Fernando Mendoza's Raiders Debut Did Not Disappoint
The Las Vegas Raiders first overall draft selection Fernando Mendoza saw the field in their first preseason game of the new year. Mendoza looked great overall with moments of true promise, other not so promising moments.
Video Transcript
Finally, we got to see Fernando Mendoza in action, and it did not disappoint.
I'm Justin Church of AZ Sports Las Vegas, and Mendoza was pretty good on Thursday, all things considered.
Obviously, the first drive didn't go exactly how you'd want.
There was a penalty that kinda derailed the whole attempt, and then things-- bullets were kinda just flying.
And you really expect that for the first, drive of his NFL career where everything's sped up, and there are gonna be a little bit of jit-jitters.
No matter what quarterback tells you there's not jitters, there's gonna be jitters for your first ever, you know, snap in an NF-NFL game, even if it's pre-season.
And then, in the second drive, we really start to see him settle in.
And that drive was orchestrated perfectly.
Fernando Mendoza ended up finding Jack Besh in the end zone, for-- on a six-yard slant for Jack Besh's first touchdown.
Obviously, it doesn't count, it's pre-season, but you get the, the idea.
And then from there on out, Mendoza was pretty good.
He had the throw to Malik Benson in a really tight window between four defenders.
But there were also some bad things.
He got hit really hard, and it looked like that was gonna be the point where Klint Kubiak said, "All right, enough is enough.
He's got enough reps. Let's take him out."
He didn't get rid of the ball.
He didn't get rid of it quick enough, I should say.
And so really, there is a learning curve between college and NFL, and we talk about it all the time in pro sports.
The league is so much faster than college, and it's really not close.
Obviously, you can have a preference of which one you'd rather watch.
College can sometimes be more entertaining, and right now it seems like there's more parity than ever in college sports because of NIL.
But then you go to the NFL side of things, and all of the best players to ever play college football are now in the NFL, and they're all together on thirty-two teams.
The competition is tougher.
The teams are better.
The players are better.
Everything is harder.
And so when Mendoza was asked, you know, what stood out, about the speed of the game, the difference in the speed of the game?
You know, there was a moment when he tried to get the edge and possibly take off, and he just wasn't quite fast enough, which we know the mobility for him isn't really his thing.
He said, he had a moment, it was actually pretty funny, in the press conference after the game, he said, "Wow, these guys are a lot faster."
And they are.
But it's good to see him notice that in real time and kind of adapt his game and kind of figure out, "Okay, like, next time I need to get the ball out a little bit quicker here because this guy is coming off the edge a lot faster than maybe, another guy who was just in the game," you know, et cetera, et cetera.
Mendoza did a fantastic job of adapting to the speed of the game, and you wouldn't even notice, that he was a rookie at times.
Honestly, there were times where Fernando Mendoza looked like a veteran that was just playing his first game of the season and just trying to, get back in the flow of things.
There wasn't really ever a moment where you're like, "Yep, that's a rookie play," because he, he just didn't make those kind of plays.
So it's gonna be interesting to see, what happens in these next two preseason games.
Obviously, the practice this week with the Houston Texans is gonna be huge.
They have the best defense possibly in the league.
Yeah, and we'll see if he starts getting some more run with the ones.
We do know that Fernando Mendoza looks to be the, the, the real deal, and it's only a matter of time before he becomes the starting quarterback in the franchise of this team.
