Carr wanted to be traded prior to restructure per NOF and CBSsports

[RaisingTheBar]

Arch isn't coming out in 2026.

He very well might not be, but that’s why I said or the other top QB prospect. How many times have we had an opportunity to draft the top QB?

 

[sammymvpknight]

Perhaps he could Trent Dilfer his way..he probably could on the Steelers. But the elephant in the room is, what would be your thoughts when we go 0-17 without him? 0-17 is a hard pill to swallow. By game 3, people will be questioning Mickey Loomis and will bring up the “KM is a puppet” narrative. By mid year, the narrative will change to, “I can’t believe we didn’t hire a proven head coach in Mike Mcarthy, now it’s too late because we burned our bridge”. All the while Sean Payton is headed BACK to the playoffs with Denver. YOUCH!!. My point is, you do not want to go 0-17. You want to go around .500, AT LEAST, to maintain confidence in the coaching staff. No one cares about excuses. You have to try and win every year in the NFL.

The narrative would be “get rid of Loomis”, which is probably what we should do. He is not objective at this point…the owner going above him to get rid of Allen is bad. I don’t trust that he’s going to be able to make the tough decisions necessary to field a winner. The drafting has been poor…the cap management has been poor. He did a great job hiring Payton, signing Brees, and fielding the Kamara draft class…but that has been forever ago.

 

[3ParStillDriver]

Please explain how they could pull off a draft day trade for Carr and afford to bring forward ALL of the prorated signing bonus charges on his contract.

I'm not sure if they can. I should've clarified and articulated my thoughts better. A plan will be decided on, or by draft day at the latest. It's entirely possible that the Saints and Steelers (or another team like the Browns) "start talking" on a trade and that trade is officially executed June 2nd. Clearly in this case, any compensation would be for 2026 draft. It's not common but we've seen it done before more then a handful of times. over the last decade or two.

No matter how it plays. Underlying moves/actions from Carr and Saints FO hints to Carr not being under center week 1 for the saints.

What would make this the most obvious thing to occur is if the Saints drafted a QB. I can promise you this, if they do then it's because they are confident about a possible trade for Carr and other team(s) have already expressed interest not just in Carr, but the timing. If it falls through (which is certainty could), then worst-case scenario is they can sit their rookie for half a season if not the whole. It's honestly a great position of negotiation to be in and does sound like a position Loomis would like to be in.

 

[SailorJerrysHorse]

I don't understand the folks who refuse to believe that he doesn't want to be traded or released. Why are you so committed to that?

I think we can all objectively say that Carr's at an age and in a situation where this is not what's best for his career. I don't think it's personal against the Saints or the fan base or the city, I think it's business for him and that's totally fine.

While we might not have heard it from him directly, we don't know that his camp is not the side that's leaking this. We don't know who the sources are we just know that the sources have been consistent and Carr has made no attempt to dispel the reporting (or rumors or whatever you want to call it).

The argument that if he wanted out he would just come out and say it can also be made for the other side too: if he DIDN'T want out he could just come out and say that. But he hasn't. His silence is key. He's saying nothing and letting the machine speak for him.

But yet so many people are doing mental gymnastics to try and convince themselves and the rest of us that he wants to be here and I'm just not sure why. Does it not feel way less probable that a group of Carr hating fans and podcasters have a vendetta and are out to hurt him by making up rumors and then getting them picked up by multiple national outlets? Or maybe (just maybe) he simply wants to finish his career somewhere else. It's Occam's Razor in a nutshell.

 

[Tulsa Saint]

Reaching is still reaching. Drafting Dart at #9 doesn't make him a top 10 pick no more than Chicago taking Mitch Trubisky early made him a top 10 pick. The player still has to be worth it.

I agree in principle but Dart is looking less and less of a reach by the day. It’s still leagues better than Davenport or Turner or some of the other misfires.

His ADP based on just the past week is solidly in the late teens(SEA) or early 20s(PIT). It’s incredibly unlikely he even lasts to the 20s tbh as he’s some boards number 2 QB.

