Fernando Mendoza keeps saying all the right things, but the Las Vegas Raiders rookie quarterback knows the real test begins when the games start.
Mendoza is saying all the right things but is that a problem?
The former Indiana superstar is two days into training camp with the Raiders, and he has already mastered the first skill every rookie quarterback needs: talking around the interesting questions.
The No. 1 overall pick has already mastered the microphone…
Asked directly about the quarterback competition with Kirk Cousins, Aidan O’Connell and Jacob Clark, a scenario with real professional stakes for him personally, Mendoza offered a version of the answer every rookie has given in that spot since the invention of the microphone. “We’re all trying to bring each other’s standards up,” he said, before pivoting to trust in the coaching staff and a promise to focus on “the next rep.”
It’s not an incorrect answer but it’s not really an answer either.
And that wasn’t a one-off. Ask him about learning from Maxx Crosby, a perennial Pro Bowler who plays a position with nothing in common with quarterback, and he reaches for words like leadership and mentality instead of anything Crosby has actually told him. You then ask him about Klint Kubiak’s scheme, and he’ll tell you the run game complements the pass game, which is true of roughly half the offenses in football. Later, you ask him whether he needs to be the Week 1 starter, and he’ll tell you there’s no “one guy,” it’s “a collective effort,” he’s just “taking a following role right now.”
Diplomatic, sure. Informative, not really.
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Maybe we should give the Raiders rookie a break…
To be fair, this is basically what a rookie quarterback is supposed to say in July. If Mendoza came out two days into camp calling shots or picking a fight with a 37-year-old veteran, that would be the actual red flag, not the caution he’s showing now.
He did offer one genuine nugget: talking about the age gap between himself and Cousins, then between himself and a 20-year-old teammate, he at least admitted that the locker room dynamics of an NFL rookie season look nothing like what he had at Indiana.
Still, noticing a dynamic isn’t the same as telling you how he’s handling it. Two days into camp, Mendoza sounds like a guy who’s been well coached on what not to say, and maybe that’s smart. But eventually the football has to answer the questions the interviews won’t.
For now, “focus on the next rep” is carrying more of the conversation than Fernando Mendoza is.
*Top Photo: Ramble Illustration/Getty Images