ImfromClayton

If the clock reads 0:00 in the fourth quarter, and we have more points than the other team, I'm happy. If the clock reads 0:00 in the fourth quarter, and we have less points than the other team I am unhappy. I don't think there's another player that can play quarterback on the Panthers roster that puts us in a better position to have more points than the other team with 0:00 remaining in the 4th quarter in the year of our lord 2025. I understand the larger discussion, but I think there's no reason to have it until this season plays out.

I just think most people don't understand what Bryce does bring to this offense. His constant checks and adjustments, and dummy calls, and all those other things that announcers don't talk about routinely put us in a position to be successful. He is no small part of the running success we've had. I agree that his physical abilities are near the bottom of the NFL, but I'd say that's less than half the job, and becoming less and less important with each passing season. We've seen far more physically gifted players that couldn't get the job done. There's a reason for that. If were winning, don't change it. I like winning.

Dion Dawkins is a funny person, and a good dude. But his personality is such that when he pisses you off, you're going to get really pissed off. That's what happened here.

Checks out. I thought the o line was fine except right tackle. That spot was consistently bad Sunday. T-Mac is ridiculously good. I am surprised at some of those defensive grades. We had no answer for that toss play. I expect to see it a lot moving forward. Crazy to say this but I didn’t even think Josh Allen was that good on Sunday. XL continues to be a really tough eval. When he’s good, he’s dominant. He just completely disappears to often, and does the weirdest stuff. Stepping out of bounds for no reason on a route. Holding a block downfield. If he ever puts it together he’s going to be very good, but costly mistakes hurt him. You can tell by snap counts they love what he does. And he is max effort all the time.

I don't think they cut Dalton mid season. I don't think he will retire either. Hendon Hooker had approximately 12 seconds to learn the playbook. I do think backup quarterback just addressed itself as a "need." Bring on Jameis.

Andy Dalton is a great guy, and he has earned every bit of the respect he's garnered. He's in line for a relatively large payday next year, so he has a tough call to make this offseason. But it's over for him as an NFL player. That was absolutely clear. I don't want to pile on the guy, because I do like him a lot, and I think he's a good dude. That was like watching your dog get old. Nothing fun about it.

I don't think anybody with a brain thought or thinks we are a legit super bowl contender this year. I do LOVE the young core group that is forming. Part of the reason I defend Bryce Young is that if he is not good enough, we're going to waste a lot of this young talent we have anyway. You don't go from 5-12 to super bowl contender in one offseason unless you get a major injury back or get an insane free agent haul. We currently can't hang with the best teams in the league. We are also much closer than we were 365 days ago. Progress is good. There's still an outside shot at the playoffs, but I am really excited to see what Dan Morgan does with this offseason. Rico Dowdle a big decision. Jalen Coker, Brycen Tremaine, Cade Mays, Austin Corbett, Brady Christensen, Nick Scott and Christian Rozeboom are the guys we have to make decisions on. But this rebuild should be over next August. Or we have to do it again. Improvements needed at pass rush and linebacker for sure. Expecting us to win a super bowl this year is like expecting a kindergartener to do calculus. Is it possible? I guess so. but 99.9% shot it aint happening. We played like doo-doo against the bills, but that was definitely a penciled in loss from the day the schedule came out. Candidly though, if Bryce is ever going to be it, next year is the year we need to start being really good.

I've seen much discussion on this topic, but its really hard to evaluate it piece for piece due to the cap implications it had. For example: I'm not sure we sign hunt or lewis with burns contract. Those picks obviously turned into XL and Mitchell Evans. So our side of the trade is still very much TBD. That said, as good as Burns has been this year, and he's been really good, He's still a pash rush only DE. He's also getting a lot of 1 on 1 there, as they have Thibidoux (I'm sure that's spelled wrong) and Abdul Carter, as well as Dexter Lawrence in the middle. If you don't double Dexter, your play is not going to work. You can only have him on the field on first and second down if you have a dexter lawrence, or a derrick brown. If you watch the giants, one of their biggest flaws is that teams attack their defense the same way they attacked ours when he was here: Run off tackle straight at Brian Burns. I'm not sure you can win a lot of games with a player like that absorbing so much of the cap. So sure, he's on pace for a ridiculous season, but the giants are not good, and I really don't think he'd be able to put up the same production here. Throw in the way this trade opened up our offense, and I think it's a wash for us at worst.

