Following a humbling draft journey, Diego Pavia finally got picked up by the Ravens as an undrafted free agent andsigned a three-year deal with Baltimore on Tuesday.
As the former Vanderbilt quarterback prepares to make the most of his opportunity to clinch a spot on the Ravens’ roster, he faces a treacherous road littered with the shattered dreams of many UDFAs before him. Pavia’s short statureisn’t doing him any favors. Nor is his recent history of behavioral concerns, including his “sore loser” post after he finished runner-up in the Heisman race behind Fernando Mendoza.
So, what exactly does Pavia have going for him in the NFL? Ravens new head coach Jesse Minter described him as a “force multiplier” in his first comments on the new quarterback on Wednesday.
“One thing I would say about Diego, and Clark Lea—the head coach at Vanderbilt—is a really close, dear friend of mine, this guy is a force multiplier at Vanderbilt,” Minter said on Good Morning Football. “He came there at a time when they needed to get it going, and Clark was building something, and this guy made everyone in the building better. He’s one of the first people in, one of the last to leave, he’s a really hard worker.”
Minter also hinted that the Ravens weren’t impressed with Pavia’s antics following his Heisman loss and said he and Pavia would have some talks about “how to handle certain things a little bit better.”
“Any rookie undrafted free agent, come in and work. Let what you do on the field, and by your actions, show who you are. We'll let him come in with a little bit of a clean slate… and give him a platform to see what he can do,” continued Minter.
Behind Lamar Jackson, Paviais set to compete for a backup quarterback job against the likes of Tyler Huntley and fellow UDFA Joe Faganano. While Huntley will likely retain QB2 duties given his history with the organization, Pavia could still have a good shot at becoming QB3 or carving out a role for himself on the practice squad.
The Vanderbilt star helped lead the team to a historic 10-win season this past year, marking a remarkable turnaround for Lea’s program, with Pavia notably clinching big-time wins over ranked opponents like LSU and Tennessee. Despite being the first Heisman finalist in Commodores history, Pavia entered the NFL draft as one of the more polarizing prospects given his height (5’9 and 7/8”, per his Senior Bowl measurements) and swaggering personality. His draft fall, while not wholly unexpected, turned into a simmering storyline picked up by national media and even led to Colorado coach Deion Sanders—whose son Shedeur endured something similar—sending him words of encouragement.
It goes without saying that Pavia will have an uphill battle to make the Ravens’ roster. But Minter and the organization apparently saw enough on tape to give him a fair chance, and that’s exactly what he’ll get this summer.
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KRISTEN WONG
Kristen Wong is a staff writer on the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. She has been a sports journalist since 2020 and has a bachelor’s in English and linguistics from Columbia University. Before joining SI in November 2023, Wong covered four NFL teams as an associate editor with the FanSided NFL network and worked as a staff writer for the brand’s flagship site. She is a lifelong Liverpool fan who enjoys solving crossword puzzles and hanging out at her neighborhood dive bar in NYC.
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