Arizona Cardinals general manager Monti Ossenfort has admitted that the team's delay in drafting Jeremiyah Love with the No. 3 overall pick in the NFL Draft was due to having the wrong phone number for the star running back.
Love, the Notre Dame standout, was selected by the Cardinals on Thursday night, making him the highest-drafted running back since Saquon Barkley went No. 2 in 2018. Despite being widely expected to take Love, Arizona was slightly late in confirming the pick, and Ossenfort later came clean about the embarrassing gaffe.
'If you want me to tell you the honest God truth, we had the wrong phone number,' Ossenfort said in a press conference. 'The phone number that we were given was the wrong one, so that was a little bit of the delay. We got that straightened out and called Jeremiyah. That's what the delay was.'
Head coach Mike LaFleur jokingly interjected, 'There was no delay!'
Fans quickly took to social media to mock Ossenfort for being so candid about the mistake. One wrote on X: 'Oh ffs, don't say that in public.' Another said: 'Of course these idiots can't even get a phone number right when they have 715 holes on their roster and go to the easiest position to find really good players at 3 overall. Makes all the sense in the world.' A third simply called it a 'clown show.'
On a more serious note, Ossenfort stressed that the Cardinals never considered trading the No. 3 pick. 'There was very minimal conversations,' he said. 'Some surface level [conversations], but nothing that came anywhere close to getting us to move up a pick.'
Love, 20, said he wasn't surprised to land in Arizona, especially after a positive conversation with Ossenfort last week. 'I'm not going to get into the specifics of it, but we had a great conversation,' Love said. 'I love him. He loves me. And we're going to make this relationship work.'
The Cardinals and first-year head coach LaFleur selected arguably the best offensive playmaker available. The 6-foot, 212-pound unanimous All-America selection ran for 1,372 yards and 18 touchdowns in his final college season, while also catching three touchdowns.
LaFleur praised Love's versatility: 'I've said this about running backs—they come in all shapes and sizes. What's unique about him is that in all three phases—run game, pass game, and protection—he doesn't have a weakness.'
Love followed his electric junior year with a standout performance at the NFL Combine, running a 4.36 in the 40-yard dash. He now joins a short list of running backs selected in the top 10 over the past decade, including Saquon Barkley, Leonard Fournette, Bijan Robinson, and Ashton Jeanty.
