lightsout

See I can't tell if this is sarcasm or not because I know people genuinely love it too. But I'd be like "fug this". Seeing two defenses fail for that long isn't exciting to me.

I found myself recently rewatching Bama vs Michigan in the Orange Bowl. Tom Brady leading the Wolverines against Shaun Alexander's Tide. The offensive philosophy of the game definitely shifted to spread a decade after that game, and with that came athletes redesigning themselves to fit that mold. Slimmer, faster, twitchier, more elusive. Gone are the gigantic warriors, the bruising backs, and the art of play action (I haven't seen a hard bite from a secondary on a play action in forever it seems). Now it's speed, speed, and more speed. Instead of plugging for 3-4 yards with the hopes of wearing down the defense and hitting the big one, it's pass for 4-7 yards with the hopes of your playmaker popping one. Let's be honest with ourselves...this current era offense is fuging boring. Everybody here knows it. You bitch about it weekly. "dink and dunk offense", "no down field shots". Look around the league. Everybody is running similar poo, they just have speed to do it. Throw the obligatory shot, sometimes your guy wins the foot race but most often? Crossing route or screen and hope. There's no mind games with defenses. No defense is overly concerned with stopping the run. You have strong run games still for sure, but nothing approaching 2000-2009. Saquon should be this generation's Adrian Peterson, and would be...if they had a philosophy of "here are variations of I and single back, we're gonna make you suffer for all 30+ carries he gets". But of course he can't because finding 5 road paving OL on the same team is rare now, let alone a fullback since they all either became linebackers or tight ends. Which brings me to us. If you ask me, Bryce would benefit most from his football IQ if he had the flexibility of yesteryear offenses. Remember QB play back then? They come to the line, you're reasonably sure the call is this, but then the entire formation shifts, now you've got no clue. Then the big play hits. You don't see that kind of poo anymore. Even better when there's just a subtle hot call. Jake and Smitty provided some of their best with the simple helmet tap. Maybe it's nostalgia. Maybe it's the pain of this team right now. Maybe it's me hitting old age in my 30s and missing what used to be and hating these kids that are on my lawn. But who here wouldn't take a Davis/Stewart type back with this current roster and see if we can cook something up? Beats the poo out of watching 4 yard passes knowing we don't have the athletes to really break one for 40 plays every game.

Given that he and Thielen are used similarly, you'd think we would utilize some misdirection and force teams to guess which safety valve they need to cover. Chark on the deep route, Mingo backside post, Thielen and Hurst running intermediate and short. Would force teams to actually respect us rather than running the same combination of crossers with an out/flat we've called 90% of the time. Or the poorly executed four verts where we're just keying the crosser.

Like normal shots or Durham shots?

True but as a fan, I'd be totally down with losing that game in a shootout. Thought we were for a bit there, then realized after the missed FG that we were absolutely fuged. At least with a shootout it's like "hey, we battled and came up short. We can build on this"

I really want to get my mother in law to watch the kids so I can get my wife to Raleigh for the first time, so I'm absolutely down to a do a huddle tailgate if we can nail down some dates.

Brother I've lived through a decade of poo Canes hockey and some poo awful years with the Panthers since 96. But I'm this goddamn close to throwing in the towel on the Panthers fandom. It's that level of bad for me. Maybe it's just an accumulation that's hit a tipping point for me but like you said, it's about winning. I'll take moral victories but we aren't even achieving that much.

Want the product to change and the team to be something worth watching? Stop buying merch, stop going to BoA for anything, make Tepper lose money to the point he bails. Tepper doesn't know what he's doing, and he's hiring people who don't know what they're doing.

3-4 is garbage because in order to be strong against the run, you rotate over into a 4-3 alignment. As opposed to just staying 4-3 and having your will be a stud (Chinn) so you don't even have to bring in nickel personnel

Dalton isn't exactly throwing darts through pinholes. He's hitting open guys, to his credit, and not getting shaken by pressure. But Bryce was doing that as well. If the defense could get a stop we probably win this. Offense is feeling it.

