PHOENIX \u2014 The owners meetings are underway, and so are the final takeaways of March. Let\u2019s roll \u2026<\/p>\n
Las Vegas Raiders<\/p>\n
Everything\u2019s been pretty quiet on the Raiders and how they\u2019ll spend the No. 1 pick. That\u2019s for good reason. Most people assume that it\u2019s a foregone conclusion that they\u2019ll select Indiana\u2019s Heisman Trophy\u2013winning national champion Fernando Mendoza. And I certainly wouldn\u2019t dispute the idea that his wait on April 23 to determine his next football destination will be very, very short (as in less than 10 minutes).<\/p>\n
But I also wouldn\u2019t mistake that lack of buzz for any lack of work done.<\/p>\n
Because while Mendoza will almost certainly be a Raider, this hasn\u2019t been some coronation.<\/p>\n
What it has been, with three weeks and three days to go until draft day, is a deep and thorough vetting, and one that a bunch of other quarterbacks have been a part of over the past six months, too. With his play in the fall and through January, Mendoza has earned his spot atop the general public\u2019s hypothetical 2026 draft board<\/a>. With what\u2019s happened since, he\u2019s in the process of working to confirm his place atop the Raiders\u2019 actual draft board.<\/p>\n So to kick off the column this morning, here\u2019s a look at how he\u2019s gotten there:\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2022 Going into the 2025 season, and after dealing for Geno Smith as a bridge quarterback, the Raiders had a pretty good idea that \u201926 might be the draft where they find their triggerman of the future. So they got eyes on those guys early. Assistant GM Brian Stark was in Oregon to see Ducks star Dante Moore square off against Mendoza in October. GM John Spytek saw Oklahoma\u2019s John Mateer live against Auburn in September. He and Stark saw Cincinnati\u2019s Brendan Sorsby against TCU in November. Senior personnel executive Anthony Patch and college director Brandon Yeargan saw guys like Alabama\u2019s Ty Simpson, too.<\/p>\n And as the season wound down, Spytek himself got shots to hone in on Mendoza, seeing him live on a frigid night at Purdue on Nov. 28 (the night before the Cincinnati-TCU game), then again against Oregon in the Peach Bowl on Jan. 9 (where he saw Moore, too), and a third time in the national title game (with minority owner Tom Brady alongside him) against Miami.<\/p>\n \u2022 During Indiana\u2019s run, the Raiders moved on from Pete Carroll and hired Klint Kubiak, who dove right into the quarterback-vetting process, one that would have Spytek, his scouts and Kubiak and his coaches at the point now, two months later, where those in the inner circle have all watched every snap Mendoza played both at Cal and Indiana. What they saw was a player who consistently got better\u2014maybe best evidenced this past year by the drop in his sack numbers, a result of being on a better team, yes, but also a quarterback playing faster.<\/p>\n And as that study intensified, the door opened to get to know Mendoza personally, too.<\/p>\n The first shot the Raiders had to do that was with a formal meeting at the combine, where they saw an authentic (if different) and driven kid with a maniacal work ethic, which basically confirmed what Las Vegas had already gathered from the coaches at both of Mendoza\u2019s schools.<\/p>\n \u2022 The next step actually comes this week. After wrapping up here at the owners meetings on Tuesday, Spytek and Kubiak will fly to Indiana for Mendoza\u2019s pro day on Wednesday, with Stark, Yeargan, VP of player personnel Brandon Hunt, offensive coordinator Andrew Janocko and quarterbacks coach Mike Sullivan meeting them there. They\u2019ll watch his workout, with the rest of the team, then have a whiteboard meeting and a dinner with him.<\/p>\n In going through these things, when a team and player are this far down the line, these sorts of get-togethers can double as de facto offensive installations, to give the rookie-to-be a better shot to hit the ground running when he reports in May.<\/p>\n That work can also be done through the three one-hour Zooms the Raiders are allowed with Mendoza. They\u2019ve already done one. The plan is to do the other two in April.<\/p>\n \u2022 Then, next week, the Raiders will bring Mendoza to Vegas on his 30 visit, when they\u2019ll be able to introduce him to those in and around the team, and build off the other meetings, in trying to dot every i and cross every t.<\/p>\n And that, of course, is the whole idea here\u2014every stone needs to be turned over.<\/p>\n The decision to take a quarterback that high in the draft generally means tying your job security to a guy, and having the level of confidence to do that with a player takes a lot of time.<\/p>\n Rest assured, the Raiders are putting plenty of time into it.<\/p>\n Wide receiver contracts<\/p>\n My last thought on Jaxon Smith-Njigba\u2019s monster contract: What will this do to the market at other positions? I think it\u2019s safe to say, and obvious, that Smith-Njigba\u2019s four-year, $168.6 million extension will materially affect Puka Nacua\u2019s contract situation with the Rams, the same way Myles Garrett\u2019s deal did for T.J. Watt last year, or Micah Parsons did for Aidan Hutchinson, or Ja\u2019Marr Chase did for JSN himself.<\/p>\n But what\u2019s interesting to me here is how this could change the mindset of players and their agents at premium positions that haven\u2019t quite kept the pace.<\/p>\n Different teams have different viewpoints on this, but I\u2019d say the general feeling among NFL decision-makers is that there are five real premium positions: quarterback, offensive tackle (and specifically left tackle), receiver, pass rusher (usually an edge, but sometimes DTs like Aaron Donald and Chris Jones are grouped in) and corner.