Category: Derek Carr

What an incentive-heavy contract for Michael Thomas could look like

What an incentive-heavy contract between the Saints and Michael Thomas could look like, via @RossJacksonNOLA:

After playing a key role in courting veteran quarterback Derek Carr to sign with the New Orleans Saints, wide receiver Michael Thomas now looks to be the apple of the Saints’ eye. And Carr may play a key role in his potential return. At the end of the 2022 NFL season, the Saints re-worked Thomas’ deal and it looked like he might have been on his way to a split with the organization. Now, New Orleans is working toward keeping its All-Pro wideout.

Keeping Thomas along with young wide receivers Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed would equip Carr with an outstanding receiver corps, so long as health holds up. And therein lies the biggest concern with making progress toward an extension. Thomas is a dominant wide receiver when he is healthy, one of the most dominant in the NFL. But it’s unmistakable that availability has been an issue having been able to appear in just 10 games over the last three seasons.

The good news is, the Saints have been one of the most creative teams when it comes to contracts and their cap guru Khai Harley could put together a masterpiece of a deal to get it done. New Orleans could construct a contract that is set up to allow Thomas to earn his due for stellar play in 2023 now that he’s paired up with Carr, but also protects the organization if anything were to jeopardize his availability. Here is an example of what they could do, based on a contract used by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers just last year for veteran wideout Julio Jones.

Jones signed a 1-year, $6 million deal with a boatload of incentives that ranged from performance incentives to team-success measures. Of course, several void years were added to help spread out the modest signing bonus as well. New Orleans could take a similar approach with Thomas guaranteeing him a base value but allowing him to work his way to a larger payday. Here’s an example of a structure they could land on:

Brad Spielberger of Pro Football Focus estimates a one-year, $12.5 million deal for Thomas may be his market. Thomas was due a $15.5 million base salary in 2023 before he re-worked his deal after the final week of the 2022 season. So we’ll work with the $12.5 million as his maximum earning potential:

  • Base contract value: 1 year, $10 million
  • $1.165 million base salary (veteran minimum)
  • $8,835,000 signing bonus with two void years ($2,778,000 per year)
  • 2023 cap hit: $4,110,000 (2023)
  • 2024 cap hit: $2,778,000 (2024)
  • 2025 cap hit: $2,778,000 (2024)
  • 2023 incentives: $250,000 each
  • Catches: 40, 50, 60, 70
  • Receiving yards: 600, 700, 800, 900
  • 50% of offensive snaps played
  • 75% of offensive snaps played

This gives the Saints the ability to entice Thomas into returning because he stands to make a good payday if he were to be healthy for the season and produce, but also protects him if something stands in the way of that. Sure, perhaps a $10 million base value is a little lofty. But Thomas is still one of the most dominant pass-catchers in today’s game when healthy, as proved in his early season scoring acumen in 2022.

New Orleans could drop the base value a few million and raise the incentive payoffs to offset as well. This would allow them to arrive at the same value upside, while not committing as heavily in the foundational deal. Either way, Harley and the Saints are sure to get very creative in this structure as a means of getting Thomas and Carr on the field together. Getting this done would be a major step towards not only competing for an NFC South title but also positioning themselves to make noise in the conference as a whole.

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5 Raiders free agents that could follow Derek Carr to the Saints

The Saints may not be done adding former Raiders to the roster this offseason. Several could follow Derek Carr to the Big Easy, via @RossJacksonNOLA:

As former Las Vegas Raiders quarterback Derek Carr gets settled in as the New Orleans Saints new starting passer, the timeline of his signing is worth dissecting. The Saints and Carr came to their contract agreement on Mar. 6 this NFL offseason. That gave the Saints signal caller about a week to court potential free agents to join the black and gold in New Orleans. And wouldn’t you know it, there is a long list of former Raiders teammates hitting the market this offseason.

