82 replies to this topic

[DOMOMAN]

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Before his first NFL practice, Kuechly was given No. 59 - the same number coach Ron Rivera wore during his nine seasons with the Chicago Bears - and told he'll start out playing weak side linebacker.

Looks like it's Davis job to win then an prove he's back for good if he wants to start

[Bullethead527]

Beason Anderson, Kuechly as starters, LB core looking strong, Davis will rotate in, maybe he will stay healthy longer, by not being a full time 3 down LBer...

[Ivan The Awesome]

Pass rush fixed?

[ladypanther89]

i agree with this.

[DaCityKats]

^{dont think so but this is were i thought he would start out at.}

[CarolinaPanthers8789]

Title of the thread is a little misleading. You made it sound like he will start at weak side line backer and that he already has the job won as where I see it as they are going to try him out at wlb and see how it goes.

[The Special One]

i agree with this.

Yup

[BeasonBeastingBacks]

Move him to DE, see what happens

[Black]

I like it. Let Beason play where he dominates, and give Luke maximum time to learn a new role.

If they can stay healthy, that's an absolutely filthy core.

[FirstRoundPick]

Pass rush fixed?

That is all you have to do to fix this pass rush? The Giants are dumb for spending all those 1-3 round picks on D-Lineman. With smarts like that, Hurney WILL get us a championship this year.

[pantherj]

The starting WLB postition is up for grabs. TD and Luke will compete for the starting postion, which has yet to be decided. Luke is simply being told what postition he'll play, not that he will be the starter. Luke will have to win the starting position, and I'm sure TD (barring injury) will give him a run for his money. We have no idea at this point if Luke will even be a good fit at WLB.

[TruCatzFan]

Title of the thread is a little misleading. You made it sound like he will start at weak side line backer and that he already has the job won as where I see it as they are going to try him out at wlb and see how it goes.

I agree. Just cause he's starting out at Will doesn't mean he's going to stay there. It's Rookie mini camp... Though, I personally don't mind him getting as many reps as possible with TD's injury history.

It's gonna be a long offseason here folks, and a long camp... Let's not get ahead of ourselves just yet on where #59 is gonna line up week one. I'm sure it will all work itself out, and we can only hope for the best

[Ken]

Rivera:

On first-round draft choice Luke Kuechly: He's exactly what we thought he is. He's an athletic, big guy that runs well, a very smart football player, very sharp. He handled things very well for us, and I'm pretty excited about what we got from him today. He's going to learn and grow within our defense, and we feel very confident about his abilities.

On how Kuechly looked: He looked good. We put a little bit of pressure on him, stressed him a little bit having to learn both positions (weakside and middle linebacker). But we think he's that kind of football player, that kind of athlete - a very sharp, heady guy but very athletic and physical. So we're pretty excited about what he can do.

On the key factors in determining what position Kuechly plays: How he works with the other 10 guys on the defensive unit. It will be interesting to see how he meshes with them. He was meshing with a couple of guys that are part of the group right now. (Safety) Jonathan Nelson, who knows what we're doing, was helping with the calls; that really helped Kuech a little bit. I think it's good to see how he's going to interact with these guys. Then once we get him back here, we'll see how he handles things with the veterans.
On if he has a plan for what position Kuechly will play: We'll start him on the outside and then we'll rotate him inside. But he'll start on the outside, and Jon (Beason) will be in the inside. I've talked with Jon about him playing inside and outside as well. It's going to be an interesting experiment as we go through this, because we want to make sure we put the best unit on the football field and the best combination of players.

On Kuechly wearing the same number, 59, that Rivera wore in the NFL: There's no legacy for him to worry about there, so he'll be fine.

On how confident he is that linebackers Jon Beason and Thomas Davis will be 100 percent: I'm pretty confident. Based on what I've seen, it's just a matter of time before they are 100 percent and on the football field doing things that we need them to do. With the combination of linebackers that we have, there's probably going to be five or six guys that will rotate and play in certain packages and give us some diversity as far as what we want to do on the defensive side of the football.

[CarolinaPanthers8789]

Nice to see Jonathan Nelson get a nice plug in from Rivera on helping Kuechly out at rookie camp today. Nelson might be a surprising player if he could possibly beat out D.J. Campbell and Jordan Pugh for a fifth safety position.

[Ken]

Panthers.com video "Luke Kuechly takes the field" ----> http://www.panthers....43-158c36640890