Chapter 1: What are the top 10 picks in the 2026 NFL Draft?
Welcome to the Ringer NFL show. I'm your host, Shiel Kapadia.
Chapter 2: Who will the Las Vegas Raiders select with the first pick?
We are jumping into the 2026 NFL draft today. Simple exercise. Let's look at the top 10 picks and do a little mock draft. And don't worry if you're not totally familiar with all these players. We're going to give you the background. We're going to get into the big storylines at the top of the draft. what these teams might do. So I got the perfect guest, Deontay Lee of the ringer.
His full mock draft is up on the ringer.com. We're just going to do the top 10 picks today. We'll get to the other picks down the road. Let's take a break. We'll come back with Deontay. All right, we are back here on the Wrinkle NFL Show with Deontay Lee.
Chapter 3: What makes the New York Jets' second pick significant?
Deontay, you're carrying me today because you put out a mock draft. You are way ahead of me on draft prep. You've got firm opinions on these guys. I spent my weekend catching up on a bunch of them here, but we're going to go through your top 10 picks. I think this is an episode not for the people who've been following this for three months, but the people who are like, all right,
let's, you know, it's almost draft time. I want to, I want to know about the big storylines, the big players, the big things that are being discussed right now. So we're going to go through your top 10.
Chapter 4: Why are the Arizona Cardinals considering a specific player at number three?
I got some questions about some of these. I agree with some, maybe want to pick your brain on some others.
I think I have a feeling on where, where you might have some, some points of contention.
Yeah, yeah. So it'll be fun. We will go through this, the top 10 picks. And then, of course, we'll hit on the other teams here in the weeks ahead. But let's get it started. You did a mock for The Ringer. Everyone can check that out at theringer.com. First pick we think is a no-brainer. Raiders take Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza.
Now, as we record this, Deontay, there has been some discourse on the internet.
Chapter 5: What are the Tennessee Titans' options at the fourth pick?
I think Dan Orlovsky of ESPN was saying, I'm going to go out on a limb today and create some chaos in the football discourse atmosphere on this Monday. And he says that Ty Simpson of Alabama said, is the best QB in this draft. So I just want to get your take. Where are you with Mendoza? Is this a no-brainer number one pick?
Chapter 6: How do the New York Giants evaluate their fifth pick?
Do you think that's a wild take? Are you like, no, I could actually see how someone would get there. Where are you with Fernando Mendoza, the expected number one pick to the Las Vegas Raiders?
I think in the mock draft, I said it's a fait accompli, right? I think that it's probably been clear really since like October, November-ish of the college football regular season in 2025 that he was going to end up being the number one overall pick. And I think that you should be fine with it if you're a Raiders fan, right?
Like, I think honestly, if there's really the biggest question to have is A, I would say the biggest two questions to have is A, what's his ceiling? And B, do they try to bring in a veteran free agent that can maybe hold down the fort if they genuinely believe that he needs some time to learn the offense between when he's drafted and when we ultimately see him on the field.
But I think in terms of skill set, he checks all the boxes, right? Like the player that I will comp him most favorably to is probably Kirk Cousins, right? I think there's some irony there because I think that there were some rumblings right before free agency started that Las Vegas might be kind of kicking the tires on whether or not Cousins was interested in coming over.
Chapter 7: What strategy do the Cleveland Browns have for their sixth pick?
And I think a player like that, if that was his backup, would be the best overall kind of outcome. I would say that to answer the latter of my own questions first.
Chapter 8: How does the Kansas City Chiefs' draft strategy impact their ninth pick?
And as far as a former goes, I think that you're probably looking at a ceiling of something like Jared Goff. At his best, can probably get you 35 or so touchdowns, especially in a well-schemed up offense. But you know you're going to have certain limits. He's not the most mobile guy. He's not going to blow you away with arm talent. He's not going to be a dynamic athlete in the pocket either.
So you're not getting... a Joe Burrow type of pocket passer. You're obviously not getting a Lamar Jackson. Anything can happen once the ball's in his hands type of quarterback either.
But I do think you can get Pro Bowl level production, maybe, you know, three to five times over a decade in the perfect scenario, which I think you should be pretty happy with if you're making a draft for a quarterback number one overall.
So you see a gap between him and the rest of this quarterback class. Like you wouldn't be having to have long meetings inside the Raiders building saying, are we doing the right thing? You like, I mean, what you just described, you know, I'll get to that in a second, but it sounds like you see a gap between him and Simpson and everybody else.
Yeah, I wouldn't say that it's like a chasm between the two, but there is a clear delineation for me between what Fernando Mendoza is stepping in the league and the questions that I still have about a Ty Simpson coming into the league, right? And some of this is maybe unfair because we just have a much wider body of work.
with Fernando Mendoza between what he was at Cal two years ago at Indiana, what he was this past year as a Heisman winner. We just have a wide breadth of throws. We have a pretty complete passing profile for him. With Ty Simpson, you're really talking about two-thirds of one regular season. for him being the guy at Alabama.
And then I think it's really hard to try to square what you saw for the first two-thirds of the regular season with what he was post-injury because he was certainly a different quarterback. I mean, I'm sure the people who watch college football in January can remember what he looked like in the Rose Bowl before he was ultimately benched.
And that was just very clearly just not a guy who could contribute because he was so banged up. So I think that, you know, With that said, it is really interesting to me to see where the discourse is at right now. I'm really struggling to try to figure out if you're Dan Orlovsky. I think Chase Daniels shared this opinion as well.
I would really struggle to try to figure out exactly why it is that anybody would feel so certain that you're getting a QB1 type of prospect from a Ty Simpson if you were to draft him this year.
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