Broncos say hi

Yung Mo$h needs a halftime show before I die as well. Just random aside, he's leaned so fuging hard into bringing back nu metal and it's glorious.

If this doesn't happen I'll be pissed. Also, spinning off of that into Luda doing Get Back is damn near a necessity for me now.

TFG is ok but QB School moreso outlines actual football thought. TFG presents info in a way where your average couch GM will feel validated, imo. I don't think, from looking at the same things you have, that Bryce is just not seeing guys that are "NFL open" (I know what you mean, but either a receiver has gotten by a defender or they haven't. If the DB is in their hip, they are absolutely not open).

I really hope Dalton does well but he won't because our receivers get no separation and while he can and will throw with anticipation, he's not throwing balls before breaks even start like Bryce has been doing. Bryce will start the minute he's healthy.

Which is the same reason Cincy let him go. Because he's not a guy you hitch your franchise to. He's a solid backup/stop gap for a year. That's it.

I'm not saying he's a preferable starter. But I certainly wouldn't call him awful either. Dude's a proven winner in this league which should say something to his ability. He's not somebody you hitch a franchise to anymore which is why Cincy got rid of him but still.

He's a 3 time pro bowler with 20+ game winning drives. He's basically Jake Delhomme if you look at his numbers.

For once, over the entirety of a game, our pass protection isn't the issue really. Run blocking is ass more often than not, and yes some pressure gets there, but no more than is typical in the NFL. Bryce held a couple balls too long (and yes that can be from not having any open options) and at least one sack was moving improperly in the pocket and screwing himself. His time to throw isn't the problem. His height isn't the problem. His receivers not being open due to short route concepts paired with a stagnant run game is the problem. His inability to put touch on his deep is the problem. His missed timing at times is a problem. A lot of rookie problems out of our rookie. Which is expected. It'd be easier to take if we had some dynamic playmaking around him but we simply don't have that.

There was a time when posters on this very board understood savvy veteran tricks that guys like Peyton did, like looking off defenders, having good ball skills on something simple like a good play action, or yes, using their entire goddamn body to force a defender to leave a space that they're defending to go elsewhere so that they can get a bigger completion than the very checkdown everybody in here is pissed about him throwing for damn near the entirety of the rest of the game. Holy poo people. I'm finding a silver lining here, something to point to and say "you don't see very many QBs in the league doing this type of poo, let alone rookies on their home opener" and we're acting like it's nothing at all? I'd say it gives one pause to not abandon the kid outright like most here are. Hell I was close, until that moment. Which is why I made the thread.

I mean i wasn't there but based purely on camera angle during live play and replays, I didn't see much in the way of him just not seeing guys running open. There were two that you could have called that but the pocket was already breaking down, no chance for him to plant and make those throws when they would have been there.

Absolutely. I'm not talking the drive though. I'm talking the shoulder fake to draw the corner down on the flat and open up the out to Mingo followed by the hits to Thielen to cap it off. It showed that he's competent and capable, just has to do THAT type of poo for a full game

You didn't read the post and it shows.

In a 2 game span every fuging one of us are deflated. The hope of the post-draft off-season has died. However, one sequence at the end has lit a small ember. Probably getting snuffed out in the first quarter of next week, but still. Bryce's use of his shoulders to make the corner bite up is a big time vet move. You don't see that kinda poo much from very many QBs. Intentional and executed perfectly and a strong throw to boot. Then the TD throw and the 2 pt throw. Both were must have type plays that NFL QBs better make and he did. Does this erase the rest of the game? No. Did Bryce have a lot to work with considering the play calling and the lack of separation from receivers? No. However, he threw a handful of shitty balls in a game where he didn't hit on much in general. If Bryce can build off that TD drive and continue the wiley veteran moves, he'll be ok for us. Whether or not Frank gets wise and let's his OC actually call plays is another question. But for those wanting something to be happy about apart from our defense looking pretty good for much of the game, there you have it.

Tepper might strip me of my desire to pull for this team and that's breaking my heart more than anything. Every decision he has made has made this team actively worse.