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The 2026 NFL<\/a> Draft is a few weeks away, and all eyes are on the Las Vegas Raiders<\/a> with the No. 1 overall pick and whether they\u2019ll take former Indiana Hoosiers<\/a> QB, Fernando Mendoza.<\/p>\n Over the offseason, the Raiders have done their best to bolster the offensive line with the arrival of Tyler Linderbaum and to upgrade their wide receiver group with the signing of Jalen Nailor. <\/p>\n If the Silver and Black do decide to select Mendoza, Nailor would be one of the targets that the rookie signal caller will be throwing the ball to. Ahead of the draft, Nailor shared his thoughts on Mendoza as many expect the 22-year-old to be the Raiders\u2019 next franchise QB. <\/p>\n \u201c[Mendoza is] a football guy,\u201d Nailor told Kay Adams on the March 19 edition of \u201cUp & Adams.\u201d<\/a> \u201cHe\u2019s a football player. He wants to win. The touch he has on his passes, those accurate passes that he makes, really pops out. <\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s a mobile quarterback; he can get on the ground and run a little bit. Just to have those aspects of him as a quarterback, he\u2019s tall as well, so seeing over the line won\u2019t be an issue. He has all the things you want in a quarterback.\u201d<\/p>\n Mendoza had a passer rating of 182.9 with 3,535 yards, 41 touchdowns, and six interceptions in 16 games in 2025,\u00a0per StatMuse<\/a>, leading to a Heisman Trophy and national title for the Hoosiers. It will be interesting to see if this production can translate over to the NFL.\u00a0<\/p>\n Jalen Nailor Explains Reason to Sign With Raiders<\/p>\n Nailor is back in a city he\u2019s very familiar with and could be catching passes from Mendoza next season. In an interview with Paul Gutierrez, Nailor, who played high school football at Bishop Gorman in Las Vegas, explained his decision to leave the Vikings<\/a> for the Raiders this offseason.<\/p>\n \u201cJust the job that [Raiders head coach Klint Kubiak] has done throughout his whole career, and the guys that he has on his staff, it\u2019s a very renowned coaching staff, and they have a lot of wisdom and experience behind them,\u201c\u00a0Nailor said in a March 13 video posted on the Raiders\u2019 YouTube channel<\/a>. \u201cThat played a major role, and I just love what Kubiak does with his offense.\u201d<\/p>\n Rich Gannon Doesn\u2019t Hold Back on Fernando Mendoza<\/p>\n With the draft drawing closer, former Raiders QB Rich Gannon shared his thoughts on the franchise selecting Mendoza and the traits he values in the player that will help him be the franchise signal caller in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n \u201c[Mendoza] came on my radio show at the Super Bowl, and there\u2019s one thing that you get an impression of a player and a person,\u201c Gannon told Raiders host Amber Theoharis in a\u00a0March 16 video from the team\u2019s YouTube channel<\/a>. \u201cHe\u2019s got presence about him. That\u2019s pretty impressive.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s very thoughtful [and] very mature; he doesn\u2019t give you canned answers. He\u2019s got a ton of energy and passion; he loves football [and] wants to learn. I think he\u2019s got a lot of the qualities and intangibles that you really love with that position.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tEduardo Razo<\/strong><\/a> Eduardo Razo is a sports writer for Heavy.com, covering the NFL, MLB, and college football. He has previously covered the NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB for NBC Sports Washington and NBC Sports Bay Area & California, and has freelanced for PSG Talk, covering Paris Saint-Germain. He also worked as an editor at Athlon Sports, focusing on MLB and the NFL. More about Eduardo Razo<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Raiders\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty (Photo by Leonardo Fernandez\/Getty Images) The 2026 NFL Draft is a few weeks away, and all eyes…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":667571,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[1318,1317,1315,1316,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-667570","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-football","11":"tag-ncaafootball","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116257763284621938","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=667570"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667570\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/667571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=667570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=667570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=667570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}