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Florida’s Jadan Baugh is the favorite for the 2026 Doak Walker Award at +250 on DraftKings, as ESPN listed the market on September 24. Duke’s Nate Sheppard, the leading rusher in FBS, is second at +750, and the winner is announced on December 10.
Baugh has run for 458 yards and eight touchdowns in three games. At +250 he has to win 28.6% of the time to pay back the stake, the shortest price on a 45-name board.
Doak Walker Award odds for 2026
| Player | School | DraftKings | Break-even | 2026 rushing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jadan Baugh | Florida | +250 | 28.6% | 458 yards, 8 TD |
| Nate Sheppard | Duke | +750 | 11.8% | 528 yards, 5 TD |
| Wayne Knight | UCLA | +1200 | 7.7% | 345 yards, 8 TD |
| DeSean Bishop | Tennessee | +1400 | 6.7% | 286 yards, 4 TD |
| Jaylin Carter | Memphis | +1400 | 6.7% | 437 yards, 6 TD |
| Turbo Richard | Indiana | +1600 | 5.9% | 315 yards, 4 TD |
| Kamari Moulton | Iowa | +1600 | 5.9% | 240 yards, 2 TD |
| Dylan Riley | Boise State | +1800 | 5.3% | 454 yards, 2 TD |
| Kewan Lacy | Ole Miss | +2000 | 4.8% | 191 yards, 4 TD |
| Jamal Rule | Nebraska | +2200 | 4.3% | 329 yards, 5 TD |
| Cam Cook | West Virginia | +2400 | 4.0% | 317 yards, 3 TD |
| LJ Martin | BYU | +2400 | 4.0% | 328 yards, 3 TD |
Prices are DraftKings’ 2026 Doak Walker Award market as listed by ESPN on September 24, 2026; rushing totals are ESPN’s 2026 regular-season figures on the same day. Carter has played four games and Moulton two; everyone else in the table has played three.
Break-even is 100 divided by the price plus 100. A futures bet like this is only worth making when you rate a player’s chance higher than that figure, and this board is built on three games of evidence.
Where last year’s names sit
Ole Miss’s Kewan Lacy is ninth on the board at +2000, with 191 yards on 39 carries, 4.9 a carry. Miami’s Mark Fletcher Jr. is at +4000 with 230 yards, and Ohio State’s Bo Jackson is at +5000 with 230 yards.
Sheppard and Knight are priced second and third on this season’s numbers. Sheppard has carried 82 times, the most of any back in the table, and Knight shares the FBS lead in rushing touchdowns with Baugh, eight each. The award has gone outside the usual powers before: Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty won in 2024 and Oklahoma State’s Ollie Gordon in 2023.
FBS rushing leaders so far
| Player | School | Games | Yards | TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nate Sheppard | Duke | 3 | 528 | 5 |
| Jadan Baugh | Florida | 3 | 458 | 8 |
| Dylan Riley | Boise State | 3 | 454 | 2 |
| Jaylin Carter | Memphis | 4 | 437 | 6 |
| Jabari Bates | San José State | 4 | 413 | 0 |
Baugh is the only back in the top five who is both top two in yards and top two in touchdowns. Riley has the third-most yards but only two scores, and Bates has 413 yards with none, which is why neither is priced near the top.
When the 2026 Doak Walker Award is decided
- Preseason watch list: announced August 18
- Additional nominations: schools may add or replace a candidate in October
- Semifinalists: 10, chosen by the PwC SMU Athletic Forum board in November
- Finalists: 3, voted by the National Selection Committee in November
- Winner: announced December 10, 2026, on The Home Depot College Football Awards
The same committee votes a second time to pick the winner from the three finalists. It is made up of past winners, former All-America and NFL All-Pro running backs, media members and special representatives, and a candidate has to be in good academic standing as well as productive.
Recent Doak Walker Award winners
| Year | Winner | School | Rushing yards | Rushing TD |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | Jeremiyah Love | Notre Dame | 1,372 | 18 |
| 2024 | Ashton Jeanty | Boise State | 2,601 | 29 |
| 2023 | Ollie Gordon | Oklahoma State | 1,614 | 20 |
| 2022 | Bijan Robinson | Texas | 1,580 | 18 |
Figures are as the award’s own history gives them, at the time of each vote. Love, a junior, was the first Notre Dame player to win it, and he also caught passes for 280 yards and three scores.
Every winner in the table ran for more than 1,300 yards. Sheppard is averaging 176 yards a game, but that pace has three games behind it and most of the season still to play. Week-by-week calls on college games are on our college football predictions hub, and the Heisman Trophy odds page covers the other big individual award. Prices on award markets differ from book to book, so compare them in our sportsbook reviews.
