Raiders given firm warning about Fernando Mendoza
Vegas seems to be set with its pick.
Raiders given firm warning about Fernando Mendoza originally appeared on The Sporting News . Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here . The Las Vegas Raiders don't seem to be leaving a lot of suspense for the No.
1 overall pick in the 2026 NFL Draft. All indications are that they'll be taking Indiana's Fernando Mendoza, who won both the Heisman Trophy and the national title in the 2025 season with the Hoosiers. Almost everyone seems to be in agreement that Mendoza is the top quarterback in this draft class, and the Raiders certainly need a QB.
Sometimes, it's that simple. Mendoza is a really good football player who kept getting better throughout his college career. ESPN's Bill Connelly does have one warning for the Raiders, though, and it's this: Mendoza may take a lot more hits than they'd like.
"Mendoza's ability to learn from mistakes was otherworldly, but when a team was able to pressure him, it could surprise him a bit," Connelly wrote in a new article on Thursday. "The national average for the ratio of sacks to pressures was 17. 2% in 2024-25 -- meaning, basically one in six pressures turned into sacks on average -- but Mendoza far exceeded that (in a bad way) both years.