Derek Carr bluntly refuses to take pay cut despite Saints’ abysmal season
Derek Carr finished the 2024 regular season with 5-5 while the Las Vegas Raiders finished the season with a 5-12 record.
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Derek Carr (Image via ESPN)
The New Orleans Saints started the season in blazing hot form – demolishing Carolina Panthers and Dallas Cowboys in humiliating fashion, combining for 91 points. The fire watered down as quick as it blazed with a losing streak that extended into Week 9. As the season concluded, they finished the season with five wins at the bottom of the NFC South below the Panthers.
In his second season as a Saint, quarterback Derek Carr was riddled with injury for a decent amount of time. Carr started ten games in which he had a completion rate of 67.7 while throwing for 2145 yards and 15 touchdowns. The second-round pick from Fresno State started for the Saints in all five wins in the season.
Carr has two years remaining on the free agent contract he signed prior to the 2023 season. His average annual salary of $37.5 million ranks 15th among quarterbacks, according to Over The Cap. In an interview with ESPN, Derek Carr admitted that he wouldn’t conform to a pay cut in the upcoming year. In 2023, he however agreed to restructuring the contract to enable the team’s success.
“I wouldn’t take a pay cut. Yeah, I wouldn’t do that. Especially with what I put on tape. Would I restructure? Absolutely. I’ll always help the team that way. But there’s some things that you put out there that you earned. Even in some cases it could be even worse, but I felt confident when I signed it that this would give the team the best flexibility at the time. … But yeah, I wouldn’t take anything less to do this. It’s hard enough putting our bodies through it. And you’re trying to get everything you can for your family for it.”
The Saints are in the most challenging cap space situation in the league, with a deficit of $78.5 million—nearly $55.1 million more than the Cleveland Browns, who have the second-worst cap space.
??????: #Saints QB Derek Carr says he won’t take a pay cut this offseason because of what he’s put on tape, along with what he’s put his body through to play, he told ESPN.
— JPAFootball (@jasrifootball) January 7, 2025
“I wouldn't take a pay cut. Yeah, I wouldn't do that. Especially with what I put on tape. Would I… pic.twitter.com/cZakjxoWTE
Derek Carr was willing to do the extremes to play against the Raiders
Derek Carr reflected on how his hand injury affected his availability for the latter part of the season. The rest of the season included a game against the Las Vegas Raiders. He downplayed any notion of a “revenge” narrative for that game, he addressed the measure he went to return back to the field in the same interview.
“I’ve got a great relationship with [owner] Mr. [Mark] Davis, [head coach Antonio Pierce] and all those players. There was no ill will or anything. It was just like, ‘I want to play against my former team, against my friends.’ They even let me inject [my hand] then and they were like, ‘We’re going to let you do it.'”
Despite the injections, Derek Carr missed out on the opportunity to represent the Saints against his former team.
“I tried to stay as positive as I could all the way through the beginning of last week… They let me try and they were like, ‘Yeah, it’s not going to work.’ And so [team trainer] Shone [Gipson] and our training staff were like, ‘Look, you’re doing everything you can and you can continue to try, but we also have to protect you at this point… You can’t even take a snap.'”
RELATEDCarr, 33, suffered an injury in Week 14 ruling him out of the season. Although he wasn’t officially ruled out, he didn’t play for the rest of the season. The injury lead to speculations about his future at the New Orleans Saints. However, Carr isn’t worried about the same. He is fully confident to return to Louisiana next year, entering the 12th season.
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Mohammed Bazim
(406 Articles Published)