Mike Reiss, ESPN Staff Writer 6y

It didn't take long for Derek Carr to earn respect of Patriots' defense


COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- The New England Patriots' preparations for Sunday's game against the Oakland Raiders in Mexico City has had players revisiting the last time the teams met -- Week 3 of the 2014 season -- which was just the third career game for Raiders quarterback Derek Carr.

They had a strong feeling that Carr, a 2014 second-round draft pick, would be on to bigger and better things after that day.

"You’re going against a young quarterback, third game and it’s like, ‘We want to do this, we want to do that, he’s never seen this.’ And he kind of just stayed calm the whole game," recalled safety Devin McCourty. "He didn’t make, really, any mistakes, kept his team in it and, honestly, at the end, we’re a Vince Wilfork interception away and a holding penalty on a touchdown that they ran from even winning that game."

The Patriots held on for a 16-9 victory at Gillette Stadium, and Carr finished 21 of 34 for 174 yards, no touchdowns and one interception.

"Right from there, when we played them, I could tell this guy is going to be a pretty good quarterback in this league, and he’s kind of just progressed," McCourty said. "For us, it will be the second time seeing him, and it’s a lot different. Even though he played poised then as the third game in his career, he’s a lot better now. So, we’ve really got to be ready. I mean, he gets the ball down the field, he takes short gains and lets his guys make plays, too, so really attacks all parts of the field."

One thing that stands out to McCourty is how Carr gets all of the Raiders' pass-catchers -- from receivers Amari Cooper, Michael Crabtree and Seth Roberts, to tight end Jared Cook -- involved in the attack. The Raiders enter Sunday's game ranked seventh in the NFL in passing yards per game.

"I think he has a lot of confidence in his guys, so when we go out there Sunday, I don’t think we’re going to go out there, and there’s going to be a matchup or we’re going to sit there and say, ‘We know Carr doesn’t want that.’ If he likes his guy, he’s going to take a shot and throw it to him," McCourty said. "We watched the Kansas City game where he threw a lot of them deep downfield and came up with some, some were pass interference or it was an incompletion, so I think he has a lot of confidence in all his guys to come down with the ball."

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