The bears made a silly trade for trubisky by trading 2 3rds(one of which was traded to us to draft AK oddly) and a 4th to go up one spot. Pace made a foolish move hardly anyone in the org approved of. Trubisky himself(going by mock draft database) was consistently mocked just outside the top 10 to CLE at 12. They also took him over Watson/Mahommes.

At least in darts case if they do draft him he’ll have organizational backing and a staff that knows QBs in Moore/Nuss/Tolzien. I can agree it’s a bit of a reach and a bit risky but I also don’t like a lot of options at 9 unless someone really good falls. This is almost all contingent on Moore thinking he’s the guy.

 

[Pkessling]

We all heard the possibility that Carr wanted out...here are more details from CBS. They quote Nick Underhill who says "the Saints are in the quarterback business."

The New Orleans Saints restructured Derek Carr's contract this offseason, all but ensuring the quarterback will remain with the team through the 2025 season. That doesn't mean all is well between the two sides. Carr sought a trade before reworking his deal, according to NewOrleans.Football, and his relationship with the Saints remains "tenuous at best" as the club scouts potential quarterbacks of the future.

This comes weeks after previous reports indicated Carr had interest in exploring his value on the open market, though the Saints apparently had no desire to release or trade the veteran. In turn, Carr publicly admitted he would be unwilling to take a pay cut, and the two sides ultimately agreed to redo his four-year, $150 million deal, pushing tens of millions into future seasons.

This will not end well.

Who is going to trade for him? A career, average QB with one playoff appearance and 34 years old.

 

[Tulsa Saint]

Who is going to trade for him? A career, average QB with one playoff appearance and 34 years old.

PIT has no QBs

I also doubt they fully trust a rookie on a team trying to win.

 

[Booker]

I'm not sure if they can. I should've clarified and articulated my thoughts better. A plan will be decided on, or by draft day at the latest. It's entirely possible that the Saints and Steelers (or another team like the Browns) "start talking" on a trade and that trade is officially executed June 2nd. Clearly in this case, any compensation would be for 2026 draft. It's not common but we've seen it done before more then a handful of times. over the last decade or two.

No matter how it plays. Underlying moves/actions from Carr and Saints FO hints to Carr not being under center week 1 for the saints.

Yeah, I suppose they could try to make a draft day trade that included “future considerations,” with the expectation that those considerations would be Carr after June 1, but don’t know if that would fly.

Otherwise, if they get “their guy” or came to the determination that Carr would be a distraction, I could see moving him in June, when the salary cap hit could be absorbed. Buy they’d have to find a trade partner that wanted Carr and that Carr would waive his no trade clause for, and the compensation probably would be minimal.

I can’t see them just cutting him, though, not after committing another $40M to him for the year. Most likely he’s the opening day starter this year, but off the roster next offseason.

 

[Ghost]

PIT has no QBs

I also doubt they fully trust a rookie on a team trying to win.

I could see them signing Flacco for a one-year deal barring retirement on his part.

 

[Merl]

Yeah, I suppose they could try to make a draft day trade that included “future considerations,” with the expectation that those considerations would be Carr after June 1, but don’t know if that would fly.

Otherwise, if they get “their guy” or came to the determination that Carr would be a distraction, I could see moving him in June, when the salary cap hit could be absorbed. Buy they’d have to find a trade partner that wanted Carr and that Carr would waive his no trade clause for, and the compensation probably would be minimal.

It won’t. The league would not approve that.

I can’t see them just cutting him, though, not after committing another $40M to him for the year. Most likely he’s the opening day starter this year, but off the roster next offseason.

 

[Snakehead]

He very well might not be, but that’s why I said or the other top QB prospect. How many times have we had an opportunity to draft the top QB?

Yeah, Nuss will more thank likely be QB1 in the 2026 draft if Arch doesn't enter. He'd be a great addition if we don't get our QB this year.

 

[robsmith32]

Yep. Saw this and posted in another thread earlier.

Anyone could see that he’s been wanting out, anyone except those who need it written in the sky lol.

