Raiders head coach Klint Kubiak hasn\u2019t made it official, but all indications have been throughout the offseason and training camp that Kirk Cousins will open the season as starting quarterback \u2014 despite the club drafting Fernando Mendoza at No. 1 overall. <\/p>\n
Mendoza flashed his potential in the preseason, though the performance was ultimately up and down.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, General Manager John Spytek noted that Mendoza has been the same kind of guy they got to know during the pre-draft process, so it\u2019s not like the team has been surprised at the way the quarterback has gone about his business.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s a tireless worker. He loves football. He loves his teammates. He\u2019s energetic on the field. He\u2019s self-critical. He\u2019s self-aware. He\u2019s very accurate,\u201d Spytek said, via transcript from the team. \u201cHis time is coming, but he\u2019s got to earn it every day, and he knows that. I think we\u2019re all very pleased with the person and his work ethic and his commitment to being a great quarterback.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the team wants to make sure Mendoza is ready before putting him on the field, Spytek cited several different quarterbacks to note that there\u2019s more than one way to develop a young QB.<\/p>\n
\u201cTom Brady, Aaron Rodgers, Jordan Love, Patrick Mahomes, Jayden Daniels. Like you said, there\u2019s success stories and failures in both ways,\u201d Spytek said. \u201cWe\u2019re just trying to build the best team we can and play the guys that are most ready to play, and have a constant competition in every room, not just the quarterback room, but every room.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe expectation always will be that the best person, the person that\u2019s earned it, the person that can do their job for the team, will be the one that plays.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mendoza completes 25-of-45 passes for 240 yards with one touchdown and two interceptions in the preseason.<\/p>\n
The Raiders will open the season at home against the Dolphins on Sept. 13.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Raiders head coach Klint Kubiak hasn\u2019t made it official, but all indications have been throughout the offseason and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":834298,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[349,99],"class_list":["post-834297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=834297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834297\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/834298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=834297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=834297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=834297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}