BYU fans have spent a lot of Big 12 life asking for respect. Athlon just handed over a pretty loud version of it.
The Daily Herald reported that 13 BYU football players landed on Athlon Sports’ 2026 preseason All-Big 12 teams. Five Cougars were listed on the first team: LJ Martin, Bruce Mitchell, Faletau Satuala, Cade Uluave, and Evan Johnson. Martin and Mitchell also made Athlon’s preseason All-America third team, while Satuala and Uluave were fourth-team All-America picks.
That is not a small pat on the head. That is a national preview magazine saying BYU has front-line Big 12 talent on both sides of the ball.
It is also a warning label.
Preseason lists do not block anyone in November. They do not pick up third-and-2. They do not make a new quarterback calm when the pocket caves in. What they do, if you read them right, is show where a season’s burden has already been assigned.
For BYU, the burden is clear: this team is no longer sneaking up on the league. The Cougars are being talked about like a contender with named players, not a cute conference-newcomer story.
The list is built through the middle
Start with the part BYU should actually like.
Athlon’s first-team group runs straight through the spine of the roster: running back, center, safety, linebacker, corner. That is a grown-up football shape. Not all flash. Not all perimeter hope. The Cougars’ best-known players sit at positions that decide whether a team can survive a Big 12 season without turning every Saturday into a track meet.
Martin is the easiest headline. BYU Sport Nuts’ local stat database, sourced from BYU and WMT data, has him at 2,541 career rushing yards, 23 rushing touchdowns, 57 catches, and 398 receiving yards across 33 games. That is not projection anymore. That is a senior back with a real file.
Mitchell matters in a different way. A preseason center honor is football-nerd applause, which is the best kind. He brings 38 career games and 20 starts into a room that already has unusual experience. BYU’s current roster lists 20 offensive linemen, and the line group carries 191 career games and 70 career starts in the local database.
If BYU is going to be steady in September, that is where it starts. Not with a poster. With the snap, the calls, the double teams, and the boring four-yard runs that keep the whole stadium from getting twitchy.
The defensive respect is even louder
The offensive names will get the easy oxygen, because running backs and quarterbacks usually do. But the defensive half of the list may say more about BYU’s actual ceiling.
Satuala, Uluave, Johnson, Isaiah Glasker, Bodie Schoonover, Keanu Tanuvasa, and Therrian Alexander III gave BYU seven defensive selections in Athlon’s All-Big 12 tiers.
That is plenty to work with.
Satuala’s career line already shows 93 tackles, 7.5 tackles for loss, four interceptions, and eight passes defended. Johnson has seven career interceptions and 17 passes defended. Glasker has 140 tackles, 23 tackles for loss, 6.5 sacks, and five interceptions. Tanuvasa brings 38 career games, 33 starts, 16.5 tackles for loss, and six sacks. Alexander adds another tested corner with 24 games, 12 starts, 37 tackles, and eight passes defended.
That is the kind of defensive resume that changes the conversation. BYU does not have to sell hope there. It has enough veterans to make opposing coordinators do actual homework.
The catch is that expectations change the week-to-week job. Last year, a timely stop felt like proof BYU belonged. In 2026, if the preseason hype is right, fans are going to expect stops. That is a different emotional tax.
Bear Bachmeier is the fourth-team name with first-team pressure
Athlon listed Bear Bachmeier on the fourth team. That feels about right from the outside: respect for what he has already done, but not a coronation.
It also might be the most important BYU line on the whole list.
Bachmeier’s career file is already busy: 3,033 passing yards, 15 passing touchdowns, 527 rushing yards, and 11 rushing touchdowns across 14 starts. For a sophomore, that is real production. It is also exactly why the standard moves fast.
The rest of the roster can be decorated with preseason honors, but the quarterback still decides whether BYU looks organized. Martin can be excellent. Mitchell can steady the front. The defense can be as nasty as advertised. If Bachmeier is loose with the ball or late with answers, every national-preview compliment starts to feel like a setup.
That is not unfair. That is the position.
The more interesting piece is that BYU’s roster gives him help. Martin is not a theory. Jojo Phillips made Athlon’s fourth team after building a career line of 25 catches, 377 yards, and three receiving touchdowns. The offensive line is older than most July optimism pieces know what to do with.
So the quarterback question is not whether BYU has talent around him. It is whether the offense can turn that talent into clean, repeatable Saturdays.
Respect is useful only if it becomes leverage
Here is the healthy way to read the Athlon list if you are a BYU fan: enjoy it for about thirty seconds, then ask what it should buy you.
It should buy BYU confidence in the run game. It should buy the defense permission to play like a veteran unit, not a group hoping to be discovered. It should buy the coaching staff enough credibility to say, without blushing, that this roster has Big 12 contender pieces.
What it cannot buy is margin for sloppy football.
The 2026 schedule opens with Utah Tech, then ramps into a league slate that includes Arizona, West Virginia, Texas Tech, Cincinnati, Kansas, UCF, Utah, Iowa State, Houston, and Baylor. The names on Athlon’s list will be the same names circled by opponents. Martin will see loaded boxes. Mitchell and the line will get every twist, mugged front, and pressure game an opposing staff can draw up. Satuala and Johnson will be tested with double moves because praise has a way of inviting disrespectful play calls.
Good. That is the Big 12 bargain BYU wanted.
The Cougars spent years fighting to be taken seriously. Now a preseason magazine has treated them seriously. The next part is less sentimental and more fun: make the league regret it.
Sources and further reading
- Daily Herald: Four Cougars top Athlon Sports preseason All-Big 12 list
- Official BYU Athletics: football roster
- Official BYU Athletics API source used by BYU Sport Nuts: 2026 football roster data
- BYU Sport Nuts context: football hub, football roster, football schedule, LJ Martin player page, Bruce Mitchell player page, Bear Bachmeier player page, and BYU’s three Big 12 proofs for 2026
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