It’s unlikely now but I hope he gets his request granted, don’t want a QB who doesn’t want to be here.

Nothing against him at all, he isn’t the reason our team has sucked the last few seasons, and I don’t blame him for wanting out.

when you throw hospital balls to your starting wr's and have only ps players left for rest of season. well yes, is his fault we wasn't good. something how he returned when olave returned, just to throw another hospital ball, then subsequintially get injured himself again.
And your backup has no chance at being any good cause of the diminished team. rattler may or not be it, but we couldn't get a good measuring stick other than, we know he can't carry it all himself.

 

[texasjefe]

The article that started this thread is a lazy rehash of incomplete information.

97% of the posts on the thread make no mention of literally the biggest factor governing Carr's roster spot - cap charges to the Saints in 2025 and 2026.

When Carr said 'no paycut' and when allegedly he said 'I want a trade' (without allegedly not waiving his no-trade clause), my understanding from an Underhill comment at the time is that Carr did not realize that he had already signed over in the first contract the right for the Saints to automatically restructure him. As @DSnfla said, Carr never really said, with any context or direct quote, or after the restructure: "I want a trade!" - so if you are mad or interpretive about Carr's "heart" on that one, I don't think it's based on valid facts.

Those of you that say 'he should've taken a paycut,' well, how much of a paycut is he supposed to take to help the Saints on the cap? You're basically asking him to give back at minimum a $10M roster bonus he just got, and probably tens of millions more. It's not a realistic take. Loomis signed Carr to a contract a little cheaper than other starters whiched looked like Loomising to us at the time, but it's still a contract Loomis' prior bloating of the cap could not support in 2024 and 2025. So the restructures and the dead caps got insane.

Carr's now restructured and under contract in 2026. The void year(s) don't start until 2027.

So, in 2026, he carries the following numbers, according to your favorite beat writer, John Sigler, who wrote a response after Todd McShay made similar 'Saints may move on from Carr in 2025' comments a few weeks ago.

We'll get into the minutiae, because it suggests the math for a possible Carr move this year just doesn't check out. The salary camp impact of trading or releasing Carr after June 1 is the same: $1,255,000 in savings and $19,207,000 left over in dead money on this year's cap sheet. But a whopping $59,670,000 would get punted onto the 2026 salary cap. The Saints don't have any dead money on next year's books, yet, but that's going to change once Ryan Ramczyk files his retirement papers this summer. More dead money will come in as players leave the team next offseason, either through retiring themselves or being released outright.

Instead, what the Saints have set up is for everyone to hold their noses and get through one more year with Carr in New Orleans. Then he can move on in 2026. Waiting until next offseason would allow the Saints to release Carr and immediately save $9,537,000. Using a post-June 1 designation would cut up that $59,670,000 in dead money. The $19,207,000 hit we mentioned earlier is paid on the 2026 cap and the remaining $40,463,000 gets moved to 2027. Older pros like Cameron Jordan, Demario Davis, and Tyrann Mathieu may be off the books by that point so the Saints can more easily turn everything over.

Source:

Todd McShay suggests Derek Carr may still move on from the Saints in 2025

Veteran NFL draft analyst Todd McShay suggests Derek Carr may still be moved in 2025. But the salary cap math just doesn't check out.

saintswire.usatoday.com

Loomis made a high risk/questionable reward decision to get DA a legit starting QB. This forum has written hundreds of thousands of words as to why it has failed. The cap numbers don't care for any opinions. They are what they are, and they rule just about everything. A trade is just to get him off the team. It doesn't begin to affect the math until June 2026, and even then, if I read Sigler right, that just dumps a $40M dead cap charge onto the 2027 cap.

 

[Patman255]

In the discussion of the possibility of a draft day trade, is it possible that a trade could be made that involves Carr restructuring his contract 'before' the trade, to make it more realistic that we'd be able to make it make sense in a cap sense (and his agreeing to it would be because it would get him onto a team that presumably he prefers to go to?).

I'm not a cap expert so I'm just not sure if the ship has already sailed on his cap hit since we did the restructure.