30 biggest NFL Draft busts of all time

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Houston quarterback David Carr during a game between the New York Giants and the Houston Texans at The Meadowlands in East Rutherford, New Jersey on November 5th, 2006. The Giants won 14 to 10. (Photo by James R. Morton/NFLPhotoLibrary) /

27. Biggest NFL Draft busts of all-time – Houston Texans QB David Carr

Flaming out as the top pick in the NFL Draft is a good way to make this list although, to be fair, teams picking that high often set those picks up for failure. That is certainly what happened to David Carr, who was the first draft pick in the history of the Houston Texans.

Carr was the first overall pick in the 2002 draft out of Fresno State with Houston having designs on him being their eventual franchise quarterback. The problem was that the Texans couldn’t build an offensive line for Carr, leading him to take a whopping 76 sacks in his rookie year, an NFL record that still stands to this day.

All of those sacks led to some bad habits for Carr, who was trying to do a ton to help drag a bad football team to victory. There were certainly some highs for Carr, who did lead the NFL in completion percentage in 2006, but he was never able to transform the Texans into a winner.

Houston released Carr after the 2006 season and he bounced around the league as a backup for a few years, notably winning a Super Bowl ring with the New York Giants in 2011. Carr’s final stat line of 65 touchdowns against 71 interceptions to go along with a 59.7 percent completion rate is thoroughly mediocre, far from what you would want out of a top overall pick.

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