The announcement of Derek Carr’s retirement from the NFL on Saturday marked the end of a stellar career for one of the best quarterbacks in Raiders history.
Yet based on the divisive social media reaction, one would think a polarizing politician had been deposed through a violent coup.
While the sycophants were quick to celebrate his accolades and anoint him a certain first-ballot Hall of Famer, they were no match for the haters, who acted as if a dictator had finally been overthrown and his subjects would be able to taste freedom for the first time.
Many of the detractors came from the Saints’ fan base, a group that seems irrationally angry Carr couldn’t find a way to lift a team with massive salary cap issues into Super Bowl contention in the two years he spent in New Orleans to cap his career.
Seriously, there were Hitler comparisons to Carr on that one site that used to be called Twitter, though to be fair, that happens with pretty much every subject on that failing platform these days.
Still, who knew a simple football player could evoke so much emotion?
A letdown or let down by others?
There are obvious explanations. As a player, Carr was always good enough to raise the expectations of every team he was on, yet rarely good enough to carry a roster beyond that bar.
An argument could certainly be made that he was let down by the Raiders, and to some extent the Saints, for never properly building around him.
Carr, after all, finishes his career as the only quarterback in NFL history to throw for at least 40,000 yards and never win a playoff game.
As a person, he was never in trouble and was a role model of what a franchise would want in its most public-facing figure.
Yet, there were times he would occasionally come across as less than genuine. OK, maybe more than occasionally.
It was most often a result of him trying too hard on camera to say the right things or the things he believed he was supposed to say instead of expressing what he truly felt or believed.
But he wasn’t going to keep the public relations staff up at night worried about him embarrassing the franchise.
And as someone who was around him quite often covering the Raiders through their move to Las Vegas and his integration into a new community, be assured Carr was always far more relatable and authentic when the cameras and microphones were off.
That’s probably why many of his teammates with the Raiders have continued to sing his praises despite the odd way his tenure as the best statistical quarterback in team history came to such an unceremonious end.
Carr made the split more dramatic than it needed to be, but the power structure in charge at the time was certainly judged more harshly by history, especially after the pettiness of the jersey number fiasco the following season.
In the end, it’s not hard to tear apart Carr’s career. He finished with a career record of 77-92 between his nine seasons with the Raiders and two with the Saints. Carr had 35 game-winning drives and 28 fourth-quarter comebacks, but had just three winning seasons, including the one in New Orleans.
While he rewrote the Raiders’ franchise record books, there’s still a large part of the fan base that will always accuse him of being a stat-padder and never forgive him for throwing the ball away on a fourth-down play to avoid taking a hit or a blemish in the box score.
Not a Hall of Famer
He will be judged in many ways. Whether he gets in the Hall of Fame shouldn’t be one of them.
Carr wraps up his career with a score of 46.06 on Pro Football Reference’s Hall of Fame monitor. The average quarterback Hall of Famer has a score just over 100.
He’s unlikely to get in, especially absent extenuating circumstances like postseason success.
It won’t happen, but that shouldn’t discount his impact on the Raiders.
Legacies can be complicated. His probably shouldn’t be. While there is plenty to nitpick, Carr gave his heart and soul to a franchise that really didn’t do the same for him.
If fans believe they should have had the opportunity to experience more success over that period, they’re probably right.
But there are far bigger culprits than Derek Carr.
Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on X.