Peyton Manning’s Raiders camp visit ‘invaluable’ to Derek Carr
NAPA, Calif. — Raiders quarterback Derek Carr especially enjoyed spending time with one particular visitor to training camp Thursday.
That says a lot, considering his former teammate, Charles Woodson, was there, too. Also patrolling the Raiders’ practice field, and wearing a bright orange Tennessee Volunteers hat, was former NFL quarterback Peyton Manning.
A future Hall of Famer that Carr admired and tried to emulate while growing up.
“I’ve taken things from his game,” Carr said. “Even from preparation, things that I could learn from my brother through Eli and all those kinds of things to stealing his warmup routine. I’ve taken things from Peyton my whole life, so I definitely didn’t stop today.”
Raiders have four QBs in position-drill area today: Derek Carr, EJ Manuel, Connor Cook and … Peyton Manning. pic.twitter.com/Tj8YN0qBG0
— Michael Gehlken (@GehlkenNFL) August 2, 2018
Manning was invited to the Raiders training camp by coach Jon Gruden. The relationship between the two goes back to 2001 when they bonded during the Pro Bowl.
Gruden had the five-time league MVP sit in on the team’s quarterback meeting Thursday morning. During the meeting, Manning saw a similar trait from Carr that reminded him of Gruden: a passion for the game of football.
“[Carr] is very engaged and obviously trying to learn a new system, which is a challenge, but one thing about Gruden is he loves football so everybody playing for him better love it, too,” Manning told a group of reporters.
“When your QB loves it—you can tell Carr does – it shows. I pull for QBs. It’s a unique fraternity and I think the NFL needs good QBs, especially young QBs, and they’ve got a really good one in Derek for sure.”
Carr and Manning met only three times on the field (2014 and 2015). For Carr, working with Manning on Thursday may have been bigger than any of those meetings.
“Peyton is one of my favorites all time.” Carr said. “He’s one of the best to ever play the game. I took full advantage of today, after whatever drill I would go, ‘Hey, how was communication? How was execution?’ And he’d give us feedback.
“To have that from someone like Peyton, I think that’s kind of invaluable.”
Notable
■ Martavis Bryant (illness), Jalen Richard (calf), Derek Carrier (soreness) and Fadol Brown returned to practice on Thursday.
■ Brandon Parker missed his second straight day of practice.
■ Raiders assistant coach/special teams coordinator Rich Bisaccia is scheduled to speak to the media on Friday. This will be his first news conference since the start of training camp.
More Raiders: Follow all of our Raiders coverage online at reviewjournal.com/Raiders and @NFLinVegas on Twitter.
Contact reporter Chris Booker at cbooker@reviewjournal.com. Follow @Bookerc94 on Twitter.
