NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Impressive and fantastic are a couple of the words that have been used to describe Tennessee quarterback Cam Ward as the No. 1-overall pick in April's draft takes over as the starter for a franchise that won just three games last season.
Yes, the preseason means many rookies will be surrounded by the hype that made them top draft picks, even if some might be tagged already as potential busts soon to be forgotten. Ward isn't the only one being watched closely to see how his first NFL season turns out.
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FILE - Cleveland Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders (12) scrambles during practice at the team's NFL football training camp, Saturday, July 26, 2025, in Berea, Ohio. (AP Photo/David Richard, File)
FILE - Las Vegas Raiders running back Ashton Jeanty participates during an NFL football practice Wednesday, June 4, 2025, in Henderson, Nev. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)
FILE - Jacksonville Jaguars wide receiver Travis Hunter makes a reception during the NFL football team's rookie minicamp, Saturday, May 10, 2025, in Jacksonville, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux, File)
FILE - Tennessee Titans quarterback Cam Ward (1) looks to throw a pass during practice at the team's NFL football training camp Wednesday, July 30, 2025, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV, File)
Travis Hunter will have to show he really can play wide receiver and cornerback in the NFL, just like he did in winning the Heisman Trophy at Colorado. The Las Vegas Raiders certainly hope Ashton Jeanty runs through defenses like he did at Boise State.
Abdul Carter won't have to carry the New York Giants' pass rush by himself.
Then there's Shedeur Sanders, who was projected to be a first-round selection but who wasn't taken until the fifth round by Cleveland. After his draft slide, everybody will be monitoring what Sanders does all season long.
Here's a closer look at some of the NFL rookies to watch this season:
The Titans tried to temper expectations for the rookie during the offseason. They embraced giving him as much work as possible and listed him as the starter to start the preseason with Will Levis' decision to have season-ending shoulder surgery.
Ward has shown the ability to adapt quickly after playing at three different colleges. He set a Division I record with 158 touchdown passes in his career. He threw for 18,184 yards during his college career while running for 473 yards and 20 more TDs. He became an AP All-American at Miami.
Titans coach Brian Callahan, who worked with Joe Burrow as a rookie in Cincinnati as the Bengals' offensive coordinator, has studied how other top picks fared in their rookie seasons at quarterback, hoping to help Ward avoid missteps.
“There’s really no stone unturned when it comes to getting a rookie quarterback ready,” Callahan said. “And there’s nowhere I won’t look for potential edges or advice or anything like that. So it’s been a fun process for sure.”
Yes, Jacksonville plans to give the man they traded up to select at No. 2 overall a chance to play both offense and defense in the NFL. The Jaguars have Hunter listed as a starting wide receiver and a backup cornerback to start the preseason.
Hunter is getting plenty of work with the offense, where the Jaguars want Hunter to help receiver Brian Thomas Jr. and franchise quarterback Trevor Lawrence.
Jacksonville also is making sure Hunter gets practice time on defense. Hunter did join Charles Woodson (1997) as the only full-time defensive players to win the Heisman Trophy. The Jags have packages for the rookie to contribute defensively.
“He’s still learning,” Jaguars coach Liam Coen said.
The Raiders finished last in the NFL in 2024 by managing just 79.8 yards rushing per game. That's why they selected Jeanty at No. 6 overall and made him the highest-drafted running back since Saquon Barkley was taken No. 2 overall in 2018 by the Giants.
Jeanty's production easily won over the Raiders, overcoming concerns about his size at 5-foot-8 and 208 pounds. Jeanty led the nation by rushing for 2,601 yards and 29 TDs last season, averaging 7.0 yards on 374 carries.
He just missed Barry Sanders' college record set in 1988 by 27 yards and finished second to Hunter in the Heisman voting.
Now Jeanty just has to prove he can help the Raiders run in the AFC West.
Unlike Ward, who got Hall of Fame quarterback Warren Moon's permission to wear his No. 1, Carter was sacked by Hall of Fame linebacker Lawrence Taylor in his quest to wear No. 56 even though he came to the Giants after 12 sacks at Penn State and after leading the nation with 23 1/2 tackles for loss last year.
The third-overall pick in April won't have the pressure of carrying the Giants' pass rush, a unit that features three-time Pro Bowl tackle Dexter Lawrence and edge rushers Brian Burns and Kayvon Thibodeaux. The 6-3, 250-pound Carter will have the chance to be rested and strong throughout games.
Projected to be drafted as high as No. 2, Sanders had to wait until No. 144 overall to hear his name called during the draft.
Now the quarterback is at the back end of a crowded quarterback room. The Browns have him fourth on the depth chart behind veterans Joe Flacco and Kenny Pickett and fellow rookie Dillon Gabriel, a third-round pick.
But it is Cleveland, where four different quarterbacks started at least one game during the 2024 season.
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FILE - Cleveland Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders (12) scrambles during practice at the team's NFL football training camp, Saturday, July 26, 2025, in Berea, Ohio. (AP Photo/David Richard, File)
FILE - Las Vegas Raiders running back Ashton Jeanty participates during an NFL football practice Wednesday, June 4, 2025, in Henderson, Nev. (AP Photo/John Locher, File)
FILE - Jacksonville Jaguars wide receiver Travis Hunter makes a reception during the NFL football team's rookie minicamp, Saturday, May 10, 2025, in Jacksonville, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux, File)
FILE - Tennessee Titans quarterback Cam Ward (1) looks to throw a pass during practice at the team's NFL football training camp Wednesday, July 30, 2025, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV, File)
BERLIN (AP) — Standing on an open truck making its way through Berlin, Anahita Safarnejad turned to the crowd of Iranian protesters marching behind her and took the microphone.
