After a 3-14 season, the Las Vegas Raiders are entering the 2026 season with a chip on their shoulder. Despite starting strong by beating the Patriots in Week 1 on the road, they couldn’t keep the pace. The team went on a 10-game losing streak for the second consecutive season. Tom Brady, who has been part of the Raiders’ leadership for the past two seasons, did not shy away from the reality.

“Last year, we just underperformed in every area,” Brady said on the Stick to Football podcast. “And it’s everybody’s fault. That’s the reality. There’s nobody who did a good job. There’s not one player in the organization; there’s not anybody involved who did the job to the level that it needs to be done at. And everybody needs to improve.”

Being a minority owner of the team, Tom Brady wants solid results from his team.

Between 2015 and 2025, the Raiders have recorded only two winning seasons. The last time they won in the postseason was the 2002 season, when they advanced to the Super Bowl. And, the franchise last lifted the Lombardi Trophy in 1984. Clearly, a lot has been going wrong for the team for a long time.

In this past decade, the Raiders experimented with six head coaches before landing on Klint Kubiak, who is getting the head coaching gig for the first time in his career. And ever since former HC Josh McDaniels let Derek Carr go, the Raiders have never had a stable quarterback. The fact that Las Vegas combined for only seven wins over the past two seasons is a telling sign of how bad things were.

However, things are looking up for the Raiders now. Kubiak brings a lot of fresh perspective as a head coach to a team that seems to have tried everything at hand. Offensive coordinator Chip Kelly has been replaced by Andrew Janocko, who formerly coached quarterbacks for the Super Bowl-winning Seattle Seahawks. They also get to look forward to a franchise quarterback-in-the-making in rookie Fernando Mendoza.

Despite all the hype, former NFL scout Daniel Kelly said the Raiders made a mistake by picking Mendoza so early.

Fernando Mendoza is on alert

Mendoza is one of only two remaining first-round picks from the 2026 draft who haven’t signed their rookie contracts, along with Ty Simpson. It is a little weird to see that the Raiders haven’t made things official, even though the QB has been a regular during all offseason activities so far. However, Kelly thought the Raiders were better off with such a situation.

“As a former NFL scout, I recommend that the Raiders and Rams DO NOT sign Fernando Mendoza and Ty Simpson to their rookie deals,” Kelly said. “Save the money. Both were overhyped. Mendoza was a 4th-round NFL value on his 2025 Indiana game film. Simpson was an NFL third-round value on his 2025 Alabama game film.

“Both of their careers have been framed with expectations they can’t meet since they both were overdrafted in the 1st round; both are busts. Both have confirmed in OTAs that they are going to struggle in the NFL. ”

It would be wrong to say Mendoza never had first-round value, because draft analysts overwhelmingly had the QB tabbed as the No. 1 pick way ahead of the draft. Mendoza won the National Championship for the Indiana Hoosiers and even won the Heisman Trophy. However, he has to start from zero, now that he has gone professional.

Kelly’s criticism came after watching Mendoza’s offseason practices. His struggle was evident against the Raiders’ defense; he sometimes struggled with his timing, which led to rushed throws and broken plays. Mendoza was also adjusting to an entirely different offensive system, having overwhelmingly played shotgun.

However, no one can deny that Mendoza is the best hope Las Vegas has at turning things around. As minicamp nears, we might eventually get to see the rookie putting pen to paper.