During his Heisman year at Indiana last season, quarterback Fernando Mendoza threw a grand total of six interceptions and none of them went the other way for a touchdown.
But against the Houston, in just his second NFL game, it took him less than seven minutes to throw his first. Midway through the first quarter, with his Las Vegas Raiders trailing 7-0, Mendoza was under pressure in the pocket. He tried to throw a short pass over the middle into tight coverage, but that coverage was tighter than he anticipted.
Wade Woodaz snagged the ball at the Texans’ 20-yard line and took it back a whopping 80 yards for a Texans touchdown to double their lead.
Welcome to the NFL
Fans on social media referred to the play as Mendoza’s “Welcome to the NFL” moment and started giving him all manner of grief over it:
“You not playing Purdue anymore buddy,” one user on X declared.
“Bro stared down his checkdown that was wide open then decided to sling that (expletive) to the middle…..” wrote another.
“Late over the middle will usually result in a pick six…lesson learned. Next time don’t try to make the pointless tackle….thats the next lesson,” a third remarked.
“That’s what happned when your forced to run an nfl playbook and not RPO all game.”
“Literally all Mendoza does is look at his first read. If he can’t find it he panics.”
Kirby Lee-Imagn Images.
Mendoza would finish the game 8-of-15 for 86 yards and a 42.6 QB rating.
Of course, throwing a pick-six early in a career isn’t really a sign of anything anymore. Lest we forget, quarterbacks Brett Favre, Sam Darnold and Jameis Winston all threw pick-sixes on the very first pass of their regular season careers and went on to enjoy varying levels of success afterwards.
That isn’t to say Mendoza is destined to be the next great NFL quarterback either. It simply means that the first interception isn’t the sign that he’s trending one way or another.
