Mr. Scot

I don't know if humbled is the word I'd use but there are some things we do know. By his own admission, he looks at what's being said about the Panthers on Twitter. From that, we can know that he's aware of how both he and the team are perceived. Doesn't really seem to be particularly happy about it either. These things would thus indicate that how the team is viewed matters to him on at least some level. So where does it go from here? Unknown, but at least we can say that he's not living in a bubble.

I knew that a--hole would come back to haunt us someday. I just never thought he'd do it using my favorite football team

Not to mention someone who wants it. I'm not sure Luke does...at least not right now.

"Stats are for losers." - John Fox

If the team looks bad, probably.

Leftwich has only been coaching since 2016, Moore since only 2018. Dorsey has the longest tenure of the bunch, starting in 2023. There are guys who have been ripe for a head coaching opportunity for longer than these guys have even been coaching. I know it's not his fault, but older coaches have been pushed to the fringe because of how successful McVay has been.

Elflein was the one blowing the snaps.

Ironically enough, that's what the Packers are hoping for this season after starting off with an ugly 23-7 loss to the Vikings. I also remember when the Patriots cut Lawyer Milloy right before the season started. He signed with the Bills and in week one they blasted the Patriots something like 30-0. That season ended with a Super Bowl victory...over us

My biggest issue with Byron Leftwich is the same one I have with Ken Dorsey and Kellen Moore. They're all very intelligent and skilled, but I think they need more experience before they're ready to take on a head coaching job. I know everybody is looking for the next Sean McVay, but I feel like if you go that route you're probably more likely to find the next Joe Brady

Depends on the coach, or at least it used to. Traditionally, there were two schools of thought when it came to offseason training. You had guys like Tom Coughlin who would put their players through the most rigorous training they could. Those teams tended to come out of the gate firing on all cylinders, but the additional wear and tear took a toll as the season went on and all too often they'd be limping by the time they got to the playoffs. Then you had other guys (I think Andy Reid was one) who took things a little easier. Their squads were more likely to start the season slow and sloppy, but when playoff time came around they weren't necessarily so badly beaten up. These days though? Since the Players Association put so many limits on practice time, it's pretty tough for the hardass coaches to run things like they wish they could. I suspect Rhule would probably be that way if he could, but he can't. Makes me wonder if Rhule would have a different record if things were still under the old rules.

Seriously though, where you throw from, how well you see the field and the trajectory of your passes have a lot more to do with this sort of thing than height. Remember those flatline passes Jimmy Clausen always used to throw?

I get what Snow is trying to say there but damn that was a poor way to phrase it

I don't think he's too sort Just to be clear though, sort of what?

Depends on what hurts you. We had a stretch there of teams that we absolutely should have or at least potentially could have beaten. That made my head hurt

Slow starts to a season are generally on coaching. Slow starts to individual games can be on a quarterback. One of the common characteristics of gunslinger types is that they tend to start slow but heat up as the game goes on. Mind you, Sunday was worse than just a "slow start" for me.

That's because I was talking about the first half. And I'm not being revisionist at all. Nor am I being hyperbolic. As mentioned before, I've probably seen about fifty week ones in my lifetime. I'm used to teams looking bad. "Bad" would have been just been simple mistakes, miscommunications and such. We had those for sure, but also much worse. We looked absolutely unprepared and damn near incompetent. Luke DeCock's description of the team looking like "53 guys who just met" was dead on target.

Been there

That's...one possibility, yeah

Last year's game just plain hurt It was one of several losses to terrible teams that really shouldn't have happened.

The NFL has a lot of "corrections". The first drive of a game, for example, doesn't always tell the whole story (that's been a pretty common one for us). Likewise, Week 1 of the season is often a bit illusory. A lot of conclusions that people draw based on what they observed in the first game of the year will turn out to be false by the next week, or the next. And others... won't. That's why this Sunday's performance is something to which we should pay very close attention. If the team comes out looking at least half decent on both offense and defense (especially run defense) then the upcoming weeks might not be so bad. But also sad to say that if we start out looking flat again and the defense is still giving up chunks of yards from the get go, we could be looking at a disaster of a season. So what will it be? Don't know, but I'm ready to find out. See ya Sunday

Nice work. Wish I still had the time to do stuff like this

Pretty much... If you can coach a team to consistently win, you can come out in your pressers and say the dumbest sh-t imaginable and nobody will care. People will probably just laugh it off as "coachspeak". If the team isn't winning, but you at least sound like you have half a clue what you're talking about when you speak to the media, people will give you the benefit of a doubt (for a little while, at least). If you're not winning, and you sound like either a clueless dumbass or a double-talking con man at your pressers, you're gonna get buried...and deserve it.

First half? Hell yes! That first half performance was as bad as anything I've seen in a decade.

Unless they start by looking slow and unprepared all over again...

...or just run over