The Natural

He's going to play.

Eh, at the end of the day, cerebral or not he's still just a rookie on a horrific team. I think of all the things we can pass judgment on his intellect is not one of them. His test scores were too good for me to think he's dumb.

What part of what he said wasn't factual though? Being the biggest fish in a small pond doesn't make you a big fish.

Stroud is giving me flashbacks of Mayfield from last season. He HAS to have a tell that's allowing us to bat so many of his passes down.

Stroud looks completely unimpressive against our decimated defense.

Stroud is doing his best to give us some turnovers. We need to capitalize on those opportunities.

The difference right now is Houston has legitimate receivers and Stroud has good protection.

Does Stroud normally have this much difficulty getting balls over the line? You'd think he was the short QB.

My sources tell me it's DJ Moore.

Nice try but we all know they thinned the air in Tuscaloosa in order to get the ball to travel further.

It's Chicago. They'll somehow mess the pick up anyways.

Well, it's not green because it was a TD but that blue dot is over 20 air yards... That was easy enough.

Ehhhh... He's had some nice balls that have plenty of zip. He certainly doesn't have a cannon for an arm but it's certainly adequate. Honestly, coaching is the issue. Outside of Thielen it appears we don't have any receivers who run crisp routes. There's a big disconnect in where receivers are and where Bryce thinks they'll be and six weeks in that boils down to a coaching problem.

If Tepper meddled as much as you guys think he does Justin Fields would be our QB right now.

The Fred Smoot game comes to mind.

The term "meddling" keeps getting thrown out but no specifics can ever be presented. I'm just as upset as everyone else that our team is toilet water right now but Tepper isn't out there calling 50 screens a game or failing in free agency. We can blame him for hiring the wrong guys (Scott and Frank) but that's the extent of his culpability. The bright side is that he has shown he's willing to throw money at coaches and wants to win. The hope is that eventually we'll land on the right GM/HC combo if we keep trying.

Charlotte is one of the biggest and fastest growing markets in the country.... Why would the NFL not want a team here?

So what exactly are you implying? Do you think Tepper is calling the plays in to Bryce? I'm genuinely curious to what extent you think Dave is controlling things.

Keeping pressure on people to perform is entirely different from actively controlling football operations. I don't think Tepper is running our draft, FA, and calling plays. Sure, he's probably an asshole to work for but not once have I been given the impression that he's a puppet master.

I get it man. We're all (well most of us) here because we're Panthers fans. It feels like ages since we last had any hope. I'm trying to remain optimistic that things will get turned around and Bryce can be a franchise guy for us. My original response probably came off more passive-aggressive then it should have, I'm sorry.

I guess you should be rewarded for bumping another ancient thread just to pat yourself on the back.

The amount of symphorophilia on display in this forum is amazing.

Is there any evidence that Tepper "forced" the Bryce pick? All the evidence I've seen points to Fitts and Reich making this pick but I'd be open to seeing anything that gives credence to this popular conspiracy theory.

Just to be clear, you people are upset that Tepper wants a winning team? I'd be more concerned if Frank said "Tepper doesn't really care how the team performs". In no way does this imply the meddling you guys thing it does.

I actually feel it's the opposite. Positives generally get ignored. Everyone here loves to wallow in misery.