So… it’s been a fun offseason so far. Eh, Raiders fans?
The Maxx Crosby trade that wasn’t, and the corresponding moves to improve the franchise, have put the Raiders in an interesting position they haven’t seen in a while. A team with exactly one winning record and one playoff berth in the last nine seasons (2021 for both) are all of a sudden in a spot to be at least frisky in the 2026 season, and more for all the right reasons than with a structure that isn’t sustainable.
Having Josh McDaniels as your head coach is like holding a grenade in your hand and not knowing if and when it will go off, Antonio Pierce didn’t stand a chance with what he had, and Pete Carroll was unfortunately in the Van Halen/Gary Cherone phase of his estimable timeline when he signed on in 2025. Now, it’s Klint Kubiak’s turn to try, and based on my experience as a Seattle resident who’s covered the Seahawks since 2010, I have reason to believe that Kubiak will have a much better handle on things.
It will help that the team did a lot to shore things up in free agency. Center Tyler Linderbaum was the deal they needed to make, cost be damned, and the additions of lesser-known players who can consistently contribute in their own ways, like edge-rusher Kwity Paye, receiver Jalen Nailor, and linebackers Quay Walker and Nakobe Dean, give boosts where needed.
We obviously know how the first overall pick in the draft will go, and we’ll get into that in a second, but beyond the addition of the hopeful franchise quarterback there, how can Kubiak, GM John Spytek, new defensive coordinator Rob Leonard, and everybody else in the building move things further in the right direction?
With my own amateur tape study, a bunch of metrics, and half a handle on what the team still needs to be competitive, here’s one seven-round path to better days.
Round 1, Pick 1 (1): Fernando Mendoza, QB, Indiana
We already know about this guy. Mendoza brings an appealing skill set to the NFL in that he can do just about everything you need to do as a thrower and as a processor, and he’s functionally mobile enough to get things done in that regard. He reminds me of Matt Ryan overall, and the ultimate version of Mendoza could be the 2016 MVP version of Matt Ryan after Kyle Shanahan taught Ryan to get on the move as a passer. Kubiak’s offense features a lot of those traits and characteristics (more on this as we go through all seven rounds), and Mendoza should benefit right away from all of that.
Spytek has said all of the right things about creating the right ecosystem around his quarterback, and the Raiders have already taken steps in the right direction.
“I think you want to limit the amount of pressure you have on that guy from the start,” Spytek remarked at the scouting combine. “Now, if you have a young quarterback, I’m not necessarily in favor of running him out there right away either, so another quality player that can play the quarterback position if you have a young quarterback. And obviously, a great offensive line, a run game, all the things that can limit his chances to really get killed. And a great defense too, because if he doesn’t feel like he’s got to go out there and score 35 points every week, I think that’s helpful.”
Based on Mendoza’s body of work, I think the pressure ease will be more about what’s around Mendoza than giving him any short of redshirt time. And I think that Mendoza will be able to handle it credibly from the start.
Round 2, Pick 4 (36): KC Concepcion, WR, Texas A&M
Now, on to Mr. Mendoza’s targets. Adding Jalen Nailor with a three-year, $35.03 million contract with $18 million guaranteed is a nice step in the right direction, but as there isn’t a No. 1 receiver on this roster, and you may have to squint a bit to see a full-on No. 2, there’s more to be done. In Kubiak’s offense with all its condensed formations, motion, and receiver distribution and location (a favorite Greg Cosell phrase), I think that Texas A&M’s KC Concepcion would be a force multiplier right away.
Last season for the Aggies, the 6’0”, 196-pound Concepcion caught 61 passes on 101 targets (yes, seven drops) for 919 yards and nine touchdowns, and he was an explosive play waiting to happen when he did catch the ball anywhere on the field. It makes your quarterback’s job a lot easier when he has a receiver who averages 15.1 yards after catch on throws behind the line of scrimmage as Concepcion did last season, and on throws of 20 or more air yards, he caught eight passes on 21 targets for 240 yards and two touchdowns.
What makes Concepcion more than your usual gadget player is his relative fearlessness when contact is converging. Get him with a JUGS machine, and he could be Kubiak’s main man with all the tricky stuff.
