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Should the Dolphins Even Kick the Tires on Carr?

Derek Carr has become the first prominent veteran QB on the move this offseason and at least one national media figure has suggested the Miami Dolphins as a possible destination
Alain Poupart|
Should the Dolphins Even Kick the Tires on Carr?
Should the Dolphins Even Kick the Tires on Carr?

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Miami Dolphins

GM Chris Grier couldn't have been clearer in saying that Tua Tagovailoa will be the Miami Dolphins starting quarterback in 2023, but it's not stopping the national media from suggesting the team might add a high-profile veteran to the roster.

Derek Carr became the first prominent QB on the move late Tuesday afternoon with his release from the Las Vegas Raiders, which had been anticipated because of the guaranteed $40 million for 2023 he was set to release had he remained on the roster Wednesday.

Once he clears waivers (because it's hard to envision any team picking up his contract), Carr will be free to negotiate a new contract with any team around the league and can be signed at any time — unlike pending unrestricted free agents, who can't teams until March 15.

Given the neverending demand for quarterbacks, Carr is expected to be able to field many offers once he's on the market, which had the good folks at "Good Morning Football" suggesting ideal destinations for him.

And that's when Peter Schrager threw out the Miami Dolphins.

"I don't know anything from the Dolphins side of it," Schrager said, "but to me if I'm the Dolphins, I'm so close. My roster is so loaded. You bring in Derek Carr to Miami, are they not one of the favorites in the AFC?"

Schrager preached the go-for-broke idea looking back at the Bucs signing Tom Brady in 2020 and the Rams trading for Matthew Stafford in 2021, and indicated his idea was that Carr would join Tagovailoa and compete with him.

Adding Carr no doubt would give the Dolphins as good as 1-2 setup at quarterback as any in the NFL, but there are many reasons to wonder — as Schrager's colleagues seemed to do — whether this makes any sense.

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WHY CARR LIKELY NOT HEADED TO MIAMI

Let's revisit again what Grier said in his joint press conference with head coach Mike McDaniel the day after the playoff loss against Buffalo and focus on the last sentence of his answer to the Tua question.

"We’ll go through our process, but he is our starting quarterback and will be next season.”

Sounds pretty definitive, no?

Tua himself has said he's moving full steam ahead toward the 2023 season and will be ready for OTAs after recovering from his second official concussion of last season.

While Tua is an ascending player coming off a breakthrough season, Carr is an established veteran who's had some good years but is not coming off a particularly impressive 2022 performance.

From the Dolphins' standpoint, if Tua is good to go for 2023 — and, again, all indications are that he will be — would Derek Carr represent much of an upgrade at quarterback? Any upgrade?

He would most definitely represent a big-time upgrade over Teddy Bridgewater at the backup quarterback position, plus he's got the bonus of being durable, having missed only two games because of injury in his first nine NFL seasons.

So adding Carr as a backup at the right price would be a great move for the Dolphins, a slam-dunk kind of move.

But Carr has started 142 of his 142 NFL regular season games and, doing some quick math here, that's 100 percent or all of them.

Derek Carr is a starter and there will be teams beside the Dolphins who will pursue him as a starter, whether it be the New Orleans Saints, New York Jets, Carolina Panthers, Indianapolis Colts, Tampa Bay Buccaneers or another team.

So why would Carr want to come to Miami where he almost assuredly be a backup when he could go somewhere else the GM hasn't declared a starter yet? Maybe Carr is so crazy confident in his ability to beat out Tagovailoa that the idea of playing with Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle convinces him to take on that challenge.

It says here it's way more likely he'll choose another option, one where he'll become the undisputed starter the moment he signs.

So, yeah, the Dolphins signing Derek Carr would be a bold, headline-grabbing move, but it just doesn't add up.

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Alain Poupart has covered the Miami Dolphins on a full-time basis since 1989. You can follow him on Twitter at @PoupartNFL. Feel free to submit questions every week for the All Dolphins mailbag via Twitter or via email at fnalldolphins@yahoo.com.

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Alain Poupart
ALAIN POUPART

Alain Poupart is the publisher/editor of Miami Dolphins On SI and host of the All Dolphins Podcast. Alain has covered the Miami Dolphins on a full-time basis since 1989 for various publications and media outlets, including Dolphin Digest, The Associated Press and the Dolphins team website. In addition to being a credentialed member of the Miami Dolphins press corps, Alain has covered three Super Bowls (for NFL.com, Football News and the Montreal Gazette), the annual NFL draft, the Senior Bowl, and the NFL Scouting Combine. During his almost 40 years in journalism, which began at the now-defunct Miami News, Alain has covered practically every sport at one time or another, from tennis to golf, baseball, basketball and everything in between. The career also included time as a copy editor, including work on several books, such as "Still Perfect," an inside look at the Miami Dolphins' 1972 perfect season. A native of Montreal, Canada, whose first language is French, Alain grew up a huge hockey fan but soon developed a love for all sports, including NFL football. He has lived in South Florida since the 1980s.

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