Raiders’ Derek Carr needs to shake Kansas City’s hex as Oakland hopes to stay in playoff race

We’ve seen a lot of growth in the second year of the union between Derek Carr and Jon Gruden.

Now comes the next step, and for Carr in particular it’s a big one.

Arrowhead Stadium is the most hostile of environments to Carr, where his record is 0-5, his stats are awful and not once has he passed the eye test of being a solid, functional NFL quarterback.

When the Raiders (6-5) visit the Kansas City Chiefs (7-4) Sunday afternoon, Carr may not win, but he needs to keep the Raiders in the fight through being a leader, avoiding turnovers and looking like the player who has both a system and a team within his control.

You can’t be the quarterback of the Raiders by continuing to flounder at the road venue of your longstanding AFC West rival.

A review of Carr’s Arrowhead misery:

Dec. 14, 2015: Carr is 27 of 56 for 222 yards and one touchdown. The Raiders lose 31-13.

Jan. 1, 2016: Carr is 21 of 33 for 1091 yards, one touchdown, one interception. The Raiders lose 23-17.

Dec. 8, 2016: Carr is 17 of 41 for 117 yards and no touchdowns. The Raiders lose 21-13.

Dec. 10, 2017: Carr is 24 of 41 for 211 yards and one touchdown, two interceptions. The Raiders lose 26-15.

Dec. 30, 2018: Carr is 24 of 33 for 211 yards, 185 yards and two interceptions. The Raiders lose 35-3.

Summary: Carr has completed 113 of 204 passes (55.4 percent) for 926 yards, three touchdowns and five interceptions. The Raiders have averaged just over 12 points per game, but three of those games were at least competitive enough that a top flight quarterback could have pulled out a win or two.

Carr has often been a top-flight quarterback. Just not at Arrowhead. Carr’s passer rating in those games is 61.4. As a point of reference, the career passer rating of JaMarcus Russell is 65.2.

There have been extenuating circumstances, not the least of which is the Chiefs usually go in with superior talent, and that the game has always taken place after Dec. 1. That means on a good day the temperature might hit 45 degrees with a cold breeze. On a bad day, it’s closer to zero with bone-chilling winds.

Carr’s struggles in cold weather are well known and he’s heard plenty about it. It was no accident when he took the practice field Thursday in a sleeveless jersey for the coldest practice session of the season. But let’s face it, many of those have been road games playing quarterback for a marginal team where they were bound to struggle anyway. It’s also not a huge sample size (0-4 at 40 degrees or below 2-8 at 50 degrees or below) for a quarterback with 89 career starts.

Mt. Everest when it comes to Carr isn’t the weather. It’s Arrowhead Stadium.

The last time the Raiders visited Kansas City as division contenders, they were 10-2 and the Chiefs were 9-3. It was 21 degrees with a wind chill of 12. Carr had broken the pinky finger on his throwing hand two weeks earlier against Carolina, but returned to play well in that win and another victory against Buffalo the following week although unable to take direct snaps from center.

Against the Chiefs, Carr never completed a pass of longer than 18 yards with no legitimate completions downfield. With the Raiders trailing 21-13 with more than nine minutes left, Amari Cooper broke into the clear and rivalry mythology has it that Carr’s downfield throw hit a “SpiderCam” wire. The ball fluttered harmlessly to the turf as if shot by a sniper.

So Carr’s difficulties at Arrowhead aren’t just problematic, they’re just plain weird.

Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith, meanwhile, was 17 of 26 for 264 yards, one touchdown and and five completions of 28 or more yards despite a reputation of being a cautious downfield thrower.

Raiders fans have run hot and cold on Carr the past two seasons, a byproduct of having inferior talent and a 10-22 record. Many were hoping the rumors of Gruden finding another starting quarterback in the past off-season were true. They weren’t, of course. Gruden had no intention of going through last season’s 4-12 season with Carr absorbing a complex system and then starting all over with a rookie.

Gruden doesn’t want to start over at quarterback next year either, not with the development of a terrific rookie class and five more draft picks in the top 90 coming up in 2020.

Jon Gruden and Derek Carr have helped to improve the Raiders offense considerably from a year ago. AP Photo

Any questions about the incompatibility between Carr’s supposedly sensitive side and Gruden’s unsparing coaching style have been answered. Carr has proved adept at being the CEO quarterback Gruden wants, and he’s shown a knack for for being clutch with 18 fourth-quarter comebacks and 19 game-winning drives.

At age 28, with six years in, Carr looks set to lead the Raiders into Las Vegas. He’s the closest thing Gruden has had to Rich Gannon, the veteran he hand-picked in free agency in 1999 to replace Jeff George. George was the man with the golden arm. Gannon piled up completions, executed Gruden’s offense and was the unquestioned leader of a brief Raiders renaissance from 2000 through 2002.

Gannon, however, was 3-1 in Arrowhead, all in close games. He had a bit of a site advantage in that he spent 1995 through 1998 as a Chiefs backup and occasional starter.

No one is suggesting Carr has to match reigning MVP Patrick Mahomes pass for pass on Sunday. And if Mahomes is at his explosive best, there may be little Carr can do about the end result because he doesn’t play defense.

What Gruden and the fan base need to see is Carr operating at his best, and that’s being a leader of a balanced offense, content to have Josh Jacobs be a nearly equal partner in terms of moving the chains and scoring points. Carr needs to be efficient and give the Raiders a chance to win.

He needs to be Derek Carr, and not the imposter we’ve seen at Arrowhead Stadium for the last five years.

This story was originally published November 29, 2019 at 10:08 AM.