Jaguars players reject criticism of lack of home-field advantage

Hall of Fame wide receiver Cris Carter: 'They don't have great crowd support'

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Hall of Fame wide receiver-turned Fox Sports analyst Cris Carter said this week that he considers the Jaguars to be flawed as a Super Bowl contender, in part, because of a lack of fan support.

Carter, speaking on First Things First on FS1, said, "I don’t feel Jacksonville has the home field advantage. They don’t have great crowd support. They haven’t won for a long period of time. Anytime you travel to a team -- I would love to go to Jacksonville and play them (in January), you allow these quarterbacks in perfect conditions -- a January evening in Jacksonville -- to throw the football. That’s going to help the opposition."

 

 

Jaguars players, and opponents have a different opinion.

Just ask Tom Brady. After losing to the Jaguars Sunday, the New England Patriots quarterback told WEEI Radio, "We had to do a better job early to give ourselves a more competitive game, take the crowd out of it, but the crowd’s in it for 60 minutes and they challenged the communication. It just made for a long day."

None of the Jaguars players are on board with Carter's assessment. 

"We've got to get him tickets to the game," linebacker Myles Jack said. "Cris Carter, you need to come down to Duval and see what the fans are all about. I don't think there's anything better. We've got the pool, Jaxson de Ville. The music is bumping, The fans are crazy. I've never seen anything like it. I love it."

Others pointed directly to the win Sunday over the Patriots, which featured a playoff-like atmosphere at TIAA Bank Stadium. 

"Whoever says that we don't have home-field advantage hasn't been to a game in Duval recently," free safety Tashaun Gipson said. "That crowd got behind us Sunday. When that momentum got going, the offense was feeding off of it. The defense was feeding off of it. This crowd was phenomenal. This is what it's supposed to be like. We're finally giving them the wins that they deserve and they're giving it back to us by giving us that edge."