DaveThePanther2008

What gets me is we had 2 @#$@##$$% weeks to get ready for this game and we look like a bunch of friends that showed up to play pickup football. It's embarrassing. Being a total optimist is getting old. We look terrible.

8pm here. I got my football App ready to go. Praying it works. It works great for college football so my hope are pretty high it works for the NFL. It has its own header.

When it was -2.5 I also saw where it said Cleveland had a 61% chance of winning. Maybe that is why they dropped it to 1.5. I don't bet so I really don't follow these guides.

As great as the passing game can be, it is and always will be teams that can run and stop the run are usually playoff teams. We have to stop the run, Period.

I used to love watching football games in the Mud. About 4th Quarter the only thing that differentiated one team from another was their helmets.

All of these predictions are a bit wild. NFC North Minnesota still has to go through Green Bay. Cousins needs to protect the ball a bit more and Minnesota needs to get over their yearly curse. NFC South Carolina. This is possible with or without Brady being great. They have a tougher schedule that we do just because they are playing divisional winners from the NFCN and NFCE plus the AFCW divisional winner. I said before we need to win those three games of the last place winners of NFCN, NFCE and AFCW. Beat Atl 2x and split with NO and TB. That's 5 wins. Plus match the win total against the NFCW and AFCN. It's possible NFC East Philly did a great job in the offseason and will be tough especially with Dallas hoping 40 yr old Peters can play one more season. Dallas IMO is more mixed up than we are. Washington doesn't really scare me too much. NFC West 49ers seems a bit of a reach. LAR are SB champs and have added some more weapons for their offense. Stafford may be the key. They say he's alright, but we heard the same thing about Cam. Lance has the tools but he looked extremely shaky in preseason. Arizona seems to have everything but falter down the stretch. KM will be playing to make a statement. I could also see the 3 wild cards switching with the projected winners with Brandt picks being WC.

We also have Hoskins and Roy from this class and it is way to early to give up on Marshall.

Real fan? Because you are pessimistic? please. There was a time when posters like you said Carolina would never get a franchise. There was a time when posters said we would never go to the Super Bowl. I've been a fan from the beginning and have been on this forum since 2004 and each year I have been optimistic during good and bad seasons. I AM A REAL FAN!!!! SPOILER ALERT!!!! Your opinion is exactly that an opinion. You nor I have no idea how this season will turn out until they play the game. You might be right, and you might be wrong. And even if you are right, it doesn't make you any more a real fan than anyone else. You can say the same thing about the traditional "the sky is falling group." That no matter how much more talent we add in the offseason we are always going to suck. What's worse about this group is they stick around and post in this forum as if they knew it all along that we going to be better this year. I would never call myself a"Wine and Cheese poster" I would call myself an eternal optimist. Sure, it's a tough schedule but guess what our entire division plays the same schedule, and we have 3 opponents that were last in their division last year. Gotta play well, stay healthy and hope for an exciting season.

I hear you. This is his year especially with a depleted oline.

It was very clear Brady, especially at the end of the season, was not the same Brady. Greatness cannot overcome age. His time has come.

That's great. CJ was having a great preseason before his injury. He's a better Zylstra.

So we are back to two open spots?

This We have to play the same non-divisional schedule. LAR, Sea, Ariz, SF, Clev, Balt, Cinn and Pitts) This IMO is the key to the season. We need to, at minimum, match the W/L as our divisional rivals. We have NYG and Detroit NFCE and NFCN 2021 last place teams. Gotta win these two winnable games. Finally Denver last place in AFCW 2021, which is the new 17th game. Another winnable game. If we can beat Atl 2x and split with TB and N.O. that would give us a 4-2 mark in the NFCS. Our divisional rivals have a much tougher schedule (hard to believe) than we do. If we could go 3-0 against these teams the chances of our divisional foes sweeping are much higher than ours. New Orleans has Minnesota in London, Philly in Philadelphia, and LAR in NO. TB has Dallas in Dallas, GB at home and KC at home. Atl has Washington in DC, Chic at home and LAC at home. As you stated health will be a factor. IF our core, including CMC, can stay healthy it might be ugly but we could win the division. And as they always say. Once you're in, Anything goes. OF COURSE I AM THE ETERNAL OPTIMIST

That was going to be my next question. Could Eason beat out PJ for that 3rd QB spot.