Some of which, could impact the Saints to varying degrees. From bona fide starts, to camp tryouts, New Orleans will have no issues making its new quarterback feel comfortable if he has some teammates he would like to bring along with him. As much as we’d love to highlight big-time players like wideout Davante Adams and tight end Darren Waller, it’s unlikely a trade for either this offseason would make sense. Though a trade for wide receiver Hunter Renfrow should not be considered out of the question.

But that’s for another day. Here are five Raiders free agents that could follow Carr to the Big Easy:

Podcast: The Derek Carr signing, and what’s next for Saints

Podcast: The Derek Carr signing, and what’s next for Saints in free agency with 2023 draft on the horizon

The newest episode of the Saints Wire Podcast is here, hosted as always by Ryan O’Leary (@RyanOLearySMG) with Saints Wire managing editor John Sigler (@john_siglerr). You can subscribe for new episodes released each week on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or your podcast service of choice.

We have a lot to catch up on this week, namely the arrival of a new starting quarterback. The New Orleans Saints signed Derek Carr to a four-year deal just ahead of free agency, and the always-busy NFL Scouting Combine ushered in a whirlwind of news on the path to the 2023 draft. Let’s get up to speed on everything on our plate.

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Derek Carr’s brother David says Michael Thomas, Tyrann Mathieu helped Saints recruit him

Derek Carr’s brother David says Michael Thomas and Tyrann Mathieu were some of the Saints veterans who helped lure the team’s new quarterback:

It turns out that getting Derek Carr to the New Orleans Saints was a team effort. His older brother and former NFL quarterback David spoke about the process that led to Carr’s four-year contract with the Saints as a free agent, and why he picked the Saints over the New York Jets among other contenders during a guest appearance on his son Austin’s Harvester Sports Podcast.

One factor that stood out in the process: New Orleans’ veteran experience in the locker room, on the coaching staff, and within the front office. While the Jets talk a big game and have some young, hungry standouts in cornerback Sauce Gardner and head coach Robert Saleh, Carr believed they lacked the nucleus of pros who have seen it all and can roll with the punches in the NFL.

“When you look at it from the Saints’ standpoint, they’re some young guys but there’s also a lot of veterans guys on the defensive side. There’s a lot of veteran coaches there. A lot of guys that are grizzled veterans that understand how to make it work,” David Carr said, pointing to offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael Jr. as one of the most-experienced play callers around the NFL, and how his work with Drew Brees became a selling-point for his brother.

Carr continued: “Derek has relationships with a lot of those guys too, that go far beyond just this offseason. With Tyrann Mathieu he’s known him forever, you know a lot of these guys. Michael Thomas, they go way back, and they have history. So when Derek became available, they were like ‘No, you’re coming here.'”

Mathieu played against Carr’s Raiders for years with the Kansas City Chiefs, going 3-1 and intercepting him once. But it’s clear those matchups built a level of respect for the quarterback. Thomas and Carr were standout high school recruits from similar stomping-grounds in Southern California (Thomas attended William Howard Taft Charter High School in Los Angeles while Carr was two hours away at Bakersfield Christian High School in Fresno). Though Thomas is expected to be released at the start of the new league year on March 15, it’s interesting that he was helping to recruit Carr and celebrated the quarterback’s decision to sign with New Orleans.

Does this mean Thomas could return to the Saints in 2023? Maybe, but that’s going to be tough to figure out. He’ll need a new contract altogether, likely including an agreeable salary and heavy incentives for performance should he return to his 2019 Offensive Player of the Year form. But that’s a version of Thomas we haven’t seen in three years because of unfortunate injuries. A deal needs to make sense for both sides. But if the Saints have already gotten on the same page with him in getting the quarterback he and other leaders on the team wanted, you have to think the hurdles ahead can’t be much more difficult.