Round 3, Pick 2 (67): Treydan Stukes, DB, Arizona
Now onto the defensive side of the ball. Kubiak made the point at the scouting combine that Rob Leonard has experience coaching under Brian Flores and Mike Macdonald, and as diametrically opposed as those approaches are (Macdonald is more married to schematic consistency, while Flores runs a ton of zone behind a petri-dish series of fronts), there’s one thing you know about defenses of any stripe: If you don’t have the right kinds of defensive backs, it doesn’t matter how evolved your fronts may be.
Arizona’s Treydan Stukes could help in a couple of different ways. Overall last season, the 6’1”, 190-pound Stukes allowed 23 catches on 39 targets for 213 yards, 130 yards after the catch, no touchdowns, four interceptions, six pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 34.4.
So, the metrics are impressive, but what makes Stukes an important addition to any modern NFL defense is his ability to match and carry receivers from the slot or field outside cornerback all the way to the deep third. As the Raiders continue to add to what has been a seriously undermanned secondary, those “glue guys” who can shine in multiple spots become crucial.
Round 4, Pick 2 (102): Malachi Fields, WR, Notre Dame
Forget about all the fancy scheme crap for a second — when you’re a quarterback, there are times when you need to just hurl the damned ball in the general direction of your biggest receiver and hope he can change the math on one of those 50/50 balls.
The 6’4 1/2”, 218-pound Malachi Fields (who looked more like a 230-pounder on the field) caught 32 passes on 62 targets for the Fighting Irish in 2025 for 630 yards and five touchdowns, and while a 58.1% catch rate won’t get anyone excited, you have to watch Fields’ tape and take the efficiency in context. More often than not, Fields was tasked with making circus catches with angry defenders all over him, and he wasn’t exactly cooking on those routes with 4.61 speed. Still, he got it done more than he didn’t, and the degree of difficulty (both in a physical sense, and in a “Will my quarterback throw the ball anywhere near me?” sense mitigates those concerns to a large degree.
If you think of Fields as almost a big receiver/tight end hybrid from a physical perspective, the fit may make more sense, but regardless, he has the juice to make more than one game-saving catch for a team that could well have more games to save in 2026.
(From Minnesota Vikings) Round 4, Pick 17 (117): Chris McClellan, DI, Missouri
So, we know that Leonard will roll a 3-4 defense out there in structure, though in the modern NFL, those front designations are far murkier than they used to be. No matter what, the Raiders need some additional attack defenders in the middle of those fronts, and when I saw Chris McClellan’s name pop up here in the PFF Mock Draft Simulator, it took me exactly 0.3 seconds to drop the hammer on that one.
Put simply, I want this guy in any front I’m running.
Last season, the 6’4”, 313-pound McClellan totaled five sacks, 21 total pressures,28 solo tackles, 27 stops, and three tackles for loss. Fitting for a 3-4 player, McClellan did that with 42% of his snaps at nose tackle, 51% as a three-tech, and the rest over the tackles. So, you know that he has gap versatility, and no matter where he lines up, McClellan at his best has the kind of speed, quickness, and technique to bowl blockers over, or to outflank them with gap stunts that make him valuable in any front. If he can add to his hand usage and leverage when he has the benefit of NFL coaching, I think that McClellan has the tools to be a real force in the middle.
Round 4, Pick 34 (134): Mikail Kamara, DL, Indiana
Now with Maxx Crosby and Kwity Paye as their two primary edge defenders, the Raiders are set up pretty well. It doesn’t hurt to have Tyree Wilson and Malcolm Koonce as rotational pieces, either. One addition I would love to see to those fronts is a guy with true inside/outside versatility, in that he’s just as comfortable on either side of the tackles. If you have that kind of player on your defense, it opens all kinds of interesting possibilities.
Mikail Kamara, one of Curt Cignetti’s James Madison-to-Indiana transfers, fits that role very well. Last season for the national champs, the 6’1”, 262-pound Kamara had two sacks, 59 total pressures, 18 solo tackles, 19 stops, and six tackles for loss. If you’re turning up your nose at the sack total, don’t — Kamara had 10 sacks and 68 total pressures for the Hoosiers in 2024, and he played though a shoulder stinger through most of last season.
I’m more interested what a guy who weighs 260 and hits like he’s 280 can do in the NFL. Maybe the Raiders will be, as well.
