Ty Simpson is widely considered the No. 2 quarterback in the class<\/a>, but he was never viewed as a threat to Mendoza.<\/p>\nMeanwhile, the Raiders have been all over Mendoza, even bringing a videographer to the pro day. They had an extended meeting with him at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, and they\u2019ve also connected once over a video call. Mendoza met with Spytek, Kubiak and other staffers after the workout to talk even more X\u2019s and O\u2019s \u2014 this wasn\u2019t a networking dinner at a five-star restaurant; it was a football discussion. And later this month, Mendoza is expected to visit the Raiders facility on an official pre-draft visit.<\/p>\n
To put it another way: If Mendoza has bought any Raiders gear for his family, he shouldn\u2019t worry about saving the receipts.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wouldn\u2019t say I have the mentality of trying to be the top pick,\u201d Mendoza said, with his typical humility. \u201cI\u2019m just trying to be the best me possible. In that aspect, whatever team picks me, you only need one team to believe in you, whether you\u2019re the first pick, whether you\u2019re the last pick or whatever. I\u2019m just trying to be the best quarterback I can be in September rather than right now here in April.\u201d<\/p>\n
For what it\u2019s worth, Mendoza put on quite the April show. He warmed up for 45 minutes with former Indiana quarterbacks coach Chandler Whitmer, who is now in the same role with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, along with other Hoosiers staffers. Mendoza started his session at 2:05 p.m. with nine warmup tosses to jogging receivers before ratcheting up the intensity several notches. He opened with 16 quick completions before bellowing out, \u201cGood job, boys,\u201d to his receivers. As on all pro days, Mendoza was throwing one-man routes without any defenders on the field.<\/p>\n
Less typical: Mendoza called out his own script. It\u2019s become increasingly common for private QB coaches to lead these workouts, but it was Mendoza yelling each receiver\u2019s name and their intended route before nearly every throw.<\/p>\n
Mendoza showed his moxie with his 19th throw. Wide receiver Omar Cooper Jr. ran a nifty return route, and Mendoza fired a strike to his left. But while the ball was still in the air, Mendoza yelled \u201cthank you\u201d to praise Cooper for his perfect route. A couple of scouts noted Mendoza\u2019s chemistry with his teammates was evident.<\/p>\n
Mendoza opened with 23 consecutive completions before the first drop. Two plays later, Cooper slipped on an out route, and Mendoza noticed, waited a beat for Cooper to recover and then hit him in stride. It might be a little thing, but Mendoza could have thrown the ball on time and blamed the receiver for the incompletion. Rather, he showed enough poise to slow down and make the play work.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were a little bit of nerves right before (the workout),\u201d Mendoza said. \u201cBut those nerves mean I\u2019m ready. Those nerves turned into energy toward the workout to be a better quarterback.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mendoza\u2019s only true miss was on his 32nd throw, as it was just a few inches too far for his receiver on a deep ball. He was short on a couple of deep completions and was a little late on an over route to Cooper, but the rest was crisp, accurate and efficient. Mendoza also threw a couple of perfect deep balls, including a beauty of a post route to E.J. Williams Jr.<\/p>\n
Mendoza closed the workout with 21 consecutive completions, capped at 2:24 p.m. with a deep lob to Cooper, who mirrored Ryan Williams\u2019 look from the Alabama pro day with a Grinch cleat on his right foot and a Reverse Grinch on his left.<\/p>\n
Mendoza threw 65 passes, including the nine warmup balls, in a tidy 19 minutes. He called for a quick water break after his 37th throw because everyone was noticeably winded, and they had one more breather after the 51st throw.<\/p>\n
It was the most purposeful and impressive pro day by any of the top QBs in the last two draft classes.<\/p>\n
That tracks with Mendoza\u2019s evaluation. Executives polled by The Athletic have generally agreed Mendoza isn\u2019t considered to be on the same tier as the top of the 2024 QB class (Caleb Williams, Jayden Daniels and Drake Maye). Of course, so much depends on the Raiders\u2019 ability to support Mendoza.<\/p>\n
Teams love Mendoza\u2019s accuracy, toughness, decision-making, movement within the pocket and his commitment to football. He is totally immersed in the game, which has helped his rise as a high-level prospect. Mendoza can play with intentionality, knows where to go with the ball and when to take shots, and he has run with effectiveness at times.<\/p>\n
And unless there\u2019s a massive change of heart in the next three weeks, Mendoza\u2019s next show will be in Vegas.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BLOOMINGTON, Ind. \u2014 The coronation is nearly complete. Quarterback Fernando Mendoza dazzled the Las Vegas Raiders\u2019 contingent of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":848941,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2065],"tags":[7,4725,1744,393,2455,2454,6,525],"class_list":{"0":"post-848940","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-las-vegas-raiders","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-indiana-hoosiers","10":"tag-las-vegas","11":"tag-las-vegas-raiders","12":"tag-lasvegas","13":"tag-lasvegasraiders","14":"tag-nfl","15":"tag-raiders"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116334483626430977","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848940","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=848940"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848940\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/848941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=848940"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=848940"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=848940"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}