Derek Carr struggles, loses MVP momentum in Raiders' disappointing loss

The chances were there all Thursday night for the Oakland Raiders, who lost 21-13 to the Kansas City Chiefs and slid from the No. 1 seed in the AFC to the No. 5 slot in the playoffs with only three games remaining.

And with that dip, there also was a drop in Derek Carr’s MVP candidacy.

Carr struggled badly — but also was a victim to a ton of dropped passes — and didn’t surpass the 100-yard passing plateau until the fourth quarter. He had trouble gripping and ripping the ball in the cold conditions at Arrowhead Stadium, where the field was frozen just hours before the game, a stiff wind blew and temperatures went below 20 degrees.

But how much did Carr’s pinkie injury affect him?

He suffered the infamous injury against the Carolina Panthers in Week 12, missed a series, came back out with a glove on and stormed the Raiders back to win at home. Stuff like that gets serious MVP mention, along with the great season Carr had put together prior to that point. Then last week, Carr seemed unfazed by the injury as he sliced the Buffalo Bills for 260 passing yards and two TDs.

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Carr said Thursday that the pinkie wasn’t the issue.

Then what was? He finished the game 17-of-41 passing for 117 yards. It was ugly on the screen as the passing line appears.

The biggest effect Thursday might have been his receivers’ drops. We counted at least eight, including several big ones. None were bigger than Amari Cooper’s “what was that?” do-si-do as Carr appeared to deliver a strike down the middle of the field. There were nine minutes left, the Raiders trailed by one score and the ball was there for the taking, with Cooper having beaten corner Marcus Peters deep and safety Eric Berry not likely to have caught him. Cooper couldn’t come down with it — even if that doesn’t count as a drop, it was on the receiver.

On the night, Carr’s top three receivers — Cooper, Michael Crabtree and Seth Roberts — were targeted 26 times but came down with only 11 catches for 62 yards and no touchdowns. That’s brutal, even with Crabtree having to leave the game briefly with an apparent injury.

But then again, Carr struggled on his own volition, too. The offensive line had a late scratch with Pro Bowl candidate Kelechi Osemele getting sick, but it mostly held up. They held the Chiefs to one sack on 42 dropbacks and limited the pressures, too.

Carr was off. His receivers were off, too. The special teams and defense were putrid early and dug the Raiders in a big hole. It was a bad night all around. Two crucial offensive penalties (of 10 by the Raiders total) killed them: a hold by Clive Walford on first-and-goal from the Kansas City 7 that turned into a botched field-goal try and a false start by right tackle Austin Howard on fourth-and-1 from the Kansas City 14 with 2:01 left in the game. The Raiders failed to convert on fourth-and-6 and lost by the same deficit they faced for the final 17 minutes of the game.

Asking Carr — even with all his late-game heroics this season — to bring them back at a rowdy Arrowhead against a very good Chiefs defense with everything that was happening was asking a lot. But it was there for the taking, and Carr was one of the big reasons the Raiders lost. No two ways around it.

Should this kill off his MVP candidacy? No — although Detroit Lions fans pushing their own Matthew Stafford for the award seemed to take joy on Twitter in Carr’s struggles. But unless Carr can pull out some more glove-on-hand type of magic down the stretch, the battle for the award seemed to have opened back up again.

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Eric Edholm is a writer for Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at edholm@yahoo-inc.com or follow him on Twitter!

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