I personally think Bryce is going to be an extremely good Quarterback for a long time. If you look at modern QB development, it just takes a while. The extreme athletes can get by early, but if you look at the trajectories of guys the last 10 years, were seeing a lot of slow-cooking. Jared Goff, Geno Smith, Baker, Sam Darnold, Trevor Lawrence. The list is long. The guys that were truly special from Day 1 is an extremely short list. The list of things that college quarterbacks are responsible for gets shorter by the day with the transfer portal, and the college offenses. The list of things that NFL Quarterbacks are responsible for seems to get longer and longer each season. I saw an interview the other day in which a rookie quarterback and center were calling plays for the offense. I can't remember the team or the Quarterback, but I definitely remember the clip. It takes time, even for the smartest and most gifted, and the reality is, we have no idea how good or bad the coaching may be until we hear things we aren't supposed to hear anyway. Bryce isn't perfect, but I saw in another thread, his biggest struggle is risk/reward. That is something I only expect him to improve upon. His adjustments, ability to read a defense, and execution have been extremely good considering our rosters in his tenure here. Our offensive personnel and coaching were both so poor his rookie year that I'm not sure it's fair to properly evaluate that at all. Since that time, all we've seen from him is growth and progress.

To this point, we have the worst pass rush in the league. Nothing in football happens in a vacuum. Corners have been fine. Not great mind you, but fine.

IMO, if Ceedee plays against us, the game probably goes the other way. Same with Tyreek Hill and the Dolphins. Our team just isn't designed to beat teams with two high level receivers like that. But when you look at the league, how many teams really have two guys of that caliber? There's nothing wrong with defensive adjustments, but sometimes I think a lot of fans want Evero to call a different play like a game on madden, and defensive football just isn't like that. That said, I thought we did a much better job this season against the Cowboys of flipping Jaycee and at least making them work for it, opposed to last season when they literally just lined CeeDee up on the other side of the field every single snap. For us to just straight up switch to consistent man coverage, or a different zone, or whatever, we likely would consistently need different personnel on the field. Doing it a few times a game is a gamble and can work, but if we consistently run man coverage against the Cowboys, eventually a RB is going to beat a linebacker, or something of that nature with our personnel. Part of the reason Evero likes this scheme is that, while we have our defaults and presets, what we do is very multiple, and you can do a lot of different things pre and post snap. We are a challenging defense to read. But as you said, if guys are getting beat, it doesn't really matter what you call.

I don't think officials are biased. I think that is lunacy. That would be about the only way to break the multi-billion dollar money printing machine that is the National Football League. I do think some teams are harder to officiate than others. Some teams do a better job taking advantage of the rules. And officials make mistakes. We see it more with teams like the Cowboys and the Chiefs because they are on national TV more often.

I'm not sure how much I'm changing mid year, especially when we are seeing some success. Most Pass Rushers are physically gifted. Scheme and personnel help, but you gotta have the Jimmys and Joes, especially at that position. We will likely lose games when the other team can throw for 400 yards, and has multiple high level receivers, but I think at this point in the development of our franchise, we have to be ok with that. You can't address every single issue at once. Really looks like we have plugged some holes on offense, and definitely in run defense. In the next draft, if we hit on a CB, an ILB and a Pass rusher, we will be pretty dangerous.

We’re 6 games into their careers. it’s never as good as you think it is. It’s never as bad as you think it is. im stoked right now, but let’s pump the breaks on this.

But a bunch of people on this chat page told me Bryce Young can't throw the ball downfield.

These threads really expose some people. First: We run a primary cover 3 zone scheme. We can't just move Jaycee wherever the other team's #1 goes. If you watched us, we did a good bit of randomly switching sides and roles yesterday to try to mess with them. They simply audibled and motioned into plays and packages that put george pickens away from Jaycee. They did the same thing with Ceedee Lamb last season. It's ok to say that the other team did a good job of something. Second, We have allowed about 40 combined rushing yards the last two games. There is absolutely nothing wrong with our defensive game plan. In fact, a lot of folks owe Evero an apology. The issues on defense is that we do not have personnel capable of rushing the passer, and we do not have a 2nd corner capable of covering the best receivers in the NFL. I can live with the 2nd problem, but the 1st one has to be addressed in the draft. Princely and Scourton have been solid, but they aren't going to be 10 sack guys as rookies. They may get there though. The more we can force teams into 3rd and 4th and long, the more chances we will have for turnovers. I think the job Evero has done with this crew has been pretty solid.

