NFL Network’s Kurt Warner on the Proper Timeline for Raiders to Start Mendoza

Kurt Warner is back from Paris after seven weeks of international games, and he came home with a theme. From Aaron Rodgers in Pittsburgh to Kyler Murray in Minnesota, the Hall of Famer kept returning to the same question on The Rich Eisen Show: can your offense make the play that isn't the first, easiest one?

"I'm glad to be home," Warner told Rich. "It's been a long seven weeks." No Spain this time. He's back to a normal schedule and back on set on Sundays, where, as Rich confirmed, the knuckles stay a game day morning tradition.

How Far Aaron Rodgers Can Take the Steelers

Rich opened by asking if Rodgers looks like the Rodgers of Green Bay. Warner wasn't ready to go there.

"I'm not sure we're there yet," he said. Rodgers at his best, Warner explained, is aggressive, "using that unbelievable throwing talent of his" to attack defenses. "This offense just isn't built that way." He saw a glimpse on a scramble where Rodgers threw it 50 yards to DK Metcalf, "but that was about all they had in terms of down the field throwing." For now, Rodgers is managing the game and getting the ball to guys like Jaylen Warren.

So how far can this Steelers team go? "I don't think it's going to go very far," Warner said, pointing at AFC teams like Cincinnati, Kansas City and Buffalo that can score every time out.

His issue is math. Any defense would happily face a team that has to run 10 to 12 plays to score, because one mistake sinks the drive. Pittsburgh moved the ball in Paris and scored 16 points. The week before, against Tampa Bay, "they did nothing for three quarters" and needed the defense to set up 10 points.

"Good offenses have the ability to explode," Warner said. Take those 16 points, add one quick-strike touchdown, "we're up to 23, and now you can be competitive." The red zone is the other problem. The Steelers have one rushing touchdown all year, a 50-yard run by Warren. "If you can't get into the red zone and be able to hand the football off and score, offense just becomes really hard."

What the Seahawks Exposed About the Chiefs Offense

Warner watched Sunday night's game on film, and Rich wanted to know if Seattle drew up a blueprint for beating Kansas City. "I would say yes, if you're capable of doing it," Warner said.

To this point, he said, the Chiefs have been "about Kenneth Walker first and then Patrick Mahomes and company second." He called Sunday "one of the worst games that I've seen Patrick play," but his doubts aren't about the quarterback. They're about the receivers. "Can they develop some route running where Patrick can count on them," he asked, to "win some one-on-ones in the medium area of the field?"

The blueprint, in Warner's words: "Stop Kenneth Walker if you can do that. Shut down the run game and force those guys on the outside to show that they can make play after play after play." Take away the big plays, force the ball away from Travis Kelce, and make Kansas City string together long drives. "That's what Seattle did to them." The Chiefs never even reached the red zone, which Warner called "unheard of."

That shaped his take on Josh Downs, who had demanded a trade out of Indianapolis moments earlier. Warner likes Downs, but sees him as an underneath target, "kind of like a Travis Kelce." With Xavier Worthy and Tyquan Thornton to stretch the field and Kelce and Rashee Rice underneath, the missing piece is a receiver who "can make those medium-range chunk plays for me consistently."

On the other side, Quenton Nelson's arrival in Seattle fits what Warner saw Sunday. Sam Darnold had a bounce-back game, but the key was running the football, the formula behind last year's championship. Nelson makes the interior line better, and getting Jadarian Price and Zach Charbonnet healthy would help Seattle "get back to that blueprint."

Life Inside a Selling Locker Room

Rich asked if Warner was ever on a team that sold off pieces at the deadline. "Never part of something like that," he said. But he understands what Indianapolis feels like right now: the GM is fired, pieces are leaving, good players are asking out, and DeForest Buckner, "best defensive player," is gone.

Veterans are the hardest part. "I don't want to give up on a season only seven weeks in," Warner said, putting himself in their shoes. With 10 games left and "everybody basically saying we're giving up on the season," it's "not a fun place to be for a veteran guy."

Vikings Super Bowl Chances With Kyler as QB1

Then Rich asked what's happening in the film room between Kevin O'Connell and Kyler Murray. Warner has watched Murray closely, since "he was obviously in my backyard" and took over one of Warner's former teams.

"He's unbelievably talented. He's a gifted, gifted thrower of the football," Warner said. Murray is at his best when the first read is open. "When the first guy's not available, he has always struggled to work through his progressions." His summary: "First read, checkdown is kind of how he plays football."

That approach has worked so far. Minnesota is undefeated, Murray isn't turning the ball over, and he's feeding off the defense. But Warner thinks playoff football forces you to "win away from your strength." Teams will score on Brian Flores's defense eventually, and checkdowns rarely get you there. "It's just really hard against good teams and good NFL defenses to go 80 yards throwing checkdowns."

Rich said his "Spidey sense" tells him the change isn't coming. Warner didn't call that unfair. "We haven't seen Kyler do that up to this point," he said. He wanted to see Murray in new surroundings, with Justin Jefferson and an O'Connell who has done "a great job with different quarterbacks like a Sam Darnold," but "I'm seeing a lot of the same stuff." Murray can give you good quarterback play, Warner said, "but is it championship quarterback play?" Rich noted this is year eight for Murray. Warner won't say never, but it "remains my biggest question with Kyler moving forward."

The Vikings Gave Up Too Quickly on JJ McCarthy

Rich brought a poker theory. Warner doesn't play, so Rich explained "flop lag": you fold a great hand, and the next flop would have been perfect for it. Is that the Vikings with JJ McCarthy now starting for the Giants?

"No, I don't think this is fair either," Warner said. The unfair part was judging McCarthy so fast. At Michigan, he said, McCarthy "was a complementary piece. He wasn't the guy that had to carry a team." Minnesota asked him to play differently, it didn't look great, "and that wasn't surprising to me."

"I just felt like Minnesota gave up too quickly," Warner said. He's careful not to overrate two games, though. Of the 200-plus fourth-quarter yards against the Saints, he said, "I'm not sure they were all really good decisions," and at times McCarthy was "just picking a guy and ripping it." The latest game was better, with real one-on-one throws. What hasn't been tested in New York is the same thing that hurt him in Minnesota: progressing on time when the first option is covered.

Warner still sees growth from Minnesota to New York and likes that McCarthy gets another shot, whether his future is with the Giants or elsewhere because of Jackson Dart. Writing him off after that first stretch "was just the wrong move for a young quarterback that just wasn't ready quite yet."

The Proper Timeline for the Raiders to Start Mendoza

Last question: when should Las Vegas give Fernando Mendoza his first start? Rich noted Klint Kubiak said it's still Kirk Cousins against the Jets, with San Francisco, Denver and a trip to Cleveland ahead before the bye.

"I think it's coming," Warner said. He pointed to his own Giants days, when the team moved to Eli after nine games while they were "quote unquote a playoff team." For a Raiders team that started 3-0 and has lost a number since, he'd use the next few games as a gauge. "Let's gauge our team against those teams. And if we can't compete, no matter where we sit in the standings," that's when you speed it up.

The hard part is the locker room, the Maxx Crosbys of the world. Warner remembers veterans coming up to him in New York asking, "What are we doing? We're a playoff team now." Careers are short and "you don't want to throw away any season in the NFL." But once a team is clearly average and not a contender, "it's much easier to sell to the locker room."

So the timeline runs through the next couple of weeks. If reality sets in, Warner said, the Raiders have to find the moment where veterans still believe and still fight for Mendoza, "while making the move to build towards the future."