Diego Pavia, the former Vanderbilt quarterback and Heisman Trophy finalist, has signed a three-year deal with the Baltimore Ravens — going from snubbed in the draft to a professional contract in the space of days. The move, first reported by ESPN, spares Pavia the weekend try-out originally scheduled with the Ravens and hands him a standard undrafted free agent (UDFA) deal, though the precise amount of guaranteed money, if any, has not been disclosed.
What an undrafted contract really means
Signing a three-year UDFA contract does not guarantee Pavia a place in the NFL. Unlike drafted players, whose contracts carry substantial financial protection, undrafted free agents can be waived with little to no penalty depending on the terms of their agreement. Pavia will now have to earn his spot on Baltimore’s roster during training camp, competing for a role that almost certainly would place him third on the depth chart behind two-time league MVP Lamar Jackson and backup Tyler Huntley.
The Ravens have a track record of turning undrafted players into contributors — defensive tackle Michael Pierce and running back Keaton Mitchell both joined Baltimore as UDFAs before making significant impacts. Pavia will also have to outplay another undrafted quarterback, Joe Fagnano, who signed a parallel three-year deal with the team. Baltimore did not select any quarterback in the 2026 NFL Draft, leaving the door open for competition among the undrafted pool.
One factor working in Pavia’s favour is his statistical résumé. In his final college season at Vanderbilt in 2025, the 24-year-old recorded 3,539 passing yards, 29 touchdowns and eight interceptions, adding 862 rushing yards and 10 touchdowns on the ground. His overall Pro Football Focus grade of 92.3 ranked fourth among qualified quarterbacks that season. He also led the Commodores to a program-best 10-win season, beating four ranked opponents, and won both the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award — given to the nation’s top senior quarterback — and the SEC Offensive Player of the Year award.
From Heisman finalist to draft afterthought
Despite those achievements, Pavia became the first Heisman finalist since Northern Illinois’ Jordan Lynch in 2014 to go undrafted entirely. He finished second in the Heisman voting to Indiana’s Fernando Mendoza, but that honour could not overcome the concerns NFL teams held about his transition to the professional game.
At 5ft 10in, Pavia is considered short for a modern NFL quarterback, a profile that teams have historically been reluctant to trust as a starter. His age — 24 at the time of the draft, older than most rookies due to a circuitous route through New Mexico Military Institute, New Mexico State and Vanderbilt, plus a prior legal battle with the NCAA over eligibility — also counted against him. Character and maturity questions were raised in pre-draft evaluations, partly because of outspoken social media posts and past off-field incidents.
Support has come from notable figures nonetheless. Television personality Skip Bayless and Hall of Fame cornerback-turned-coach Deion Sanders have both publicly stated that Pavia deserved a better outcome. His former Vanderbilt teammate Eli Stowers described him as “the best player in college football last year”, noting that Pavia led the country in total yards.
Strip club footage and a social media backlash
Pavia’s humiliating week took a further twist when bizarre footage of him at a New Mexico strip club surfaced. The clip, filmed on 8 March at the Knockouts Gentlemen’s Club in Albuquerque, showed Pavia holding a wad of cash. According to TMZ, a source revealed that “all of the money” seen on stage in the footage came from Pavia, who reportedly stayed at the club until 5am that night.
This was not the first time Pavia has found himself at the centre of a club-related controversy. After being snubbed for the Heisman Trophy, he initially re-posted an Instagram story of himself alongside his offensive line captioned with an expletive directed at voters, alongside the words “FAMILY FOR LIFE”. The combination of the strip-club clip and the social media outburst fuelled the concerns that had already depressed his draft stock.
Separately, Pavia had been placed on the Canadian Football League’s Winnipeg Blue Bombers negotiation list — a standard procedural move that grants the CFL team exclusive negotiating rights — though that now appears academic given his NFL contract. He will report to Baltimore’s training camp in the coming months alongside Fagnano, both hoping to defy the odds that undrafted quarterbacks have always faced.
