I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but the fact remains that there aren't any guarantees that Carter will be in any condition to actually contribute to the DE production. If he were back to the condition he was late last season with the Pats, then I'd bet there would be quite a few teams out there trying to sign him, but as it seems that there aren't - I'd have to infer that he hasn't made a full recovery from the injury.

It might seem like there isn't a huge risk in signing a guy like that to a 1-year deal, as you suggested, but with the new CBA teams are able to carry the cap room they don't use one year to next year, so it might be better to save that money towards next year's cap than signing a rotational player who might not be anywhere close to 100% healthy all year.

I think they have an interesting corps at the DE, even with the unfortunate injury to Romeus, and I bet Spags is going to be able to get a lot out of that group of players. I'd much rather see him trying to find young "nobodies" out of the UDFA pool or teams' practice squads than signing broken down veterans based on what they have been able to do in the past. Lets remember that Carter had the opportunity to make a run for the QB in a 3-4 base defense where he was positioned next to Wilfork, who repeatedly takes on double teams and pushes them to the ground - he wouldn't have that same luxury with the Saints.