BrianS

Preseason will tell the tale.

I have no clue whether Corrall will be good, or even serviceable. But having Matt Corrall on the roster means there is at least a chance - slim yes - that we have a franchise QB. We already know for (*&#@ sure that Darnold ain't it. We know PJ ain't it. JimmyG? Pass. Baker? Question marks surround him. McAdoo wasn't sold. At least there is a slim chance that we have a franchise QB on the roster. If he's better than Darnold but not a franchise QB, fine. We have our backup, and we'll be picking high again. If he sucks, oh well, it's a third. But if he's great. Oh man. Imagine what we can do with our first round picks. We can, you know, build a team. I'm not excited about Matt Corrall other than to admire some of the traits he's shown. But I am excited about the possibility he represents.

For those questioning his arm, I invite you to behold this throw:

My hope is that he comes in as the anti-Dennis Daley.

Tannehill, Mariota, Dalton in 2020 were FA's, along with Brady. Brissett, Trubisky, Dalton in 2021. Pretty much any of those guys are better than PJ Walker or Sam Darnold. They are all on par with Bridgewater, though we paid far too much for him. Really just a matter of preference. The fact that we even have to consider who "wants" to play here should be setting off alarm bells somewhere.

Huh. Robby for a pick that nets us a QB would actually be a good deal. I hope it happens. It will also solidify for us in the fan base who is really pulling the strings on roster. I don't see any way Rhule trades away his boy Robby, but I could see Fitts doing it.

Not disagreeing with you there, but the fact is he picked ALL of those guys, except Cam, who he tossed away initially. Pretty hard to feel sorry for a guy who spent $60 million and a 2nd round pick to get "his guys". I find it quite telling that the Panthers in talking about the draft this year have on multiple occasions said "We see CJ Henderson as our third round pick", but I've never once heard anyone say "We see Sam Darnold as our second round pick".

Wondered if I was the only one who noticed that. Rhule looked pissed off the entire time.

No, that wasn't the mistake. The mistake was extending Anderson AFTER they drafted a WR in the second round. On draft day, the pick made it look like Robby was going to be playing out his contract in 2021 to see if he could be the same guy or whether it was a career year. It looked like good business. Once that extension went through, the pick looked very questionable.

That's demonstrably false. Pitts got hurt in the Georgia game, only caught two balls. Fifth ranked Georgia at the time. Trask went for 474 yards, 4 TD's, 1 INT in a comfortable win. Without Pitts for the next two weeks, Florida won both, Trask was a combined 9 TD's, 0 INT's, 700+ yards. The next time Pitts was out was against LSU. They lost, yes, but only because they missed a game tying FG which Trask got them in position to try from their 25 with 23 seconds. The last game without Pitts is the one everyone points at as "Oh, he was so bad in the Cotton Bowl". However, they ignore the fact that Trask wasn't without Pitts. He was without Pitts, Toney and Grimes. His top THREE targets. Against Spencer Rattler. So no, Trask wasn't terrible without Pitts. He was pretty darn good. Does that make him an NFL QB? I dunno. He was a damn good college QB though.

Here's the problem I have with all the "trade down" talk: Either Howell is a franchise QB or he isn't. Bottom line. If he is a franchise QB, forget trading down, you draft him. If you think he's a franchise QB, you draft him. It's really that simple. What the fans think or believe is utterly irrelevant. The Panthers problem is their evaluations at the QB position have been complete dung since we took Cam Newton. I'm not sure what's changed there. What makes any of us believe in their evaluation? Pickett? Corral? Howell? I dunno man. Sometimes you just gotta take a swing. I just wish I felt better about the guys who were making the calls on who to swing for.

Unlike Darnold, Baker has won games in the league - even one in the playoffs. I worry however that Baker just might be good enough to win 7-8 games here. I would not mind him here, if our evaluation said he could be the guy. Problematically, I don't trust our evaluators. And that's the real problem. If we had solid evaluators, and they said he was the guy, bring him in. Get him here. Draft a tackle. Unfortunately, we can't trust our eval. And then Baker wins 7 games, we're drafting in the teens, and no chance to draft a guy we REALLY like once Rhule is gone. This franchise is so screwed up man.

Kyler Murray is a GOOD QB. It sounds / seems as if he's looking for GREAT QB money. That is what I would be concerned about. Asking for great QB money before he's really showed it. He's improved every year, which is what you want. I'd just like to see a consistently good level of performance game to game. He still goes missing at times.

Rhule needs to grasp and shred of credibility he can get at this point. I'm sure he'd love it to come in the form of Kuechly returning to the Panthers in some role.

I don't think Pittsburgh can afford it. If they wanted our pick, we'd ask for their first and second this year and probably their first next year to make the trade. Their pick value in R1 is very different than ours. Seattle is a possibility if they have their eyes on somebody. The could probably have our pick for their first and one of their seconds this year. That might be something they would be willing to do depending on their level of commitment to the guy they want.

While his career may have been short, I don't know that I've ever seen a better defensive player than Kuechly. The only one who comes close is Lawrence Taylor.

Saying that someone "reeked of alcohol" is very different than saying they were intoxicated. A guy I played with in college came to practices and just reeked of it, but he wasn't intoxicated. He was just sweating it out the day after. FWIW.

I am actually less concerned about the knee than I am about the offense he played in. Air Raid QB's typically don't fare all that well in the NFL. But, obviously: Patrick Mahomes. Strong is going to get drafted. He's going to get a chance to take snaps in the NFL. He's a risk, yes. But honestly, I'd rather draft Strong than Willis. Strong has actually shown things against big boy competition. He's been remarkably consistent over the last two years despite the injury. What I like about him is that you saw the growth from his first year starting at Nevada to his second and then he continued to perform that way the year after. He showed growth, and proved it wasn't a fluke.

I'm all for drafting a great player, but dude, we aren't beating NO this year. It's just not happening. That defense is salty AF and no matter who we have at QB they're gonna be seeing ghosts. And now the chairman and CEO of the Taysom Hill fan club is gone, so we don't have that to fall back on. Ekwonu looks good, but so do Cross and Neal. I'd rather have Ekwonu or Neal just because they have legit positional flexibility whereas Cross is a tackle. While I'm dreaming I'd like to have a second round pick as well so we can at least start rolling the dice on finding our franchise QB without wasting our first round pick on a lesser talent.

I'm not sure the visits are as much about who you end up drafting, but who you eliminate as a potential draftee.

This. All these "running" QB's get figured out eventually and nearly always have a shorter shelf life than your pocket passers - or even your mobile but NOT running QB's. I want a guy who even if his legs are failing can still scare the defense. If John Elway or Steve Young were playing hurt / unable to run, they could still just kill you. We need a bit of that around here. I'm not convinced any of these rookies will be that, but Willis is the LEAST convincing of them all.

That is a lame way to say the guy caught 26 balls for 300 yards last year.

No. Think about it. Let's say Person does have connections to some of the Panthers players. If he starts naming names in "print" of those who may not be sold on Darnold, how likely do you think those players will be to answer the phone again? If a player publicly makes a statement, of course, Person can report that. But when you're building relationships in an effort to get interesting tidbits, you can't out your sources.

Forget about downfield stats and stuff. Just look at accuracy period. It's a huge indicator unless the team is running Air Raid or something silly. (Yes, I'm looking at you Carson Strong.)

In all fairness, if Ridder had come out last year the flaws would have been exposed at that time, despite his great season. It's not like his game went from perfect to flawed in 12 months. You can't hide that stuff once people start to look hard.