New Raiders General Manager Dave Ziegler said that the team will see how everything fits together with quarterback Derek Carr “and kind of work from that point” when asked about a contract extension at Tuesday’s introductory press conference, but head coach Josh McDaniels sounds like he sees Carr as part of the foundation of the Raiders team he wants to build.
During an appearance of SiriusXM NFL Radio, McDaniels said Carr has “impressed me for a long, long time” and talked about Carr as a leader of the team that he was hired to coach this week.
“It’ll be a really fun experience for me to continue to build this thing with him as our leader,” McDaniels said. “He’s certainly capable of doing a lot of great things, he’s done them before in his career. I’m just looking forward to getting to know him, how he learns the best, what he does, and how we put this thing around him the best way we can to help him be successful and help our team ultimately achieve our goals.”
Carr is headed into his ninth season and this year’s playoff loss to the Bengals was his first postseason appearance. McDaniels’ comments suggest he thinks Carr has more to come in his future, but the Raiders’ offseason actions will provide further evidence of how they plan to move forward at quarterback.