The Fantasy Football Implications of Fernando Mendoza to the Raiders

With the first overall selection of the 2026 NFL Draft, the Las Vegas Raiders bring quarterback Fernando Mendoza to the (hypothetical) podium. Much like the two previous No. 1 picks (Caleb Williams, Cam Ward), there was never really any doubt who would kick off Thursday night’s festivities at any point throughout the pre-Draft process. Mendoza will join a number of new faces in Allegiant Stadium this season, including head coach Klint Kubiak and offensive coordinator Andrew Janocko, both of whom are fresh off a Super Bowl victory with the Seattle Seahawks.

Let’s take a look at how this triumvirate can impact the fantasy football landscape in Sin City.

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Fernando Mendoza Prospect Profile

Coming out of high school in the Miami area, Fernando Mendoza was a two-star recruit, with most of his initial scholarship offers coming from Ivy League schools, and he eventually briefly committed to Yale. Before he had a chance to head up to Connecticut, he received a last-minute offer from Cal, where he would redshirt in 2022 before starting the next two seasons with promising, if not stellar, results.

Prior to his entry into the transfer portal, Mendoza was viewed as a prospect who would flash from time to time but needed to cut back on some untimely risks and increase his efficiency to finish drives in the end zone. With some question marks in scouts' eyes prior to the 2025 season, Mendoza was often projected behind the likes of Cade Klubnik, Garrett Nussmeier, and Drew Allar in terms of potential NFL Draft positioning, typically mocked somewhere in the late first or early second round.

Cutting back on some ill-advised tight window throws is something a quarterback can control all on his own, but an injection of talent around him would certainly go a long way toward boosting nearly every other aspect of his game. Mendoza was operating with a very good tight end in Jack Endries —who also transferred following the 2024 season— in his final season with Cal, but Indiana provided him with a massive offensive line boost and two wide receivers who are likely to go on Day 1 (Omar Cooper Jr.) and Day 2 (Elijah Sarratt) of this same NFL Draft. Mendoza already had the requisite arm strength, so it was time to see what he could do with a great supporting cast.

Fernando Mendoza is a machine throwing out routes. Quick outs, slot outs, field outs, dropbacks, RPOs, you name it. He constantly gets the ball out promptly and with outside ball placement. pic.twitter.com/wQCfTjvvF7

— Nate Tice (@Nate_Tice) April 9, 2026

In Curt Cignetti’s 11 personnel-heavy, RPO-loving, explosive offense, Mendoza set the college world alight. On the back of a 3,500-yard, 41-touchdown, Heisman-winning season, there was no doubt who the real QB1 in this Draft class was, and he created such a gap between himself and the rest of his contemporaries that there’s a good chance we don’t even see another option take legitimate NFL starter snaps in 2026.

While it’s arguable that Indiana’s intense reliance on RPOs (26% of their throws in ‘25, the highest rate in the country) created an outsized amount of “easy” reads for its quarterback, Mendoza’s next-level ball placement was on display regardless of how far down his progressions he needed to go.

79 seconds of Fernando Mendoza backshoulder completions pic.twitter.com/vhv13CDilF

— Ian Hartitz (@Ihartitz) February 10, 2026

Per Pro Football Focus’ numbers, Mendoza had the second-highest adjusted completion percentage (54.5%) among draft-eligible quarterbacks on throws of 20+ yards, finishing number one in NFL passer rating on such throws (130.1). On intermediate throws of 10-19 yards, he replicated that success by finishing fifth (68.6%) and third (120.0), respectively, in those same two categories. Sports Info Solutions’ statistics back up that same deep-accurate depiction, as he finished with a 68% on-target rate on passes both outside the hashes and 10+ yards down the field, a number that is rarely reached by NFL quarterbacks on any type of a consistent basis.

We saw a great arm on display, and some as-yet unmentioned rushing ability (276 yards, seven rushing touchdowns in ‘25), but what we haven’t seen is traditional, under-center, play-action quarterbacking. That’s a typical story for most modern collegiate quarterbacks, but it is most especially the case for Fernando Mendoza. Over the entire course of Indiana’s National Championship-winning season, the QB was tasked with only two total snaps from under center, and while an RPO is by definition a potential passing play with the defense out of position, turning your back to the defense to sell the run isn’t quite the same.

So how will that impact his early-career production in a Klint Kubiak offense?

What to Expect from Fernando Mendoza and the Raiders Offense in 2026

While the Indiana offense is described as a “pro style” scheme, Mendoza almost couldn’t have gone to a more “under center” professional situation than under Kubiak. Throughout the Seahawks’ Super Bowl-winning campaign, Sam Darnold took a dropback with a play-action element on 27.4%, the fifth-highest mark in the league, while his 176 under-center dropbacks were the third-highest mark.

