The David Carr era of the Houston Texans came to a merciful end yesterday as the Texans released Carr, the team’s first NFL draft pick in its five year history.
I didn’t agree with the Texans decision to take Carr as the first overall pick in the 2002 NFL draft and I expressed skepticism about him in each of my three pre-season previews of the Texans since starting this blog back in early 2004 (see here, here and here). Carr’s performance really deteriorated over this past season, (here, here and here), so he became essentially untradeable. It’s true that the Texans’ porous offensive line subjected Carr to an inhumane amount of physical abuse over the years, but effectiveness in football is much more interdependent on one’s teammates than, say, baseball, and Carr’s lack of development over his five seasons certainly didn’t help the OLine, either.
The Texans decision to release Carr and trade for Falcons backup QB Matt Schaub has been the talk of the town the past couple of days, and the reactions have been all over the map. One of the more curious ones has been that of Chronicle sports columnist Richard Justice, who is self-righteously indignant that Carr didn’t work out in Houston:

What we’ll never know is what would have happened if Carr had gotten with an organization that knew what it was doing. The Texans never protected him or coached him, never put enough talent around him. Shame on you, Charley Casserly. Shame on you, too, Bob McNair. Maybe you guys were wrong about what David Carr could have been, but you never gave him a chance to find out.

Of course, this is the same Richard Justice who, as recently as a year and a half ago, was effusive in his praise of both Carr and Texans management during the middle of the team’s free-fall from a promising expansion team to a laughingstock of the NFL:

The Texans are respectable. They’re coming close. They’ve got four 2-7 teams left on their schedule. They almost won in Jacksonville, and they made a run at the Indianapolis Colts before losing 31-17 Sunday. [. . .]
The Texans are a better offensive team since [since-fired offensive coordinator Joe] Pendry took over [for the fired Chris Palmer]. David Carr looks like he’s on his way to becoming a first-rate quarterback. He’s quicker and more accurate in his throws, less likely to take a sack.

In reality, Casserly and McNair were constantly attempting to upgrade the talent around Carr, they simply weren’t able to pull it off. Tony Boselli and Orlando Pace are just two of several top-level offensive linemen who the Texans unsuccessfully attempted to hire as an anchor for the OLine over the past five years. Granted, Casserly and McNair didn’t get it done, but it sure wasn’t for lack of trying. Justice is being petty in not pointing that out.
Meanwhile, Justice gushes over the progress of the Texans under the Gary Kubiak regime:

If you care about the Texans, you should be happy this morning. A page has been turned. Moving on, moving up. In two off-seasons under Gary Kubiak and Rick Smith, the Texans have undergone a significant facelift. By the beginning of next season, there’ll be few reminders of the [former coach] Dom [Capers] and [former GM] Charley [Casserly] era.
You should be happy about your new quarterback. Matt Schaub has a chance to be really good. He’s no sure thing, but Jake Plummer, Jeff Garcia and Brady Quinn aren’t sure things, either.
The Texans paid a high price for Schaub and they’re taking a chance. No franchise gets better without taking some chances. Let’s be optimistic for a second. Let’s pretend the glass is half-full.
They’ve got a Pro Bowl wide receiver on one side of the field in Andre Johnson. They’ve got a very good tight end in Owen Daniels. They’ve got a productive runnning back in Ahman Green. Hopefully, they’ll match the offer to FB Vonta Leach. They’ve got more depth and talent in the O-line than ever before. If they can find another receiver in the draft, they’ll have the makings of a very good offense. [. . .]
The bottom line is they’re making progress. They’ve added a running back and a quarterback and a bunch of experienced, professional guys. If they have a good draft, they’ll be positioned for their first .500 season.

Maybe so, but in addition to coughing up $48 million over six years for a guy who has never been a starting NFL quarterback, the Texans dealt some serious draft-day compensation to land new QB Schaub. Was it too much? Probably not, particularly given that a quarterback taken in the first round of the draft is not an even money bet of developing into an above-average NFL QB. For every John Elway, Peyton, Troy Aikman or Carson Palmer, there are far more David Carr’s, Tim Couch’s, Akili Smith’s and Ryan Leaf’s.
But while continuing to bash McNair and the previous Casserly-Capers regime, why is Justice giving Kubiak a pass on the first key decision that he made in his tenure as the Texans coach — that is, Kubiak’s initial blunder in agreeing to retain Carr in the first place? That decision was as bad as any of the dubious decisions of the Casserly era. The Texans paid an $8 million option bonus after the 2005 season ended and before Kubiak was hired to secure the rights to Carr for three more seasons, so maybe Kubiak took the Texans head coaching job without really having any choice but to keep Carr. But by not pressing the issue that Carr was an inadequate QB last year, Kubiak blew an opportunity to dangle the No. overall 1 pick during the 2006 NFL draft in a trade. A trade of that spot could have easily allowed the Texans to receive some much-needed value plus move back a few spots in the draft and still draft either Matt Leinart, Jay Cutler or Vince Young, the Houston and UT icon who went on to win the NFL offensive Rookie of the Year Award and become the first rookie quarterback to play in the NFL Pro Bowl.
Justice may not care about any of that, but my sense is that most Texans fans won’t forget about it until Kubiak and Schaub are leading the team into the playoffs. From my vantage point, that still appears to be a long way’s off.