This, a very good player, not a great one.
Like Lukaku in that he excelled against lesser opposition but disappeared occasionally in the crucial games hence the "Coward" jibes.
I think something that people should remember is that Carrick was our main defensive midfielder most of the time. People always compare him to the likes of Scholes, Pirlo, Xavi, Alonso, etc, and he obviously comes up a bit short in terms of passing and creativity. But the fact that he was close enough to be mentioned in the same breath as them while actually playing a different role (a role that none of them were defensively good enough to play) was a huge strength. It actually allowed us to do something that pretty much nobody else could do and play two true playmakers together in midfield (Carrick-Scholes), while all the others I mentioned needed a more defensive player to help them out. The only other team that could do something similar was Barcelona with Busquets next to Xavi.
He wasn't perfect and he did go through a rough 18 month period after the first Barca loss (he's since come out and said he was probably suffering from depression at the time), but I always felt some people had unrealistic expectations on him at times. Basically expected Carrick to dominate the game in a way that normally wouldn't be expected of the defensive midfielder in other teams. Not just now, but it's something I remember having to point out quite a bit back while it was happening. Of course, he eventually even did start doing that in his latter years as he both became more experienced and had to carry weaker partners.