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Drew Brees on Derek Carr signing: ‘It’s a great fit for him, great fit for the Saints’

Drew Brees endorsed his old team’s Derek Carr signing: ‘I think it’s a great fit for him, I think it’s a great fit for the Saints’

Who better to comment on the New Orleans Saints quarterback situation than the best quarterback in Saints history? Drew Brees joined The Dan Patrick Show on Thursday to share his take on Derek Carr’s outlook in New Orleans, and it’s a move he’s embraced enthusiastically.

“I think it’s a great fit. I think it’s a great fit for him, great fit for the Saints,” Brees said. “I’ve always been impressed with Derek Carr. I think he’s been in a pretty dysfunctional situation, I think we all recognize that. Look at all that’s happened to the Raiders from a personnel perspective, all the controversy, I think he’s caught the brunt of that unfairly in a lot of ways.”

Stability is the name of the game in New Orleans. Mickey Loomis is the longest-tenured general manager in the league. Front office executives like Jeff Ireland, Khai Harley, and Michael Parenton have each been around for almost a decade or more. Offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael Jr. isn’t going anywhere, and the defense that Dennis Allen built is stronger than anything Carr has played with in the past.

But what about Carr’s system fit? Brees continued pointed to Carr’s experience in a similar offense as reason for optimism: “I’ve been impressed watching him play. He certainly has the ability to take an offense like what the Saints run and execute that well. Put a lot on his plate, where in many cases you’re going up to the line of scrimmage with multiple plays, the ability to check into multiple plays. Jon Gruden’s offense which he came up in was the same offense that we run. That West Coast-style, but the ability to ‘Hey we’re not going to run a bad play.’ That’s always the philosophy. We’re going to get out of bad plays, get into good plays, you have to be a smart quarterback to recognize that. I thought he’s always done a good job of that.”

So Brees is fully on board with this move. NewOrleans.Football’s Nick Underhill reported that Brees helped recruit Carr to the Saints, selling the free agent quarterback on New Orleans’ organizational culture and strong supporting cast, neither of which he enjoyed with the Raiders. We’ll see if this move works out as well as hoped, but Brees’ endorsement is encouraging.

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Fox Sports’ Nick Wright couldn’t be more wrong about the Saints and the salary cap

Fox Sports personality Nick Wright couldn’t be more wrong about the Saints and the salary cap. But he’s paid to be loud, not to be right:

More like Nick Wrong, am I right? The FOX Sports television personality went on a rant this week in the wake of a four-year contract agreement between the New Orleans Saints and free agent quarterback Derek Carr, accusing the team of, among other things, “Some form of NFL salary cap Ponzi scheme.”

Sure, the Saints didn’t have a great plan for life after Drew Brees, and that’s led to some challenges. And the salary cap crunch — aggravated by economic pressures during the COVID-19 pandemic — has cost them some backups and good players on each side of the ball. Pointing to their cap strategy as the source of all their problems, though is a mistake.

Wright claimed: “But the reason that they have gotten worse record-wise each of the last four years, the reason they have won only one playoff game the last four years, is because when 25% of your salary cap is allocated to players who aren’t on your team every single year, you don’t have enough talent. And to do then this with Carr, you’re going to be in this position the next three years as well, it’s insane.”

When Wright’s cohosts pushed back, quipping that they don’t care about the Saints’ accounting and asking whether this move makes them a better football team, Wright struggled to voice a rebuttal before the conversation turned to other topics.

Right now, the Saints are spending just 2.2% of their salary cap resources on players no longer on the roster, though it could increase to as much as 17.3% if Marcus Davenport, David Onyemata, and Deonte Harty leave in free agency with Jameis Winston and Michael Thomas being released as post-June 1 cuts. But it feels likely at least some of those players return for 2023.

