2025 NFL Draft: Isaiah Bond scouting report

The Texas receiver has blazing speed that the Packers are looking for

The Green Bay Packers sent both general manager Brian Gutekunst and vice president of player personnel Jon-Eric Sullivan to Texas’ pro day this month, but that apparently wasn’t enough exposure to one of the prospects they’re eyeing. Beyond seeing Longhorns receiver Isaiah Bonds in person, they’re also reportedly going to bring him in on a pre-draft visit. Bonds will also make trips to the Los Angeles Rams and San Francisco 49ers, two teams that run a fairly similar offensive scheme to the Packers.

So who is Bond, and what would he bring to the table for Green Bay? Let’s get into it.

Isaiah Bond Scouting Report

First of all, the Packers need speed at receiver. Slot receiver Jayden Reed is probably Green Bay’s “go-to” target entering the 2025 season, but Green Bay uses him in a specific role. Reed really only sees the field consistently as a slot receiver in three-receiver sets, which limits his playing time. Beyond that, he struggled mightily against man coverage in 2024, which included some of his most impactful drops of the year.

While no one is clamoring to put either Dontayvion Wicks or Romeo Doubs on the bench, those outside receivers don’t take the top off of the defense in the same way that Christian Watson has. Unfortunately for the Packers, Watson will likely miss the first three months of the regular season as he recovers from his ACL tear.

Above everything else, Bond would bring the Packers speed they don’t otherwise have offensively. At the combine, he ran a 4.39-second 40-yard dash and was also measured as the second-fastest player at the event by their GPS tracking data, only behind Kentucky cornerback Maxwell Hairston, who ran a 4.28-second time. For what it’s worth, Bond’s 4.39 number was actually slower than expected for him coming into the event and National Scouting’s hand time, the company that puts on the combine, of the receiver was a 4.32-second 40.

Originally starting his career at Alabama, Bond left the Crimson Tide in 2024, following the retirement of head coach Nick Saban. In 2023, Bond was the number two pass-catcher for Alabama, only behind Jermaine Burton, a 2024 draft pick who the Packers also brought in for a pre-draft visit last year. With the Tide, Bond was a slot receiver about 50 percent of the time, while he played mostly outside receiver for the Longhorns.

At 5’11” and 180 pounds, Bond is unlikely most of the receivers who head coach Matt LaFleur has played in Green Bay. For reference, the average snap played by a LaFleur receiver is in the ballpark of 208 pounds since he took over as head coach in 2019. But maybe Bond’s rare speed will lead to the Packers bucking their trend on bigger receivers.

If you want a look at the speed that we’re talking about here, the video above shows Bond pulling away from the competition. The first play is a bubble screen where no one was able to get so much as a hand on Bond. The second is a skinny post where he was able to get over a middle-of-the-field safety, a player whose responsibility is to stop that very route, despite the defender getting a 10-yard head start.

While Bond doesn’t have bad hands, Pro Football Focus only credited him with two true drops on the year, he certainly doesn’t have strong hands. The point of Bond isn’t to throw him contested passes in the deep area of the field. He simply isn’t a ball-winner to that degree. It’s to have him get so open that defenders aren’t even in his radius at the catch point.

Here’s where we should mention his ability versus press coverage. Because of his size, he often gets rerouted significantly by jams. There were only two games where he was pressed more often than not last season: The two times Texas played the Georgia Bulldogs. In those two games, Bond posted only 38 total receiving yards.

Due to his limitations against press coverage and in contested catch situations, I actually like Bond’s ability to run crossing routes out of the slot as his trump card trait. With Reed in the slot for the foreseeable future, though, that makes Bond’s projection in the Packers’ offense a little less than a snug fit. With that being said, Green Bay can use Bond as an “outside” receiver in condensed splits, which will give him the functional spacing of a slot receiver.

Whatever team that drafts Bond will be smart to figure out creative ways to get him the ball, even if it isn’t on downfield throws. For example, he got four carries last year and recorded 98 rushing yards. Three of his four carries went for 25 or more yards. You can find the clips of them linked above.

Bond probably would have posted more of those down the stretch, had he not injured his ankle in October, an injury he played through later in the 2024 season.

Lastly, it’s time to talk about the biggest weakness in Bonds’ game: His blocking ability and willingness to block. The clips above show Bond losing at the point of attack, leaving his teammates hanging out to dry. Beyond simply losing blocks, though, there are plenty of times where he gave up on downfield blocks that cost his teammates yards after catch or yards after contact chances. Considering how run-centric the Packers’ offense is, this would be a severe limitation on a down-to-down basis, at least until Bond improves in this aspect. If Bond is picked by Green Bay and is this caliber of a blocker early on, it wouldn’t be surprising if the Packers limited his early career snaps to obvious passing situations, considering that the team is already working around other smaller receivers in Reed, Bo Melton and now the newly-signed Mecole Hardman.

At the moment, Bond is ranked the 78th overall receiver in the class. The projection of him as a Day 2 receiver checks the box for me. He has rare speed, something every team in the league is looking for at the position. How you maximize that speed without allowing his negatives to pop up — his blocking ability/mentality, his releases versus press and his lack of ball-winning — set his floor and where you think he should be drafted as a prospect. If you can fix some of those issues, none of which are limited by his athleticism, then you could get a gem of a selection. If he doesn’t raise his floor, though, he might be a situational offensive player and a returner at the next level.

It’s quite possible that the Packers brought Bond in on a visit to better judge his mentality, a key aspect in the evaluation process if you’re taking a project player. They would be wise to, considering how wide the range of career outcomes is for Bond.