The Las Vegas Raiders are paying QB Fernando Mendoza on a standard rookie contract, but he may not need the money.
We all know how much NIL money is changing the football landscape, and that includes the NFL and the Las Vegas Raiders. Some truly strange stories are coming out of this, and one of the strangest is a report from Matt Moret of The Athletic that quarterback Fernando Mendoza’s NIL deal was funded by billionaire Mark Cuban.
Explanations are necessary, so let’s go there. Cuban, of course, is one of the most controversial owners in pro sports, which dates back to his stint as a very active owner of the Dallas Mavericks. Many people don’t know that Cuban is also an Indiana alum, though, and that’s how this connection came about.
Specifically, Cuban told Front Office Sports that he covered the cost of Mendoza’s NIL deal. As Moret states, he “helped bring the Hoosiers their first national championship and indirectly molded a No. 1 NFL draft pick.”
“[Indiana athletic director Scott Dolson]’s like, we’ve got this quarterback that we really, really like that we think would be great in (coach Curt Cignetti’s) system, we just need a little bit more,” Cuban said. “I’m like, ‘How much is a little bit?’ And so he told me, and I’m like, ‘OK, you know, we’re on a roll, I’ll put up the money to get this quarterback.’”
Front Office Sports shared a video clip as a preview of the full video, and in it Cuban said he’s never donated to Indiana sports before. But he had a prior connection to Mendoza’s family that helped “grease the wheels,” however, according to Moret.
“I knew [Fernando’s brother Alberto], who was already on the team, was a (Miami) Heat fan and he would sit behind the Miami bench, and when I would come to go to Mavs-Heat games, he was like, ‘Oh yeah, I’m going to IU and da da da,’” Cuban said. “So we met. And so I’m like, OK, I’ll put up the money, and we can go get Fernando, and the rest is history.”
Cuban has been known for making sharp investments in the sports world, and this one paid off. Mendoza went on to win the Heisman Trophy, and he led Indiana to a 16-0 record and a national title. The Raiders picked him first with the top pick in the draft, and now Mendoza is in camp learning the NFL version of his craft with the Raiders.
So what does this have to do with the Raiders on the field? More than you’d think, actually. One of the advantages of getting a QB like Mendoza on his rookie contract is that he’s making relatively short money for a quarterback, and in the past, players like Mendoza basically had no recourse.
Now they do. If Indiana needed someone like Cuban to chip in and pay the freight for Mendoza’s NIL deal, that means Mendoza is already a rich young man and then some. The amount won’t be disclosed completely given that numbers for NIL deals are college football’s dirty little secret, but if things go sideways for Mendoza with the Raiders, he’ll have options that top college quarterbacks have never had before.