As NFL teams land quarterbacks that they believe will take them to the promised land, the New Orleans Saints made the decision to sit out of the quarterback carousel this year. Instead, the Saints restructured the contract of current quarterback Derek Carr to save nearly $30 million against the cap and ensure he remains the starter going into the 2025 season.
Carr has not set the world on fire as Saints QB, going 14-13 in 27 starts with a 98.8 passer rating and an average of 223 yards per game before missing seven games due to injury in 2024. While Carr hasn’t had the most stable coaching situation, as he’s about to have his third playcaller in as many seasons, fans would expect an 11-year veteran QB to overcome those issues to lead their team to more success than the Saints have seen in his tenure.
Saints fans may not be pleased with the news of Carr almost assuredly being the starter for another season, however, this may be better for the Saints in the long run.
To be clear, this is not a vote of confidence in Derek Carr's ability to turn things around. Carr has shown the kind of quarterback he is over his 11 years in the NFL, a league-average starter who won't be any kind of difference-maker in the important spots. He is a master gatherer of empty stats, making furious comebacks in garbage time to make box score watchers think higher of him than fans who actually watch the games. This is not a defense of Derek Carr. This is an acceptance of where this team currently stands in the grand scheme of the NFL. This team is far from being a true contender, and they’re moving further away from even contending for the playoffs.
To illustrate this point, let’s take a look at the Atlanta Falcons. The Falcons have not made the playoffs since the 2017 season. 2017 was also the last year that the Falcons finished a season with a record over .500. For whatever reason, the Falcons felt that they were a quarterback away from contending in the NFC. So, they decided to get two quarterbacks! In their infinite wisdom, not only did they sign Kirk Cousins to a 4-year, $180 million contract, but they also drafted Michael Penix Jr. with the eighth-overall pick in the 2024 Draft.
Some pundits applauded the decision, noting that the Falcons were setting themselves up to win now and win later with the upgrades at quarterback. Unfortunately, the Falcons had more quarterbacks than effective edge rushers. Instead of using $100 million or the premium draft pick to improve the subpar team they had, they used both on the quarterback position in the hopes that it would be a shortcut to the top of the NFC. That worked out to the tune of Cousins being benched after 14 games and losing a valuable year of development for Penix while he’s on his rookie contract.
Why bring up the messy quarterback situation for the Falcons? For one, Saints fans never pass up a chance to mock the neighborhood doofus. But in all seriousness, the Falcons are a warning sign of what happens when a team believes that a quarterback can duct tape over their other problems. The Falcons could have drafted an edge rusher or a top-line secondary player with their premium draft pick but instead chose a quarterback when they had already one signed to the roster. They could have used the money they guaranteed to Cousins to build a stronger roster around their rookie quarterback, but instead, they gave it to a quarterback who had never shown the capability to take a team over the top.
The Saints find themselves with a premium draft pick and a subpar team. The Saints roster can be compared to a Faberge egg, in that while they once had value, they’re now old, fragile, and expensive. They lack edge rushing, have a thin receiver room, and have big questions concerning their offensive line. This team is moving further and further away from success, with their last playoff appearance being in 2020. Suffice it to say, this team is not a quarterback away from a Super Bowl.
There is no benefit to restarting this cycle with a Sam Darnold or a Geno Smith or burning a quality draft pick on a quarterback behind a lacking offensive line with few weapons to support him. For the grief the Saints front office has gotten (and earned in some respects), the move to ride out the Carr contract and use this time to improve the team around him makes the most sense. That way, when the Saints are in the position to move on from Carr in the next two years, the team will be in a much better position to succeed with their new man under center.