<\/p>\n At this point, there are four edge rushers and two receivers with deals carrying a new-money APY (average per year) topping $40 million. Meanwhile, Laremy Tunsil is the only offensive tackle topping $30 million per year, and he\u2019s just above it, and the top corner, new Ram Trent McDuffie, is \u201conly\u201d making $31 million per year, with just two other guys at the position, Sauce Gardner and Derek Stingley Jr., joining him in the 30s.<\/p>\n So if you\u2019re, say, Devon Witherspoon in Seattle or Christian Gonzalez in New England\u2014two 2023 first-rounders who\u2019ve become top-shelf corners, and balled out in the Super Bowl\u2014are you asking for $32 million to get past McDuffie? Or are you asking for a leap that gets the position closer to the other top nonquarterbacks? If you\u2019re Paris Johnson Jr. in Arizona, or Joe Alt next year with the Chargers, are you O.K. with getting a tick over Tunsil, or are you going for the bigger bag? And how about Trent Williams this offseason in San Francisco?<\/p>\n A lot of this, of course, is going to come down to what the players are really looking for. Some, understandably, are willing to give a little to get to the payday. But if there\u2019s a Darrelle Revis (the businessman<\/a>, not the player) in the group \u2026 some of these could get messy.<\/p>\n NFL-NFLRA negotiation<\/p>\n Recapping the NFL-NFLRA tit-for-tat this week reveals they\u2019re a ways off<\/a>. The two sides were scheduled to have a two-day meeting last week, starting Thursday in the Fort Lauderdale area. How did that go? Well, everyone was gone by noon the first day, with the NFL Referees Association saying that it presented the league with a counter-offer, asked for a response and had NFL negotiator\/executive Larry Ferazani tell them he wasn\u2019t authorized to give them one.<\/p>\n The NFL\u2019s claims have been that the NFLRA is pushing back on quality-control measures to hold officials accountable for their performance, and that the referee\u2019s union wants salary increases at a percentage basis that doubles what players have gotten over their past two CBAs. The NFLRA vehemently denies that. Usually, the truth is somewhere in the middle.<\/p>\n Anyway, there are a few things that we know to be of issue other than just economics.<\/p>\n One is that the NFL wants to shorten the offseason dead period, and have it end in April, rather than mid-May (this year, it\u2019s May 15), so they can do more work in the offseason to train and equip the officials for the fall. The NFLRA has asked for detail on what the plan would be for that extra time, given that players don\u2019t go into OTAs, when officials start working practices, until the end of May.<\/p>\n The NFLRA has also asked why the NFL has gone from having three in-season seminars to only one\u2014a decision they suspect was budgetary. And perhaps an example of the NFL not prioritizing the training of and communication with officials.<\/p>\n The NFL, meanwhile, claims that the NFLRA has been stubborn and stuck in the areas where it\u2019s looking to enhance performance.<\/p>\n And, of course, the money\u2019s an issue.<\/p>\n Anyway, the NFL has now reached out to Division II and III college conferences it has relationships with, to tell them to have officials ready to replace the NFLRA guys if a deal can\u2019t be hammered out by the August kickoff to the preseason. The NFL, for a bunch of reasons, can\u2019t just dip into the Big 10 or SEC pool. The league\u2019s also voting on a proposal that is purely for the contingency of a lockout, where they can use expanded replay power from New York to correct calls made by replacement officials.<\/p>\n That\u2019s important beyond just the obvious reasons because part of the NFLRA\u2019s leverage is the embarrassment the league suffered in 2012 in a similar fight, which means the owners are essentially voting to give themselves more leverage in the negotiations this week.<\/p>\n Still, you\u2019d think that everyone would be doing all they can to avoid a repeat of 2012.<\/p>\n We\u2019ll see if that\u2019s actually how they operate in this case.<\/p>\n Cleveland Browns<\/p>\n My buddy Conor Orr wrote this week that the Browns should trade Myles Garrett<\/a>, and, as wild as it sounds, I wholeheartedly agree with him. I actually wrote at the trade deadline that they should do it\u2014I know they disagreed with me at that point\u2014and my overarching reason for it remains the same as it was then.<\/p>\n The Browns\u2019 timeline doesn\u2019t really match up with Garrett\u2019s.<\/p>\n If you presume the quarterback of the future isn\u2019t on the roster right now\u2014and that\u2019s with all due respect to Deshaun Watson, Shedeur Sanders and Dillon Gabriel\u2014then we\u2019re talking about it being 2027 before that guy arrives, and that guy potentially being a rookie then. On top of that, next year, they\u2019d also be dealing with nearly $90 million in dead money assigned to the position, with the cap debt the Browns pushed forward coming due.<\/p>\n On the flip side, the Browns have two first-round picks, giving them three picks in the top 40 in April, which gives them a real chance to build on last year\u2019s rock-solid class, headed by DROY Carson Schwesinger, Mason Graham, Quinshon Judkins, Harold Fannin Jr. and Dylan Sampson. If they can do that, they\u2019ll have a nice, young core, with lean contracts, going into 2027, playing around whoever the quarterback is.<\/p>\n So that would mean the target for all this to really take flight would be 2028. Garrett will start that season at 32 years old and finish it at 33. And that begs the question: Is it best for everyone if Garrett is traded, the Browns grab even more capital to pour into their young core, and really lean into the rebuild, and the reigning Defensive Player of the Year<\/a> can go chase a championship somewhere else?<\/p>\n I know the Browns\u2019 answer<\/a>, at this point, would be no, understandably.<\/p>\n But I think I\u2019d lean toward saying yes.<\/p>\n Baltimore Ravens<\/p>\n