Round 5, Pick 35 (175): Hezekiah Masses, CB, Cal
DB2 in our mock is one of those players whose slide in perception is a mystery to me. How is it that Cal’s Hezekiah Masses, a 6’1”, 179-pound cornerback from a major program, who allows 30 catches on 61 targets in 2025 for 413 yards, 125 yards after the catch, four touchdowns, five interceptions, 13 pass breakups, and an opponent passer rating of 59.0 be this far down in any mock draft simulator?
I get that the four touchdowns allowed is a red flag, but after auditing those plays, I would say that one was the result of a coverage breakdown, and the others were tight plays that could have gone either way. I would also like to see Masses become more of a receiver when the ball is in his vicinity — it’s great that he led the nation with 18 pass breakups, but he could have had 10 picks with a bit of work in that department. Maybe the tackling isn’t the best, but if you’re breaking up this many potential catches, the need to tackle is less of a thing.
Bottom line: Hezekiah Masses will likely be somebody’s third-day steal, and the Raiders would certainly appreciate a few of those.
Round 6, Pick 4 (185): Nolan Rucci, OT, Penn State
Now on to an offensive line already fortified with Linderbaum and ostensible guard Spencer Burford. With Kolton Miller at left tackle and Jackson Powers-Johnson at right guard, it would seem that 4/5 of what was an unmitigated disaster last season has been… well, if not “fixed,” at least pointed in a better direction. I would still look for depth with potential starting talent in the later rounds of this draft, and I would start with Penn State tackle Nolan Rucci, who would seem to be an ideal fit in Kubiak’s zone run concepts, and passing ideas designed to get the quarterback on the move to a degree.
Last season, the 6’8”, 301-pound Rucci allowed one sack and 16 total pressures in 302 pass-blocking reps, and had some nice run-blocking reps, especially as Penn State’s season progressed. Like anybody at his height, Rucci will need to mind his pad level and leverage, and he might benefit from a few protein shakes. But right tackle is the Great Unknown for the Raiders right now, and Rucci does have the profile to work into that in time.
(From Buffalo Bills) Round 6, Pick 27 (208): Micah Morris, OG, Georgia
Let’s say that Burford proves to be an acceptable left guard, which is what the Raiders told you they’re hoping for with that one-year, $3.255 million deal with $2.745 million guaranteed. Barring a major uptick in performance, he’s probably not the long-term solution. In that case, I would like to see the team take a flyer here on Georgia’s Micah Morris.
In 2025, while left tackle Monroe Freeling was showing off all of his unfinished potential, Morris held that side of the line together. He allowed no sacks and four total pressures in 426 pass-blocking reps (which is consistent; he didn’t allow a single sack with the Bulldogs in five years overall and three as a starter), and when he was on point, the run-blocking was serious business. The 6’4”, 330ish-pound Morris is a couple of fixes away from a possible bright future in the NFL, and he’s shown the ability to lay defenders to waste (at times) as a stationary or move blocker in the zone concepts Kubiak holds dear.
Goodness knows, the athletic testing was off the charts.
Round 7, Pick 3 (219): Eli Heidenreich, FB/WR, Navy
Now, let’s deal with the Most Interesting Man in the 2026 draft, and how he might fit like a glove in Kubiak’s offense. In 2025, Navy FB/WR Eli Heidenreich totaled 499 rushing yards and three touchdowns on just 77 carries, and he caught 51 passes on 79 targets for 941 yards and six touchdowns. Now, Heidenreich wasn’t just catching the swings and screens and rail routes you’d expect from a guy spending most of his time in the backfield, because he didn’t spend most of his time in the backfield. He was there just 13% of the time last season, with 31% as an outside receiver, and the rest of the time in the slot, or as an H-back aligned to the formation.
Heidenreich isn’t a running back in the traditional sense, but the Raiders already have that covered with that Ashton Jeanty guy. His skill set varies from explosive runs on sweeps to coordinated and targeted blocking to legit route concepts outside. Heidenreich had 15 explosive receptions last season, and it came on go balls, seam balls, corner routes, deep overs… you name it.
Strength of competition and measurables concerns will drop Heidenreich in the draft (no, he’s not the next Christian McCaffrey), but given the ways in which Kubiak loves to attach players to his run concepts with two backs on the field, and the fact that he can disguise those intentions with Heidenreich lined up as a threat receiver pre-snap, I’d be utterly fascinated to see how this particular combination of player and scheme would work.
How does this mock draft sit with you, Raiders readers? Sound off in the comments below!
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