), but might keep Hemby (e210), Donaldson (e232) and Henry (e205) on the board.
Donaldson actually began his career at West Virginia, where he transferred from in 2025, as a “tight end.” At the college level, he ran the ball 517 times for 2,419 yards (4.7 yards per carry) and 40 touchdowns to go along with 47 receptions for 286 yards and two scores. He was Ohio State’s number two back behind freshman Bo Jackson this year.
Hemby recorded a 1,000-yard rushing season for Indiana after transferring from Maryland. He also returned kicks for the championship Hoosiers from time to time.
Receiver
- #88 Skyler Bell, UConn
- #178 Eric Rivers, Georgia Tech
- #186 De’Zhaun Stribling, Mississippi State
- #196 Noah Thomas, Georgia
The Packers under LaFleur are also pretty picky about the size of their receivers, with players under the 205-ish pound range basically being delegated to the slot role (already filled by both Jayden Reed and Matthew Golden in 2026). If you’re going to watch receivers in this group, let it be Stribling (e6’2”, e210) and Thomas (e6’5”, e205).
Stribling caught 216 passes for 2,964 yards and 23 touchdowns in college, at Washington State, Oklahoma State and Mississippi. Thomas was at Texas A&M until this past season and finished with 89 receptions for 1,238 yards and 19 touchdowns. He only posted a 16-reception, 254-yard and 4-touchdown mark in 2025.
Tight End
- #106 Jack Endries, Texas
- #135 Eli Raridon, Notre Dame
- #145 Dalton Bentley, Utah
- #209 Lake McRee, USC
- #256 Riley Nowakowski, Indiana
This draft class is deep at tight end, based on scouting sources I’ve talked to (I haven’t had the time to watch everyone). Jack Endries wasn’t the biggest Cal transfer in the portal last year — that title goes to future first overall pick Fernando Mendoza — but Endries’ name is probably second on that list. He’s one of the top prospects at this entire event.
Riley Nowakowski played linebacker, fullback and tight end and was a relative unknown in the scouting community until he transferred from Wisconsin to Indiana in 2025. He went to Marquette High School in Milwaukee.
Offensive Line
- #80 Brian Paker II, Duke
- #140 Pat Coogan, Indiana
- #142 Ar’maj Reed-Adams, Texas A&M
- #148 Jaeden Roberts, Alabama
- #151 DJ Campbell, Texas
- #168 Fa’alili Fa’amoe, Wake Forest
- #175 Joshua Braun, Kentucky
- #176 Aamil Wagner, Notre Dame
- #247 Diego Pounds, Mississippi
Interestingly, Brian Parker II was listed as an interior offensive lineman by the Shrine Bowl, despite playing right tackle at Duke. Many scouts expect that he’ll move inside, potentially to center, at the next level. I took him in the third round in our first mock offseason.
Pat Coogan, the Rose Bowl MVP, is another center prospect who actually played center at the college level. If you want the breakdown of which players played at which positions in college, you can find that here.
The Packers have tried to get bigger on the offensive line under LaFleur, with the exception being the center position. Outside of the potential centers, the only lineman who doesn’t really seem like a “Green Bay-type” is Wagner, who was listed as a 296-pound tackle by Notre Dame.
Edge Defender
- #111 Malachi Lawrence, UCF
- #119 Anthony Lucas, USC
- #129 Tyreak Sapp, Florida
- #154 Patrick Payton, LSU
Edge defender is probably one of the better units in this game. All of these players have pretty good size, too. Patrick Payton had some first-round buzz heading into the 2024 season. Obviously, the 2-10 Florida State Seminoles disappointed that year. In 2025, he transferred to LSU, where he posted just one sack and five TFLs, his worst marks since 2021, when he played in only one game as a freshman.
Interior Defensive Line
- #91 Dontay Corleone, Cincinnati
- #99 Darrell Jackson Jr., Florida State
- #134 DeMonte Capehart, Clemson
- #181 Albert Regis, Texas A&M
- #252 Landon Robinson, Navy
- #255 Gary Smith III, UCLA
There’s a good chance that Dontay Corleone and Darrell Jackson Jr. will be the top nose tackles available to the Packers with their first selection of the draft, depending on whether Domonique Orange of Iowa State is taken before they get an opportunity to nab him.
Corleone has had multiple productive seasons, but he has also been dealing with a blood clot condition that is apparently under control now.
More than anything, the Packers need a starting nose tackle more than another body in the room. I think they either take one early or tap out of the position in the draft. Every one of these linemen is nose tackle-sized, other than Navy’s Landon Robinson, who is estimated to be around 285 pounds. The American Conference’s defensive player of the year has a 665-pound squat and a 465-pound bench press.
Off-Ball Linebacker
- #61 Jake Golday, Cincinnati
- #87 Harold Perkins Jr., LSU
- #108 Taurean York, Texas A&M
- #125 Lander Barton, Utah
- #187 Eric Gentry, USC
Like tight end, another position I’ve been told is very good this year is off-ball linebacker. Each of Harold Perkins (e222), York (e227) and Gentry (e225) will have to answer for size questions, though. For reference, Isaiah McDuffie, who is about as small as the team goes, was taken in the sixth round by the Packers at 227 pounds.
Perkins is one of the weirdest evals that will ever come across a scout’s desk. He originally began his career as an edge rusher, but Perkins was later moved to nickel, then to linebacker and then back to the nickel position. Here’s the breakdown of Perkins’ snaps by season:
- 2025: 353 nickel, 212 linebacker, 32 edge
- 2024: 108 linebacker, 52 nickel, 25 edge (tore ACL)
- 2023: 368 nickel, 187 edge, 120 linebacker
- 2022: 192 edge, 185 nickel, 96 linebacker
He’s sort of a positionless football player, which can be viewed as a good thing, but those players don’t have a strong track record at the next level, either. It will be interesting to see what the NFL does with him.
Cornerback
- #128 Domani Jackson, Alabama
- #190 Devon Marshall, NC State
Devon Marshall is expected to come in sub-5’10”, and that’s basically a no-draft situation for the Packers. They do not like shorter cornerbacks and haven’t taken them under Wolf, Thompson or Gutekunst.
If Marshall does measure in as expected, then the one draftable cornerback to pay attention to at this event is Alabama’s Domani Jackson, who transferred in from USC in 2024. He was a top-10 recruit in the country in the 2022 class and has started at outside cornerback for Alabama over the last two seasons.
Safety
- #123 Louis Moore, Indiana
- #156 Bishop Fitzgerald, USC
- #172 Cole Wisniewski, Texas Tech
I doubt that the Packers will be in the safety market much because they already have Xavier McKinney, Evan Williams, Javon Bullard and Kitan Oladapo under contract for 2026, but it never hurts to look, considering the team likes to keep five around on the 48-man roster to play special teams.
Cole Wisniewski is an interesting story. He was actually an FCS All-American at North Dakota State before injuring his foot and missing all of the 2024 season. He ended up at Texas Tech, where the Red Raiders, full of transfers, had the third-best defense in college football last year. He is also a Sparta, Wisconsin native.
