{"id":665861,"date":"2026-01-10T10:26:35","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T10:26:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/665861\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T10:26:35","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T10:26:35","slug":"why-peach-bowl-seemed-like-absolute-disaster-for-new-york-jets-dante-moore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/665861\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Peach Bowl seemed like absolute disaster for New York Jets, Dante Moore"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the New York Jets<\/a>, a franchise that\u2019s two years away from being a year away \u2013 and this has somehow remained perpetually true for the past 15 seasons, the NYJ last reaching the NFL playoffs in 2010 \u2013 Friday night\u2019s Peach Bowl<\/a> felt like an unmitigated disaster.<\/p>\n

The Jets<\/a>, who are still in search of a worthy successor to Hall of Famer Joe Namath nearly 50 years after he threw his final pass for the franchise, are scheduled to pick second overall in the 2026 draft<\/a>. Their 3-14 record this season matched the Las Vegas Raiders<\/a> in terms of ineptitude \u2013 though only the Jets managed to become the first team in league history to lose five consecutive games by at least 23 points apiece. Quite the exclamation mark \u2212 expletive mark? \u2212 to another sad-sack campaign.<\/p>\n

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1. Las Vegas Raiders \u2013 Fernando Mendoza, QB, Indiana<\/p>\n

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1. Las Vegas Raiders \u2013 Fernando Mendoza, QB, Indiana<\/p>\n

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2. New York Jets \u2013 Dante Moore, QB, Oregon<\/p>\n

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3. Arizona Cardinals \u2013 Arvell Reese, LB\/DE, Ohio State<\/p>\n

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4. Tennessee Titans \u2013 Keldric Faulk, DE, Auburn<\/p>\n

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5. New York Giants \u2013 Carnell Tate, WR, Ohio State<\/p>\n

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6. Cleveland Browns \u2013 Jordyn Tyson, WR, Arizona State<\/p>\n

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7. Washington Commanders \u2013 Rueben Bain Jr., DE, Miami (Fla.)<\/p>\n

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8. New Orleans Saints \u2013 Jeremiyah Love, RB, Notre Dame<\/p>\n

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9. Kansas City Chiefs \u2013 David Bailey, DE\/OLB, Texas Tech<\/p>\n

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10. Cincinnati Bengals \u2013 Caleb Downs, S, Ohio State<\/p>\n

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11. Miami Dolphins \u2013 Mansoor Delane, CB, LSU<\/p>\n

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12. Dallas Cowboys \u2013 Sonny Styles, LB, Ohio State<\/p>\n

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13. Los Angeles Rams (from Atlanta Falcons) \u2013 Spencer Fano, OT, Utah<\/p>\n

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14. Baltimore Ravens \u2013 Jermod McCoy, CB, Tennessee<\/p>\n

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15. Tampa Bay Buccaneers \u2013 Peter Woods, DT, Clemson<\/p>\n

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16. Jets (from Indianapolis Colts) \u2013 Makai Lemon, WR, USC<\/p>\n

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17. Detroit Lions \u2013 Francis Mauigoa, OT\/G, Miami (Fla.)<\/p>\n

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18. Minnesota Vikings \u2013 Avieon Terrell, CB, Clemson<\/p>\n

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19. Carolina Panthers \u2013 Kenyon Sadiq, TE, Oregon<\/p>\n

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20. Cowboys (from Green Bay Packers) \u2013 Brandon Cisse, CB, South Carolina<\/p>\n

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21. Pittsburgh Steelers \u2013 Ty Simpson, QB, Alabama<\/p>\n

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22. Los Angeles Chargers \u2013 Olaivavega\u00a0Ioane, G, Penn State<\/p>\n

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23. Philadelphia Eagles \u2013 Emmanuel Pregnon, G, Oregon<\/p>\n

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24. Buffalo Bills \u2013 Denzel Boston, WR, Washington<\/p>\n

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25. Chicago Bears \u2013 Caleb Banks, DT, Florida<\/p>\n

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26. San Francisco 49ers \u2013 KC Concepcion, WR, Texas A&M<\/p>\n

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27. Houston Texans \u2013 Kayden McDonald, DT, Ohio State<\/p>\n

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28. Browns (from Jacksonville Jaguars) \u2013 Kadyn Proctor, OT, Alabama<\/p>\n

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29. Rams \u2013 Colton Hood, CB, Tennessee<\/p>\n

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30. New England Patriots \u2013 Cashius Howell, OLB, Texas A&M<\/p>\n

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31. Denver Broncos \u2013 CJ Allen, LB, Georgia<\/p>\n

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32. Seattle Seahawks \u2013 Kelley Jones, CB, Mississippi State<\/p>\n

But no matter. By virtue of playing a weaker schedule, the Silver and Black actually “earned” the No. 1 pick \u2212 and the right to select Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza.<\/p>\n