The COVID-19 pandemic-impacted 2021 and 2020 seasons forced the Saints to cut more players than anticipated — guys like Janoris Jenkins, Emmanuel Sanders, and Malcom Brown were all pandemic-era casualties who otherwise would’ve stayed on the roster, eating up 7% of the team’s cap resources in 2021 alone — leading to higher dead money totals, but Wright’s exaggerating by quite a bit (all numbers via Over The Cap):

  • 2023: 2.2% of cap (TBD)
  • 2022: 21.2% of cap
  • 2021: 26.5% of cap
  • 2020: 11.6% of cap
  • 2019: 11.4% of cap

So even in this year’s worst-case scenario the Saints are looking at a dead money payout that pales in comparison to what preceded it. Wright is correct that you don’t want to be paying for players no longer on your roster, but the Saints know that better than he does.

His other claim, that the team’s depth was eroded by salary cap management which led to all their recent losses, carries no weight. Few teams have dealt with as many injuries at high-profile positions like New Orleans the last few years. Their starting quarterback has gone down in each of the last two seasons. Their 2019 Offensive Player of the Year winner has been unavailable ever since. Poor injury luck has done more to hurt their odds than the salary cap boogeyman.

You don’t get into sports management to save a billionaire owner some money on payroll. Fans don’t tune in every week or spend thousands of dollars on tickets and traveling to support a team that’s trying to tank. Sports are entertainment, and the Saints are embracing that by doing all they can to maximize their resources. You don’t have to pay interest on future cap space or win more games for having unspent cap space. You play to win the game and that extends to the front office.

We can agree or disagree on whether Carr is the right guy for the job, and not every team has the appetite to pay out a bunch of signing bonuses every year, but it’s not a moral failing to try and win now. In an industry where few people are fortunate to hold the same job for even three years, the only real choice is to live in the moment and compete on Sundays.

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WATCH: Saints QB Derek Carr’s biggest throws with the Raiders

The Saints released a highlight reel of Derek Carr’s biggest throws with the Raiders, which he’ll be looking to recreate with Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed:

Derek Carr isn’t afraid to air it out, which is good news for New Orleans Saints fans. The longtime Las Vegas Raiders quarterback is on his way to New Orleans after agreeing to sign a free agent contract with the Saints, which the team helped announce by sharing a couple of quick highlight reels of Carr’s biggest plays with the Raiders.

Carr averaged the fourth-highest average depth of targeted passes around the league in 2022 (9.1), well ahead of the Saints’ Andy Dalton (7.9). He found plenty of success throwing to Davante Adams deep downfield, and the Saints will be looking to put that playmaking ability to good use now that he’s throwing to Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed.

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Where Derek Carr’s Saints contract ranks among highest-paid quarterbacks

Here’s where Derek Carr’s contract ranks among the NFL’s highest-paid quarterbacks, via @RossJacksonNOLA:

Before the New Orleans Saints and new starting quarterback Derek Carr landed their deal, expectations were that Carr would be looking for $35 million per year on his contract. The deal instead yielded him a $37.5 million average. Though guarantees, outs and bonuses change the way we should be looking at his agreement, the number stands as a high-ranking quarterback contract. At least for now. 

Passers like Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson, Philadelphia Eagles passer Jalen Hurts and Joe Burrow of the Cincinnati Bengals are all looking to capitalize on recent successes. Los Angeles Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert will soon be looking for a new deal as well. So, it’s only a matter of time before the Saints’ agreement with Carr turns into a bargain. But for now, here’s where Carr ranks amount other signal caller who have gotten their bags in per-year average annual value:

Saints make it official, announce 4-year contract with Derek Carr

The New Orleans Saints made it official, announcing their 4-year contract with free agent quarterback Derek Carr:

It is, to quote any number of network show talking heads, officially official. The New Orleans Saints announced their agreement on a four-year free agent contract with quarterback Derek Carr on Monday, though the deal’s unique structure gives them an exit ramp after just two seasons if things don’t go according to plan.

But that’s not the worry right now. The Saints identified Carr as their top target this offseason and made every effort to sign him. They got their guy, and general manager Mickey Loomis was eager to introduce Carr to Saints fans.

