Once upon a time, in his role as a broadcaster, legendary former Raiders' head coach John Madden said, to paraphrase, a "great quarterback is a great deodorant." To put it in plainer terms, a great quarterback can cover up a lot of things that stink on a football team. It was an obvious but spot-on sentiment from Madden, and we always see clear evidence of it.
Of all the problems the 2025 Raiders had, quarterback was a primary one. Geno Smith was legitimately one of the worst signal callers in the league by any measure you can find. Beyond Pete Carroll's strict commitment to his pet quarterback, it's not like Kenny Pickett was a markedly better option.
For the first time since 2007, the Raiders will have the No. 1 pick in this year's draft. As Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza has asserted himself as the clear best option to go first overall with his performance in the College Football Player, there are easy visions of what he'll look like in Silver and Black.
Raiders' distance from No. 1 overall pick to legit contender has been further proven
FanSided's Nick Villano has ranked each of the 18 NFL teams who missed the playoffs this season based on how close they are to contending.
The Raiders, unsurprisingly, came in at No. 18, the furthest of the non-playoff teams from being a playoff contender.
After briefly recapping some reasons things went so bad this season, Villano arrived at the bottom line for why the Raiders landed where they did on his contender spectrum.
"The Raiders will likely spend a ton of money this offseason, but they are so far away from anything that we can’t claim they are anything more than light-years away. Not only are they an untalented team compared to the rest of the league, but they aren’t getting their top coaching choice. They will have to accept what’s left after some better teams get a chance."
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While general manager John Spytek, et al will try, the roster ashes left by previous regimes, and by the Carroll-driven miscalculations dating back to last offseason, will surely be too much to overcome and make the Raiders a playoff team next year. Beyond that has at least some chance to be different.
If the Raiders draft Mendoza No. 1 overall in April, time will tell if he becomes the kind of franchise quarterback Raider Nation has been yearning for. But even if he becomes that, and does so fairly quickly, it will be hard for him to immediately be the kind of cure-all "deodorant" Madden referred to years ago.
Right now, and until there are signs the rest of the roster is better-situated, one player cannot overcome all of the Raiders' issues. Finally, and however obviously, having a young franchise quarterback is a great place to start a rebuild that will stick though. So even if legit playoff contention will remain a long way away, there is some hope to cling to there right now.