Carr finds 4th-quarter magic in win
QB sharp: 8 straight games without pick.
OAKLAND >> As JuJu Smith Schuster of the Pittsburgh Steelers ran down the left sideline after taking a lateral from teammate James Washington, Raiders quarterback and straightarrow Derek Carr insisted he wasn’t thinking of a swear word. But there was an accompanying physical reaction with seeing all the Raiders’ hard work potentially go for naught.
“I almost threw up,” Carr said as he walked off the podium following a 24-21 win Sunday over the Pittsburgh Steelers at the Coliseum.
The 48-yard play to the 22-yard line set up a gametying 40-yard field goal by Chris Boswell. But Boswell’s plant foot slipped on the Coliseum turf, he kicked the ball into the line, and the Raiders had their third win of the season before delirious home fans who had been joined by an unusually large number of Pittsburgh supporters.
Draft nerds be damned, the win kept the Raiders on the outside looking in when it comes to the No. 1 overall pick, with the 49ers also winning against Denver.
That’s the way Carr wants it, and no player did more to sabotage the Raiders draft standing. He finished 25 of 34 for
322 yards and two touchdowns.
Have we finally gotten past the breathless speculation that Carr and Jon Gruden are a bad mix, doomed to divorce? Or that Carr has leadership issues which could prematurely end his reign as the Raiders’ quarterback of the future?
I’ve maintained since the season began the most important development for the Raiders this season would be for Gruden and Carr to develop a chemistry together and for the head coach to have a veteran, CEO quarterback. And despite a 3-10 record, it’s happening and you’d have to be blind not to see it.
All Carr did in the fourth quarter against the Steelers was twice lead his team from behind, completing 11 of 15 passes for 134 yards and both touchdowns on the Raiders’ final two possessions. He looked the part of the $125 million franchise quarterback.
The Raiders got a huge break when Ben Roethlisberger missed four scoreless Pittsburgh possessions with backup Joshua Dobbs at quarterback in the second half. Roethlisberger returned in the fourth quarter and finished 25 of 29 for 282 yards and a pair of touchdowns.
The Steelers were lost without Roethlisberger much in the same way the Raiders would be without Carr. At one point this season, Carr had seven touchdown passes, eight interceptions and his equity with home fans from 2016’s 12-win season had pretty much evaporated.
Carr has now thrown 261 passes since his last interception on Oct. 7. In his last two games against playoff bound teams, assuming the Steelers don’t completely collapse, Carr is 54 of 72 for 607 yards and five touchdowns.
After Roethlisberger led the Steelers to a 21-17 lead, Carr needed three completions to reach the Steelers side of the field, then threw a 39-yard strike to Seth Roberts to the 7-yard line.
The play was supposed to go to Jared Cook, except Carr had done the same thing in Friday during practice and correctly surmised Roberts would be open again against a Cover 2 defense Sunday against Pittsburgh.
Carr said he told Roberts if the safety played it high, to take the middle of the field.
“I honestly thought I overthrew it by 12 yards, but he found another gear and went and got that ball,” Carr said. “That had to be the play of the game by Seth.”
Forget the notion that Gruden is suddenly opening things up and taking off the training wheels.
When Carr was struggling, the two had a conversation that helped him move past the mistakes that came in the first five games.
“Coach grabbed me and said I don’t care about stats and things like that,” Carr said. “I just want to see you efficiently do exactly what I tell you. Honestly, when he said that it was freeing to me. I thought I was trying to prove something to him. It kind of settled me down.”
While Carr is self-confident enough to avoid saying ‘I told you so,’ he thinks the way the Raiders are playing of late proved he and Gruden can make a good team.
“I think we’ve been able to show our team that our relationship, this system — we’ve tried to sell it as hard as we both can,” Carr said. “We knew it was going to be a process. We didn’t know stat-wise how it was going to start out. It would just take time for people to see it the way we see it. It feels good because it puts a stamp on it.”
Considering it’s the most important partnership in the organization, it’s something the Raiders can call progress regardless of their final record.