The 2026 NBA Draft is right around the corner and the deadline to withdraw from the draft to retain NCAA eligibility is May 27 at 11:59 p.m. ET which means that Jeremy Fears Jr. has a big decision to make.
When he entered the NBA draft initially, everyone kind of expected him to get some feedback and come right back. That’s still the expectation for Tom Izzo.
The Hall of Fame head coach recently appeared on some podcasts and said that he feels good about where things stand with Fears because the communication has been great. He also said that he thinks that the Spartans will get him back for his junior season.
However, after the NBA Draft Combine including a couple of scrimmages, Fears has improved his draft stock from an undrafted projection to as high as the middle of the second round.
Some Spartan fans are getting a little worried about him staying in the draft despite that option not even being on the radar a couple of weeks ago. He’s being looked at as a potential second-round pick, but he revealed to Andy Katz what it would take for him to remain in the draft.
Jeremy Fears Jr. talked NBA Draft and @MSU_Basketball’s upcoming season with @TheAndyKatz at the combine 💪 pic.twitter.com/ipTJBd32go
— Big Ten Men's Basketball (@B1GMBBall) May 14, 2026
Basically, Fears needs to be locked in as a first-round pick if he plans on staying in the draft, but unless something changes drastically from now until May 27, I just don’t see that happening.
It’s not because I don’t believe that Fears is a first-round talent — he absolutely is — but he’s not there quite yet. He admitted himself that he’d like to turn his defense up a notch and also work on his shot this offseason and through two scrimmages, it was apparent that he had been working on both but there’s still a little ways to go.
The feedback he gets will probably be mid-to-late second round right now, but that’s actually taking a pay cut from one more year at Michigan State.
The vibes are still that he’s going to return.
Jeremy Fears knows what his legacy can be
Fears knows that a lot rides on this decision, but hearing him say that it would take him being a first-rounder for him to remain in the draft, that kind of shuts the door on the NBA — for now.
If he wants to wait until he gets first-round grades, that will likely be next season. He showed serious improvement in 2025-26 and one more year of getting better in every aspect of his game could mean first-round projections next year around this time.
There’s a legacy on the line as well and while the NBA is his dream, that means a lot to him. He wants to leave Michigan State as a legend and he’s well on his way, but that can’t happen if he leaves two years early only to be drafted in the second round. That would crush a potential legendary legacy.
Izzo has said several times that Fears reminds him of Mateen Cleaves and he’s a better leader than anyone that he’s had since the 2000 national champion.
The greats under Izzo have done similar things: win Big Ten titles, compete for Big Ten Player of the Year, make the Final Four, and Mateen has brought home Izzo’s only national title. Fears has won a Big Ten titles and he’ll be a Big Ten Player of the Year candidate next season so all he has left is a Final Four and a national title to be considered one of the greats.
A return could yield just that.
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