As mentioned by NFL Insider Tom Pelissero in his league-wide dive on thoughts about this incoming quarterback class;

“Mendoza is facing a significant transition from the Hoosiers’ run-pass-option-heavy scheme to Kubiak’s offense, which emphasizes under-center QB play and play-action. And Kubiak has made clear publicly that he prefers to give a rookie time to develop before playing him. The Raiders made an affirmative move to provide it by signing four-time Pro Bowl QB Kirk Cousins, whose personality and play style have led several scouts to refer to Mendoza as Tall Kirk Cousins.”

Not to downplay Pelissero’s remarks or the difficulty of getting out of one’s comfort zone by taking snaps so close to the trenches, but we’ve seen a successful transition in that regard very recently. In those aforementioned play-action/under-center Darnold statistics, only two players finished above him in both instances: Matthew Stafford and Caleb Williams. Williams, who had attempted only seven passes from under center through his college career, finished as fantasy’s QB7 (18.7 FPPG) in his first year matched with Ben Johnson, and though Williams and Mendoza are nowhere near a 1v1 comparison stylistically, it was a great example of how quickly these guys can slide into a new alignment.

Then again, that was Williams’ sophomore season, and he also went into 2024 as the Week 1 starter. Things could be a little trickier for Mendoza in that regard.

Comp update: Kirk Cousins will sign a five-year, $172 million deal with the Raiders that in reality is a one-year, fully-guaranteed $20 million deal that also contains a club option for two years at $80M.



The Falcons will pay Cousins $8.7 million this season, the Raiders another… pic.twitter.com/MHYqOOfBs7

— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) April 2, 2026

Those are obviously some big numbers for a backup quarterback, but with only one guaranteed year and the Falcons eating $8.7M, the Raiders are essentially paying Kirk Cousins $13M, which would land him smack in the middle of what Malik Willis and Marcus Mariota earned this offseason. Which is to say, the team could opt to begin the Mendoza Era as early as Week 4, depending on how things are looking with the veteran handling the offense.

If that’s one of the better-case scenarios, it means we’ll get to see a lot of the former Hossier in Year 1 of his professional journey, but it’s not likely enough to put him in the fantasy redraft consciousness. The Raiders have a much better infrastructure than even a couple of years ago, but though top-tier options at tight end (Brock Bowers), running back (Ashton Jeanty), and center (Tyler Linderbaum) will absolutely insulate the rookie as he grows, this wide receiver room (Jack Bech, Tre Tucket, Jalen Nailor, etc.) still needs a lot of work to capitalize on turning good throws into great plays.

Fernando Mendoza isn’t the type of prospect that you need to coddle, but it would still make a lot of sense for Kubiak and Andrew Janocko to lean on Jeanty and the run game, particularly after their massive success with the third-highest rush rate in the league last season with Seattle. And while Mendoza proved that he can work on the move, and had a respectable 6.2% scramble rate, we’re not likely to see enough rushing usage to push him out of “streaming QB” range when he does officially take over.

We should expect at least a bit of a learning curve as well, especially given how he and his receivers won down the field at Indiana. Not to take away from Mendoza's ball placement, but so many of his receivers were "ball winners", with Charlie Becker and Elijah Sarratt being his go-to options on "50-50" balls. There will be big questions about who the Raiders currently have in their wide receiver group who can operate, let alone win, in that capacity.

Bottom Line

• Fernando Mendoza enters the league as the hands-down most polished passer in this class, but his early fantasy outlook is tied heavily to situation and timing. The transition from an RPO-heavy system to a more traditional, under-center, play-action offense isn’t insignificant, and the Raiders have the flexibility to bring him along slowly if they choose.
• There’s a realistic path for Mendoza to take over as early as the first month of the season, but it wouldn’t be surprising if this turns into a half-year development window before he’s handed the keys. Either way, the lack of high-end wide receiver talent and a likely run-heavy approach will cap his immediate upside.
• The presence of both Cousins and Mendoza should help stabilize the fantasy floors of Brock Bowers and Ashton Jeanty, but the rest of this pass-catching group is best treated as wait-and-see options as the offense takes shape.
• Mendoza’s pre-Draft Underdog ADP currently sits around QB28, in the 13th or 14th round. This feels more than appropriate given the uncertainty surrounding his rookie-year role, but he is a stud of a QB3 selection given his upside. In typical 1QB redraft formats, he’s more of a wait-and-see streaming option once he takes over, but in Superflex leagues, the draft capital and long-term stability make him more intriguing in the QB25 range.