The Mendoza era can wait. The Dolphins get Kirk Cousins instead.
Las Vegas is starting the veteran over the No. 1 overall pick, which changes what Miami's Week 1 defense is actually being asked to do.
For most of the summer, the most interesting thing about the Miami Dolphins’ season opener was the quarterback on the other sideline. Fernando Mendoza went first overall in the 2026 draft after winning the Heisman and leading Indiana to an undefeated national championship. Las Vegas took him to be the franchise. Sunday looked like the debut.
It is not. Raiders coach Klint Kubiak announced Wednesday that Kirk Cousins will start against Miami on September 13, with Mendoza opening his career as the backup.
Kubiak’s reasoning was straightforward — Cousins played well through the offseason and camp and earned it. Asked whether Mendoza would play at all this season, he declined to look past Miami.
Why this is the harder assignment
There is an instinct to treat this as a break for a Dolphins defense breaking in a new coordinator. It probably is not.
Rookie quarterbacks making Week 1 debuts are volatile and beatable. Cousins is neither. He is entering his 15th season with 44,700 career passing yards and 298 touchdowns, sits 19th and 15th all-time in those categories, and — importantly — is reunited with Kubiak, who coached him in Minnesota from 2019 through 2021 as quarterbacks coach and then coordinator. That is an offense the quarterback has already run.
Jeff Hafley takes over a Miami defense that finished in the bottom third of the league in yards and points allowed last season. His first live test is a veteran in a scheme he knows, throwing behind a backfield that Kubiak has talked up as a two-back look with Ashton Jeanty and Mike Washington Jr.
The other debut
Malik Willis makes his first start as a team’s unquestioned starter, in Las Vegas, for a coach who was his defensive coordinator in Green Bay a year ago. Hafley makes his head coaching debut. Miami’s roster looks almost nothing like the one that ended last season.
Two franchises are opening new eras on the same field. One of them decided to wait a while before starting the future at quarterback. The Dolphins did not have that option.
Kickoff is Sunday, September 13.