What an adventure it is for him. You go from literally nowhere to being a good football player. His story is a great achievement. I know he is a hero in the UK. Question for those that went to the game in London a couple of years ago. How many Obada Jerseys were there?

ME TOO

It's not really grading. All of these are young players but the fact that most of them are on the field and making plays is impressive. I remember Hurney would have most of his picks on the team but many of them never did much. I did a post last year where 56% of his players he drafted never did much. So far it is nice to see at least they are on the field.

You look at our 2021 picks and it looks pretty good 1st Round Horn Lockdown corner 2nd Round Marshall needs to step up and contribute more than 2021. Has the talent just needs to get on the field 3rd Round Christensen locked in as starting guard and backup tackle 4th Round Hubbard 612 yds rushing after CMC went down 2 100 yd games. Should contribute with an upgraded offensive line 5th Round Daviyon Nixon Solid rotational guy for the DL 5th Round Taylor solid young DB that contributes situationally 6th Round Brown Probably the most disappointed draftee of 2021 however is still on PS so maybe he develops more. 6th Round Shi Smith could be a starter and will definitely see plenty of playing time 6th Round Fletcher This was the only wasted pick of 2021 7th Round Hoskins rotational DT.

Agreed, outside of Moton this line is revamped with Fitterer picks. Granted some aren't barn burners but they are much better than when he got here. Roy, Nixon and now McCall are fresh young faces. QB gotcha.

Many Huddler's seem to give Fitterer a lot of grief over his work for the past two season and after looking at all his signings we still have the majority of those players on our team. 2021 Draft out of 11 Picks 8 are on the 53 man active roster and Brown (6th round pick) on the PS. The other 8 see or will see plenty of action. 2021 UDFAs None are still on our roster 2021 Free Agents (deals over 1 yr) Irving, Elflein, Luvu are still on the roster. Though it cost us a 3rd round pick we got Henderson and a 5th for Arnold. 2022 Draft 3 of the 6 could see plenty of playing time (Icky, Smith, Barno) Mays being the remaining active rookie player that may see time in the latter part of the season. Corral of course will not see any time this year. Barnes is now a Dolphin. 2022 UDFA 7 of the 14 players we signed are on the practice squad with the exception of McCall who is on the active roster. 2022 Free Agents 9 of the 11 are on the active roster with CJ Saunders (for the life of me I don't know why) and Westry being waived. 17 of the 53 remain prior to Fitterer's time. 11 of which are starters and core players and the other 6 are contributors. Every GM is going to have his blunders and players that didn't work out. It is a gamble with every player you draft or sign. We could have drafted so in so instead of trading for Darnold and the list goes on and on. Most of us are armchair GMs, Coaches and QBs. When the final 53 is named, you have to believe that our staff believes no one out there is better than what we already have. (the answer is on the roster mentality) Overall, I think Fitterer (Rhule for whatever amount of credit you want to give him) has done a pretty good job of getting quality talent. We'll see how he addresses issues for the season.

Maybe his agent is negotiating with other teams before they (CJ and Zylstra) sign with us. We do still have 2 spots.

That's sad, they guy was having a great preseason until he got hurt.

Only 2 OL? Good God haven't we learned our lesson. Hopefully, we sign two from other teams. I guess they saw enough talent to bring Brown back.

@SCP No one does smack like you. So, during your playing days you were a trash-talker? Thanks for the laughs and your optimistic outlook. Panthers all the way!!!!! Glad you're back. Can't wait for your epic Cleveland smackdown.

Had to be personal reasons. Wilks is one of the best DB coaches in the league. It can't be because they saw more of an upside in Harper over Barnes. I sure hope this Harper kid has some talent.