I like the wild and crazy stuff. I like the traditional stuff. It's the blend of the two that looks awful to me. When we go all blue, it looks way better with the black helmet. Blue jerseys with silver pants looks better with silver helmet. Every other pair of pants looks better with the black. When we go all black, it looks better with the black helmet. Silver pants = silver helmet. When we go all white, it looks way better traditional, with the silver helmet. Silver pants = silver helmet. black or blue pants = black helmet. ^^^ These should be the rules. I've enjoyed the creativity, but we look downright silly, like a 6 year old with a madden controller some weeks. I'm a sucker for white/white and black/silver though.

I think Rico is really good, but he has an insanely small sample size here. Look at the production in Dallas. He was good there too, with an extremely good O-line. That said, what he's done here the last two weeks is not sustainable. At some point, the production will decrease, or he's the best player in the history of the league. Those are the two options.

Rico has been awesome, but we just played two of the worst run defenses in football. Let's take it easy before we trade away our best players. Rico has definitely earned more carries and a much more expanded role. Multiple things can be true. We also have Dowdle on a one year deal, and I'm not sure how likely we are to extend him. He's 27 and RB's tend to fall off a cliff in their late 20's.

What I like most about Dan is that it appears he values production over measurables. I know that's ironic considering the XL situation, but I also think you are far less likely to miss if you draft that way.

I don't think it's swings as much as the positive people post after wins and the negative people post after losses. Most people haven't changed their minds on much. I'm overly positive. Tend to avoid the board after a loss.

Derrick Brown is one of the most unsung heroes in the history of our franchise. He's played almost entirely through the dark ages, but he is an absolutely dominant, game wrecking force. He's definitely the best player we've had since 1 and 59. If he had played on a better team he'd likely be a HOF type player. The team was absolutely miserable, but if we had even been decent he'd have had a case for DPOY in 2023. He's legit one of the best DT's I've ever seen.

I'm a big fan of Dan. His ability to find productive players deep in the draft will pay off. I'm going to give him 1.5 draft classes right now, because I do think it's a little unfair to evaluate his first year when he got the job in January, especially when we went into that draft not having a first round pick. XL and Brooks are still big time TBD players. Both still have incredibly high ceilings, but both have also given us legitimate reasons to have a lot of pause. Trevin Wallace, Chau Smith Wade and Jatavion Sanders have IMO outplayed their draft position early in their careers. That's a great thing. He also got Coker and Demani Richardson as UDFAs that year. Given the situation we were in, I really don't mind the gamble on the high ceiling guys. Still may work out, still may not, but if you made a checklist of ideal situation for an NFL GM to walk into, ours was near the bottom of that list. Every single 2025 pick is contributing in some way. That typically doesn't happen. I am absolutely blown away by this draft class 6 games in. Even the best GM's miss on occasion, and we can't expect Dan to be 100% on drafts moving forward. Ryan Fitzgerald was an excellent find as well. Comparing our last two drafts to the previous few is pretty shocking. Can you imagine this season without our Rookies? It would not be good. Additionally, this roster only has 6 players with more than 6 years of experience, and two of those are specialist. The next step is equally important, and still very much TBD. We have to avoid Cap Chaos.

We don't have to tear down Dak to appreciate what Bryce did yesterday. Dak had 0 running game. If the cowboys were better, he'd be a legit MVP candidate if he keeps playing this way. They did it with Ceedee last year, but they do a better job of anybody we play consistently of getting their best receiver off Jaycee. Bryce was good too. If we just catch the ball that was intercepted, we probably win by 7+, and Bryce goes over 200 yards passing. Biggest shift the last few weeks has been play calling. I thought Canales abandoned the run game way to early at times last year. This year he really seems to be sticking with it. I still think Chuba is better at making 4 yards when there's nothing there, but Rico is better at making 30 yards when there's 6 there. I like the direction. Hopefully we can get Moton, Sanders and Coker back and really be dangerous. Our play action game is pretty deadly right now. Unrelated: My favorite quality about Bryce right now is his ability to see the defensive hold and throw the ball there. He EXPOSES the officials when they don't call it. That one on Tetaroia yesterday late in the game was a bad miss on their part.

I'm one of the bigger Bryce defenders on this board, but this is a natural consequence of being on a terrible team. While I do think it's to his credit that he doesn't freak out in those moments, It sure would be nice to be playing with a lead more often so he doesn't have quite as many opportunities to do this.