{"id":668120,"date":"2026-01-11T06:35:14","date_gmt":"2026-01-11T06:35:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/668120\/"},"modified":"2026-01-11T06:35:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T06:35:14","slug":"afc-notes-fernando-mendoza-anthony-richardson-geno-smith-colts-raiders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/668120\/","title":{"rendered":"AFC Notes: Fernando Mendoza, Anthony Richardson, Geno Smith, Colts, Raiders"},"content":{"rendered":"

Colts owner Carlie Irsay-Gordon addressed one of the team\u2019s offseason questions, which involves the future of former first-round QB Anthony Richardson<\/a>, who suffered a fractured orbital bone in a freak accident.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I\u2019m going to stay in my lane on that one,\u201d Irsay-Gordon said, via Pro Football Talk<\/a>. \u201cBut it\u2019s \u2014 I feel horrible for Anthony with the injuries that he\u2019s had to endure, and I know Chris [Ballard] and Shane [Steichen] are going to do the right thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Colts GM Chris Ballard said that he feels good about where the team is heading and said that the 8-2 start was legitimate.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t all negative. The 8-2 (record) is real. That was not a mirage. It wasn\u2019t,\u201d Ballard said, via Around The NFL<\/a>. \u201cWe were humming, and we were playing good football.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ballard is confident that QB Daniel Jones<\/a> will revert to form based on his age and athletic ability.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not a doctor, and I\u2019m not God in terms of knowing what the future\u2019s gonna hold in his healing,\u201d Ballard said. \u201cThe history of guys coming back has been pretty good and they\u2019ve been older than Daniel. Daniel is 28 years old, and he\u2019s a pretty freaky talent in terms of athletic ability. So no, I do feel confident that he\u2019ll make it back. Will he be the version you saw right away? Maybe not, but he\u2019s still going to be really good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ballard indicated that Jones will continue to be a part of the team\u2019s long-term plans.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think Daniel Jones has a really bright future here in Indianapolis,\u201d Ballard said. \u201cI think (a return is) mutual on both sides. I think Daniel was a really good fit for this organization, and I think this organization and city were a really good fit for Daniel.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ballard refused to say if QB Anthony Richardson<\/a> would remain part of the team\u2019s long-term plans and said that his development has been hindered by a string of bad luck.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a very fair question,\u201d Ballard said. \u201cI was really happy with Anthony. I think you knew that even after we named Daniel Jones the starter. Unfortunately for Anthony, he\u2019s had some really bad luck. \u2026 Anthony was making really good strides. I\u2019ll tell you this about Anthony \u2014 he\u2019s a great teammate, he\u2019s a great teammate. He never sulked, never complained, was doing a great job as a backup quarterback and then had a freak accident in the locker room. I think time will tell. \u2026 He\u2019s gotta still work through the vision that he has, and we\u2019ll see what the future holds there, but (he\u2019s had) a little bit of bad luck.\u201d<\/p>\n

Raiders GM John Spytek was asked about having the first overall draft pick and the chance to draft Indiana QB Fernando Mendoza with veteran QB Geno Smith<\/a> still under contract.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, Geno is under contract for next year,\u201d Spytek said in his Monday press conference<\/a>. \u201cWe did that because when we traded for him, we liked him. I\u2019m not going to get too far into the future right now, I\u2019m day by day, but he\u2019s one of the guys that\u2019s under contract, he\u2019s a quarterback, he played some good football this year, and we\u2019ll make those decisions going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n

Per ESPN\u2019s Jeremy Fowler<\/a>, a Raiders team source expects a candidate with a background on offense to get heavy consideration for the head coaching vacancy. Las Vegas is aware it could have a rookie quarterback coming in as the No. 1 pick who needs to be developed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Looking for the latest NFL Insider News & Rumors?<\/p>\n

Be sure to follow NFL Trade Rumors<\/a> on X.com<\/a>\u00a0and FACEBOOK<\/a>\u00a0for breaking NFL News and Rumors for all 32 teams!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Colts owner Carlie Irsay-Gordon addressed one of the team\u2019s offseason questions, which involves the future of former first-round…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523736,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2065],"tags":[1504,21476,5422,2772,3619,7,1507,4949,1744,393,2455,2454,6,525],"class_list":{"0":"post-668120","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-las-vegas-raiders","8":"tag-anthony-richardson","9":"tag-carlie-irsay-gordon","10":"tag-chris-ballard","11":"tag-daniel-jones","12":"tag-fernando-mendoza","13":"tag-football","14":"tag-geno-smith","15":"tag-john-spytek","16":"tag-las-vegas","17":"tag-las-vegas-raiders","18":"tag-lasvegas","19":"tag-lasvegasraiders","20":"tag-nfl","21":"tag-raiders"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115875081796084514","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668120","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=668120"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668120\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668120"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668120"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668120"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}