Carr's opportunity

things gotta get better in carolina!!! cower anyone?

 

Bullshit, the guy completed about 40 more passes than Delhomme and STILL had fewer TD's with Andre Johnson catching alot of those balls. Mind you, this came in a season when our offense was averaging less than 17 points a game and Delhomme didn't even finish the season. Now,add in the fact that Carr has only produced 2 TD's in two games as a Panther, one of those coming in garbage time, and you have to be a little worried. For cryin out loud, the Saints routinely give up 20+yd pass plays, but Carr could only manage 119yds? I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm very worried about our season. I hope Carr gets better, but he scares the hell outta me.

 

You're neglecting the fact the guy was playing with a HORRIBLE back strain.

 

That whole completion % thing was BS from what I read because it was all off short routes to Andre Johnson.

Passionless Fruit

 

I am just not completly sold on Carr.....got step it up, really at this point it is on his shoulders, can he bare the load? other than in his ass as we have seen lately?

 

As opposed to the defender of the fresh biscuit. C'mon Thelt. I think you must have a man crush on Jake. Carr might turn out to be good.

 

the general lack of plays made in a game this close is bothersome, yes. You can say it's a lack of going for it deep or being creative, but we also just didn't make plays up field.

 

[sarcasm] Carr was a playmaker throughout his career with the Texans, so there's no reason to think he won't continue to make big plays. [/sarcasm]

It'll take a Tommy Maddox style revamp for Carr to win the job. But it's there, a big time second chance, and those are rare.

My money says he can't and won't. My homer-heart thinks he just maybe might.

 

he could be. I'll be hoping to see it. What he looks like, I could give a shit, but make some plays.

 

Thelt believes that we should give up on the season because Carr is "obviously" awful. Personally, I think that Thelt should shut the fuck up because he's a complete joke who has rarely ever gotten anything right in his nearly twenty thousand posts. That kind of negativity is not warranted or helpful right now.

Believe me, Thelt, if Carr actually does suck in upcoming games, I'll call him out on it like I do every player. Until then, though, I would strongly suggest dialing back the unnecessary pessimism.

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As for Carr himself, let's keep in mind that the guy had QB ratings of 83.5, 77.2, and 82.1 the last three seasons despite a poor offensive line and the absence of a consistent running game.


Strengths:
Carr is the polar opposite of Jake in that he's very reluctant to just throw the ball up for grabs. That can be a negative when you're hesitant to give your superstar receiver a chance in traffic, which drew some criticism in Houston where they had Andre Johnson but no one else. On the bright side, he generally won't give away points or set up opposing offenses in our territory with dumb turnovers. He does dump the ball off to the backs and tight ends more than I'd necessarily like, but I do feel like his mobility (when healthy) adds a dimension to our offense. If Davidson is aggressive, we can start incorporating bootlegs and other roll outs to show defenses a different look than they've ever seen from us. He can also get the job done in the pocket, but I'd like to see him get outside more, as I don't think that's something they had him do much even with the Texans.

Weaknesses:
He is risk averse to the point of being unnecessarily cautious. In the NFL you don't always have an open receiver, so sometimes you just have to pick the guy who is least covered and accept that it might get broken up. That doesn't mean throwing it where it can be easily picked, but taking some calculated risks is essential for a quarterback. And while he doesn't throw the ball up for grabs under pressure, he does tend to turtle and bring the ball down. He doesn't do a good job of keeping his head up when scrambling to look for receivers who come open downfield, and he definitely needs to cut out the habit of running backwards. The absurdly low arm angle causes some problems as well, although his passes don't get knocked down as much as I'd think they would.


I said before the season that I hoped Carr wouldn't play at all this season, but that I did believe that he could work on his flaws and be ready to legitimately challenge Jake for the starting job in 2008. He has more talent than Jake does, but lacks the gunslinger mentality. As noted, that's both good and bad. Right now is when we need Davidson to step up and earn that money, though, because Carr is someone we can easily win with. Not only can he be adequate, he (with Steve) can become the strength of our offense, but he's going to need to make some adjustments and the coaching staff will need to be pro-active about putting him in advantageous situations. Personally I'm much more optimistic about his level of performance than I am about our defense.

How much can we do in this offense with short routes to Steve Smith? Doesn't that sound like something you can get excited about?