If you believe the rumors, the Las Vegas Raiders looked into signing Tom Brady this offseason. That would have pushed Derek Carr off the team.
Carr, though, never felt threatened by the rumor mill, and credited coach Jon Gruden and GM Mike Mayock for being transparent with him.
“No,” Carr told Vic Tafur of The Athletic when asked if he had ever doubted he’d return as the team’s quarterback. “And I say no without getting into too much detail. I knew some of the things that were going to be said and I knew some of the things that were going to be thrown out by the media. I knew a lot of those things. And then I’d wake up in the morning and those things would happen. And, I would just laugh. Obviously, people would be like, ‘Oh my gosh, did you see this?’ And then they’re asking my teammates questions, and it’s like … I just don’t care enough anymore to call my teammates and tell them, ‘Don’t worry about it, we’re good.’ I just didn’t care enough.
“But from what they told me — I can tell you that Mr. Mayock and Mr. Gruden both called me and said that they did their due diligence on everything. … And they can tell you that in their own words. I am not going to say what they said, because it’s kind of awesome and I don’t want them to have to answer for it. But I felt very comfortable with what they said.”
While the Raiders publicly stood by Carr, rumor had it that they pursued Brady right up until the end. Regardless, it’s still Carr’s job, and he’ll be expected to make progress with a new-look Raider offense in 2020.