“No more dictatorship in Iran, the mullahs must go!” she shouted. Hundreds of voices echoed her slogan with the same sense of urgency and desperation.
Across Europe, thousands of exiled Iranians have taken to the streets to shout out their rage at the government of the Islamic Republic which has cracked down on protests in their homeland, reportedly killing thousands of people.
Women have taken a prominent role in organizing the protests abroad, raising their voices against the theocratic government that discriminates against them.
But beyond the anger, there’s also a sense of fear and paralysis. Iran's government has been shutting down the internet and limiting phone calls for days, making it nearly impossible for Iranians in the diaspora to find out if their families back home are safe.
Safarnejad, 34, fled Iran seven years ago. She came to Berlin to study theater but now works in a bar when she's not attending one of the almost-daily protests in the German capital.
Since the demonstrations broke out in Iran in late December, Safarnejad said she's been living in two different realities that are almost impossible to combine. The easygoing hipster life of her new hometown is a jarring contrast to the bloody protests in Iran that she's been following every minute she doesn't have to work, glued to her phone for the latest updates.
While she was initially almost euphoric that the current uprising would finally bring freedom to Iran and she'd be able to go back home, her sense of hope has turned into horror.
Safarnejad hasn't spoken to her brother, also a protester, since communications with Iran were cut off. She's been scouring video on social media showing piles of dead bodies to see if he's among the corpses.
“I'm desperate and don't know how to keep going anymore,” she cried, tears rolling down her cheeks, as she spoke to The Associated Press during Wednesday's Berlin protest.
“I can’t really switch off. I can’t really stop reading the news either," she added, her voice breaking. “Because I’m waiting all the time for the internet to be available so I can get some answers from my family.”
The young woman's horror is felt by many of the more than 300,000 Iranians living in Germany — one of the biggest exile communities in Europe and similar in numbers to France and Britain. Many of them still have family ties to their homeland, even if they left decades ago.
Mehregan Maroufi's Persian cafe and bookstore in Berlin has become a place of solace for Iranians to share their grief without many words — because they know they are all living through the same nightmare.
Maroufi, the daughter of the late Iranian author Abbas Maroufi, welcomes Iranians and everyone else at the Hedayat Cafe, where she serves Persian tea with sweets such as chocolate cake topped with barberries. She lends an ear to anyone who has to get worries off their chest.
“For some, the emotions are still too high and too strong, so to speak, and it’s impossible to talk," the 44-year-old says, adding that she, too, had to force herself to open the cafe on some mornings because the violent images coming out of Iran sucked away all her energy.
“But at least you can find compatriots here. You can talk to a little, and that helps,” she said.
She says she's been listening to and learning from the convictions her fellow Iranians express when they talk about their dreams of an Iran after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei that — due to the uprising — now seems closer that ever before.
While most in the diaspora agree that the theocracy has to be toppled, ideas of what a new Iran should look like differ widely.
Adeleh Tavakoli, 62, joined a demonstration outside Britain’s Parliament in London earlier this week. She hasn't been back to Iran in 17 years but has spent decades protesting from afar against the Islamic Republic.
But with the latest wave of protests, she hopes that the Iran’s exiled Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, the son of the shah ousted by the Islamic Revolution in 1979, will return to power. If he does, she said, she has her bag packed and is ready to get on the first flight.
“For 47 years, our country has been captured by a terrorist regime,” she said. “We’ve been the voice of Iran. All we want is our freedom and to get rid of this horrible dictatorship.”
For Maral Salmassi, who came to Germany as a child in the 1980s, history explains the calls by exiled Iranians for Pahlavi to lead the country.
“As an Iranian, as someone who comes from this culture and knows its culture and history, I can only say that we have had kings and queens for thousands of years. It is our culture," said Salmassi. She is the chairwoman and founder of the Zera Institute think tank in Berlin, which researches democracy, radicalization and extremism.
She added that Iranians make up a multi-ethnic country and "to bring them all together again, we need a constitutional monarchy that symbolically and traditionally represents our identity and reunites everyone ... and then a democratic, federal parliament where everyone is represented equally.”
However, not everyone is convinced by Pahlavi. Maryam Nejatipur, 32, who also joined the protest in Berlin, thinks her country should avoid a cult of personality.
“We don’t need something like Khamenei again. We don’t need one person,” to lead us, she said, as she burnt a portrait of the Ayatollah and used the flames to light a cigarette — an act that's become a symbol of Iranian resistance.
Safarnejad, who led the recent Berlin protest, agrees.
“I don’t belong to the left, I’m not a liberal, I’m not a monarchist,” she stressed. “I’ve been there for women’s rights, I’m for human rights, I’m for freedom.”
Fanny Brodersen and Ebrahim Noroozi, in Berlin, and Brian Melley in London contributed reporting.
Protester Adeleh Tavakoli, left, demonstrates outside the House of Parliament, in London, Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)
People take part in a rally in support of anti-government protests in Iran, Berlin Germany, Wednesday, June 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
Iranian Mehregan Maroufi poses for a photo before an interview with the Associated Press in her cafe in Berlin, Germany, Thursday, Jan. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
Iranian Maryam Nejatipur 32, poses for a photo after a demonstration in support of the nationwide mass protests in Iran against the government, in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
Iranian Anahita Safarnejad, 34, poses for a photo after a demonstration in support of the nationwide mass protests in Iran against the government, in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)