“We are excited to welcome Derek Carr to the New Orleans Saints,” Loomis said in a statement to NewOrleansSaints.com. “Derek’s experience, leadership and skillset will be an asset to our offense.”

Loomis needed more of an introduction than Saints head coach Dennis Allen. Allen drafted Carr into the NFL back in 2014 when they were both on the Raiders, and he values the relationship they’ve maintained over the years as their careers went in different directions.

Allen said, “In addition to his talent, I admired his approach to the game, work ethic and commitment to get better every day in what were the formative stages of his career. From afar and when we played him as an opponent, I saw Derek’s development into one of the most productive quarterbacks in the National Football League. Derek is an outstanding addition to the New Orleans Saints and I can’t wait to get working with him and the rest of our team this offseason.”

The work isn’t over just because Carr is locked in, though. The Saints need to hash things out with restricted free agent tight end Juwan Johnson and embattled wide receiver Michael Thomas, who hasn’t been healthy since winning recognition as NFL Offensive Player of the Year in 2019. And then they need to finish navigating the salary cap so they can begin to sign upgrades and replenish the depth chart so Carr has the best supporting cast possible. But this is a major step for the organization.

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Derek Carr contract details: QB gets no-trade clause, Saints get exit ramp in 2025

Derek Carr contract details: QB gets no-trade clause, Saints get exit ramp after just two years into new deal

Both sides have to feel happy about this one. We’ve got the details on Derek Carr’s contract with the New Orleans Saints thanks to Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio, and it’s enlightening. While the new deal is being advertised as a four-year, $150 million commitment (and it does max out at those values), in reality Carr’s per-year earnings will fall to about half of that. Thanks to some creative accounting, the Saints structured this so that Carr’s 2023 salary cap hit is only about $7.2 million, taking up roughly 3.2% of the league spending limit. Carr got a no-trade clause out of the arrangement, which gives him some control in the second half of his career.

Florio reports that Carr received a $28.5 million signing bonus from New Orleans, which will toll over the course of five years (with a void year likely written into 2027 for accounting purposes). Most interesting is the non-guaranteed $50 million base salary written in for 2026. That raises the overall average per-year income from $33.3 million to $37.5 million per year, boosting Carr from ranking 12th among quarterbacks to 9th. That $50 million is funny money, though, and it’ll either be wiped out in an eventual release or else be restructured into a signing bonus on a new deal.

Here’s what you need to know about Carr’s new contract with the Saints, based off Florio’s reporting:

  • 2023: $7,200,000 salary cap hit ($1,500,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration)
  • 2024: $35,700,000 salary cap hit ($30,000,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration)
  • 2025: $45,700,000 salary cap hit ($30,000,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration, $10,000,000 roster bonus)
  • 2026: $55,700,000 salary cap hit ($50,000,000 base salary, $5,700,000 signing bonus proration)
  • 2027: $5,700,000 salary cap hit (Contract voids, leaving $5,700,000 behind in dead money from signing bonus proration)

The Saints can kick the can down the road in each of those future years with more restructures, converting base salary and roster bonuses into new signing bonuses, but that won’t happen if Carr hasn’t earned it. Only his base salaries in 2023 and 2024 are guaranteed at signing, and his 2025 base salary is only guaranteed for injury. A $10 million portion of his 2025 base salary will become guaranteed if he’s still on the roster in 2024 (that’s the roster bonus mentioned earlier).

So the Saints gave themselves an exit ramp here in 2025. If Carr declines and doesn’t perform as hoped, they can release him after two years and be left a dead money salary cap charge of about $27,100,000 between the guaranteed roster bonus and leftover signing bonus prorations (which accelerate to the year he’s released). There are more factors we don’t know about yet, and they could spread out those dead money costs by designating him a post-June 1 cut, but that’s the gist of it. Hopefully Carr continues to play at a Pro Bowl level so he can get this team where they want to go.

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