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The recently crowned Heisman Trophy winner<\/a> had played like an NFL franchise quarterback facing Pop Warner competition throughout 2025. Then he thoroughly embarrassed the University of Alabama in the Rose Bowl before the Hoosiers routed Oregon 56-22<\/a> in Atlanta on Friday.<\/p>\n

Yet while Mendoza continues to etch his 2025 season as one of the best in the history of college football while cementing himself as the prohibitive top pick of the 2026 draft, it had seemed like the Jets would be in line for a tantalizing consolation prize \u2212 namely Ducks quarterback Dante Moore, a prospect some evaluators think might have more professional upside than Mendoza.<\/p>\n

2026 NFL mock draft: Projecting first round with early order set<\/a><\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

\u201cAround the league, there\u2019s a debate on who\u2019s one or who\u2019s two,\u201d ESPN draft analyst Matt Miller told USA TODAY Sports. \u201cSome people love Mendoza \u2013 pocket passer, super accurate, poised, never seems to get rattled. He\u2019s more of a distributor \u2013 he allows his guys to go make plays. I think there\u2019s a lot of people that see that and like it. He\u2019s kind of Jared Goff-esque \u2026 or Kirk Cousins-plus.<\/p>\n

\u201cDante, I think he\u2019s a little more explosive, he\u2019s a little more dynamic. \u2026 He\u2019s really not quite as experienced. And so it\u2019s more of an upside bet.\u201d<\/p>\n

But now? Sure doesn’t appear to be much room left for debate after Mendoza owned the Peach Bowl stage, while his team took down Oregon for the second time this season.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Moore served up a pick-six<\/a> on the first play from scrimmage \u2013 a poor throw on an out-breaking route, easily jumped when he didn\u2019t place it closer to the boundary. Moore consistently struggled to sense or evade pressure, fumbled twice and was never able to give his team a chance to keep its championship dreams alive.<\/p>\n

\"Dante<\/p>\n

Dante Moore loses the ball during the second quarter of the Peach Bowl.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Mendoza was once again surgical \u2013 repeatedly drilling the back shoulders of his receivers when he wasn\u2019t layering touchdown passes to them. He finished with five touchdown passes \u2026 and three incompletions. (Between the Rose and Peach Bowls, Mendoza has eight TD throws and five incompletions \u2013 against teams stocked with plenty of NFL-caliber talent.)<\/p>\n

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Said ESPN play-by-play man Sean McDonough at halftime, \u201cI think the debate about who the number one quarterback is and who\u2019s gonna be the number one pick in the draft has been answered.\u201d<\/p>\n

Responded analyst Greg McElroy, one of the many quarterbacks who couldn\u2019t cut it with the Jets: \u201cI think it was established even before this. I mean, if you\u2019re drafting Dante Moore, it\u2019s on a projection. You\u2019re getting a ready-made product right now in Fernando Mendoza.\u201d<\/p>\n

In fairness to Moore, he made some nice throws Friday, even if his 285-yard, two-TD night was ultimately full of empty calories. In further fairness to Moore, he\u2019s 20 years old and has started 19 college games. But he also looked like a deer in headlights at times. With the benefit of more time and nourished by more quality coaching, he certainly has the potential to be an excellent pro \u2013 though time and quality coaching have been in fairly short supply with Gang Green since the Jets\u2019 landmark Super Bowl 3 victory, famously\/infamously guaranteed by Namath, to cap the 1968 season. (The Jets have never returned to the Super Sunday stage.)<\/p>\n

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In the decades since, they\u2019ve picked passers like Richard Todd, Ken O\u2019Brien, Chad Pennington, Mark Sanchez, Sam Darnold and Zach Wilson in the first round. All have been saddled with outsized expectations, few have had the benefit of a strong supporting cast, none have flourished for more than a handful of seasons.<\/p>\n

Moore could be set up for a similar fate if the Jets, desperate behind center yet again more than a year after the failed Aaron Rodgers experiment, pick him. ESPN personality Stephen A. Smith even advised Moore to remain at Oregon in 2026 rather than play for the Jets, whom SAS deemed a \u201cfootball atrocity.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the Dante Moore dilemma,\u201d said Miller. \u201cIt\u2019s do you go for the sure thing of being a top-five pick, or do you go back to school and risk having a Garrett Nussmeier-type of year, where your stock kinda falls off.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWho\u2019s to say (the Jets) don\u2019t have the number one pick next year? The Jets are always in the top five. If you\u2019re running from the Jets, you just need to come out and say you don\u2019t want to play for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

1 \/ 4<\/p>\n

Best images of the 2025 NFL season<\/p>\n

Week 1: Detroit Lions wide receiver Isaac TeSlaa (18) makes a catch for a touchdown<\/a> against the Green Bay Packers during the fourth quarter at Lambeau Field. The play was originally ruled an incomplete pass, but the call was overturned. Despite TeSlaa’s effort, the Packers won the game 27-13.<\/p>\n

