There’s no doubt the 2023 New Orleans Saints season has been disappointing up to this point for the Who Dat Nation. The Black and Gold are back below .500 after their Thursday night loss to Jacksonville, sitting at 3-4 seven games into the season.
Fans expected better.
The Jaguars were only the second team this season to score more than 20 points on the Saints, and generally the defense has acquitted itself well. The offense is where most of fans’ frustrations lie.
And for better or worse, those criticisms will always fall at least partly on the shoulders of the quarterback.
Derek Carr joined the team as a free agent acquisition in the offseason, hoping to ball out for a team with a plethora of toys for him to play with. But despite having Alvin Kamara, Chris Olave, Michael Thomas and Rashid Shaheed at his disposal, Carr has never really gotten revved up.
Their loss to Jacksonville was just the second time this season the Saints scored more than 17 points, and their 34-0 demolition of the New England Patriots two weeks ago now looks more like an outlier than a reason for hope.
Carr’s passer rating for the season is 82.8, and he’s completed 63.9% of his passes for 1,600 yards and thrown 6 touchdowns against 4 interceptions.
The numbers and the outcomes have some fans already grousing about switching quarterbacks again next year. So just how feasible is it for the Saints to trade in Carr this offseason?
If the Saints release Derek Carr before June 1, 2024, they would absorb a salary cap hit of $52.8 million. If they were to execute a trade of Carr, they would still garner a $22.8 million cap hit, and they’d have to find someone willing to deal for him.
Carr will also be owed $30 million in guaranteed money by the franchise whether he’s on the roster or not, and an extra $10 million roster bonus gets tacked on as of March 1.
If the Saints release Carr after the 2024 season, the salary cap hit is a more manageable $17.1 million.
So the bottom line is that the Saints are tied to Carr for the rest of this season and likely next season as well. Can he turn his fortunes around and guide the offense to increased productivity?
It’s not improbable, seeing as the Saints have the easiest schedule of all 32 teams for the remainder of the season. And the team’s offense has a multitude of issues other than its quarterback, including questionable playcalling and a leaky offensive line.
But the quarterback always receives both too much credit and too much blame, and it will be up to Carr and Carr alone to salvage his time in New Orleans.