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Best images of the 2025 NFL season<\/p>\n

Week 1: Detroit Lions wide receiver Isaac TeSlaa (18) makes a catch for a touchdown<\/a> against the Green Bay Packers during the fourth quarter at Lambeau Field. The play was originally ruled an incomplete pass, but the call was overturned. Despite TeSlaa’s effort, the Packers won the game 27-13.<\/p>\n

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Best images of the 2025 NFL season<\/p>\n

Week 1: The New England Patriots’ Robert Spillane (14) and Christian Elliss (53) tackle Las Vegas Raiders tight end Michael Mayer (87) during the second half at Gillette Stadium. The Raiders won the game, 20-13.<\/p>\n

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Week 1: New York Giants quarterback Russell Wilson (3) fumbles the ball on a tackle by Washington Commanders safety Will Harris (3) during the first quarter at Northwest Stadium. It was a rough Giants debut for Wilson (17 of 37 passing for 168 yards) as the Commanders won the game, 21-6.<\/p>\n

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Week 1: Fireworks go off before the NFL Kickoff Game between the Philadelphia Eagles and Dallas Cowboys at Lincoln Financial Field. The defending Super Bowl champion Eagles opened the season with a 24-20 victory over their longtime NFC East rivals.<\/p>\n

As well as Moore played in 2025, two of his worst games came in the losses to Indiana \u2212 an opponent sporting a talented, opportunistic defense, if not one as remotely good and complex as the ones Moore will eventually see in the NFL. He didn\u2019t distinguish himself against Texas Tech in the Orange Bowl, either.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Mendoza, 22, couldn\u2019t have looked more composed or efficient in the biggest game of his life \u2013 at least until the South Florida native faces the University of Miami for the national championship on Jan. 19. Big (6-foot-5, 225 pounds), accurate, intelligent and perhaps underrated athletically, Mendoza appears like precisely the guy the Jets need \u2013 a winner unlikely to be derailed by the Big Apple\u2019s scrutiny and distractions.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Yet, un-Raider-y as the clean-cut Mendoza presents, he\u2019ll likely instead be avoiding the distractions of Sin City while trying to elevate that once-great franchise from the ashes \u2013 and with minority owner Tom Brady to oversee his professional growth and development.<\/p>\n

As for the Jets?<\/p>\n

Maybe they try to package some of their midseason bounty of high-end draft picks<\/a>, acquired after trading Sauce Gardner and Quinnen Williams, to move up for Mendoza. Maybe they make a run at a veteran like Mac Jones or Cousins (a Mendoza facsimile without the wheels) and target Texas\u2019 Arch Manning or Ohio State\u2019s Julian Sayin in 2027. Maybe Moore \u201cDucks\u201d the Jets entirely and winds up in an environment preferable to a \u201cfootball atrocity\u201d \u2013 you know, like in Cleveland or Arizona.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

But it sure feels like Moore\u2019s best play personally is to enter this draft, given the likelihood he\u2019ll be close to a surefire top-five pick, rather than chance a regression ahead of what\u2019s shaping up as a stacked 2027 draft. Better to take the Caleb Williams path and join an organization that might foster initial misgivings \u2013 while realizing circumstances in the NFL change on a dime, for the league\u2019s worst franchises and its best (slot Williams’ Chicago Bears wherever you choose).<\/p>\n

Regardless \u2013 somehow, some way \u2013 sure seems like the Jets now find themselves two years away from being two years away.<\/p>\n

All NFL news on and off the field.\u00a0Sign up<\/a>\u00a0for USA TODAY’s 4th and Monday newsletter.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Dante Moore, Oregon Peach Bowl loss felt like loss for New York Jets<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the New York Jets, a franchise that\u2019s two years away from being a year away \u2013 and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665862,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2051],"tags":[1586,615,375,223,1036,391,85,6446,7,96724,226,13638,393,5215,20641,1917,255,2321,2097,6,84,7606,6736,1878,7536,796,1369,1733],"class_list":["post-665861","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-jets","tag-aaron-rodgers","tag-arch-manning","tag-arizona","tag-atlanta","tag-caleb-williams","tag-chicago-bears","tag-cleveland","tag-dante-moore","tag-football","tag-indiana-quarterback","tag-jets","tag-joe-namath","tag-las-vegas-raiders","tag-mac-jones","tag-mark-sanchez","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-jets","tag-newyork","tag-newyorkjets","tag-nfl","tag-nfl-playoffs","tag-peach-bowl","tag-quinnen-williams","tag-sam-darnold","tag-sauce-gardner","tag-the-jets","tag-tom-brady","tag-zach-wilson"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115870329099881018","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665861","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=665861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665861\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665862"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}