BrianS

You're right, we're not. But that doesn't mean run, run, pass, punt is going to fix our issues. Over reliance on either the run OR the pass is going to make you an easy target for a good defense. An unbalanced offense is simply not sustainable. Our sack numbers aren't problematic over the last four games. Our sack numbers are problematic over the entire season save the first two weeks. Oddly enough, the last two full games CMC has played. This is the part of CMC that a lot of people gloss over. The guy is a complete back. He brings balance to our offense. Yes, 100%, he's a great player. Can't argue that. But what's more important is that with him on the field, you just don't know what the Panthers will do. Run? Pass? Option? That's the real value. Unfortunately, while we have some good backs, none of them are the complete player that CMC is. Our backups make us predictable. And we've seen the results.

ZG has been in the league since 2017. Before this year, he's made greater than 80% of his FG's exactly once - a year when 2/3 of his kicks were under 40 yards. We need to see an entire year of this. It's possible the guy has figured something out. If so, I'm excited to have him here. Kickers should be largely judged on their consistency over a long term.

ffs. Stop it. Even if some crazy crap happens and we end up in the playoffs we are not a good team yet. We were never supposed to be. THIS YEAR. Next year squeaking into the playoffs should be a reasonable expectation, if we can identify and acquire an NFL QB while fixing the most egregious of our OLine problems. We aren't going to fix everything next offseason.

I'd like to remind everyone who loved the game plan that we scored 19 points against a very bad team. That gameplan isn't going to net consistent success. If it was that simple, we would have won a lot more games last year with TB5. Our biggest problem remains our OLine. While they looked somewhat better run blocking, the fact remains we kicked four FG's. We managed to hide the problems for a week. That's all we saw.

I'm glad to see Shaq playing well. Bottom line was that he HAD to have this kind of season if he wanted any chance of earning the dollars available to him on his contract. He's getting paid elite money. His cap number next year is very similar to Bobby Wagner. Let's hope he continues his high level of play. Certainly is nice to see.

The only teams that MIGHT be interested in trading for Donte are teams that have established themselves as playoff contenders and have gotten killed by injuries at corner. How many of those are there? Any? If you aren't a serious contender, you simply wait until the offseason when you can talk to Donte for FREE. There is no motivation for any other team to trade for Donte. Even in that scenario, Donte's value is highly suspect because he is a free agent this offseason. Pie in the sky trade speculation based on how well Donte is playing irrelevant. His trade value isn't set by how well he's playing. It's set by the market for his services. Right now, it's extremely limited. Donte is playing great. Sure, it would be great to get something for him. We won't. The guy is a FA this offseason and he'll probably get paid way more than we can afford, given other needs.

Mariota is "an" option, but frankly none of the FA's next year are inspiring: Brissett is probably the most promising of a bad, bad bunch. And most of them are OLD.

To me it's mind blowing the caliber of player we've lost to injury and otherwise shortened an amazing career. I'll give them that Kuechly was probably not preventable. He played the way he played. But Cam was 100% on the staff. I don't care that Cam "seems to take his biggest hits in the pocket" (still a problem) or that "he's big enough to take it". You don't run your MVP QB in a power scheme at the volume we did it. That's on them. I'm not sure what to make of CMC. There were no signs prior to last year that he would have these issues. A lot of folks cite his volume of touches, but when you look at it objectively, Barry Sanders had similar numbers of touches. It does sometimes seem like we're a little snakebit when it comes to injuries. Even in 2015, who is to say what might have been without all the injuries.

I don't. When do you anticipate the players giving up? To me it's obvious when it happens. Witness, Ron Rivera's last year. If you wish to wallow in misery because we lost badly, feel free. As I said, I anticipate we'll bounce back. I don't yet have evidence that the players have given up. We fought in every game last year save for a couple. I expect to see us fight this week. If we start to get repeatedly blown out without signs of a fight, that's a different story. But it's a story not yet written.

I'm not worried about Rhule until the players give up on him. Last week was not a good look, but I expect to see a reaction this week. It's ok to lose, it's not ok to lose without a fight.

With the season going the way it is, I'd prefer we not rush any of our players back from injury.

Yep, this. We're trying to rehab Darnold from a situation where he had entirely too much pressure on him from a horrible offensive line. So we then put him behind a line that arguably might be even worse? How was that EVER supposed to work? Darnold is Colin Kaepernick minus all the political baggage and a good offensive line. As Kaep's Oline fell off, he started to get exposed for what he was. A one read runner.

Chuba has been fine in the run game. Sometimes teams decide to take that away by stacking the box and forcing you to throw. Our line is DEFINITELY not good enough to run against a stacked box. The Saints stacked the box, but Sam lit them up. The Giants stacked the box, and . . . that happened. Expect more of this now that word is out that Sam is struggling. Run game and pass game work hand in hand. If Sam is completing throws downfield, box loosens up and we have a chance to run it. The whole offense is just in a really bad place. This is what happened to Cam his last year. Teams stacked up close to the LOS to stop the run and short pass because they knew Cam just couldn't beat them deep. Teams know Sam is struggling, so they force him to beat them. Some of this is on Sam. Some of it is on our receivers. Some is on our line. Sam completed 64% of his passes against the Giants. That's not terrible. It would have been around 70% if our receivers didn't have a collective case of the yips. Our line hasn't had a game allowing less than 3 sacks since WEEK TWO. That's terrible. Way too much pressure to put on a QB who you are trying to rehab from THIS EXACT PROBLEM.

New IR rules just make it easier / more beneficial to put guys there. That's all it is.

Before you poo on Minshew, you might want to look a little closer. Yes, the Jags were 7-25 over the last two seasons, the two where Minshew was on the roster. Minshew was 7-13. While that record isn't wonderful, what it does say is that WITHOUT him the Jags didn't win a single game. His stats look fine. On his career, he's at 63% overall completions. He made a huge jump from his rookie season to his second season, going from 60% to 66%. His TD% looks good at 4.5%, on par with Derek Carr. His INT% even better at 1.4%, on par with Aaron Rodgers. All of this while on a Jacksonville team that was, believe it or not, even worse than ours. Honestly, I would have much rather had Minshew and someone like Brissett in here than what we have. But that's just me.

This is why I say it's an interesting problem. Baker's one really bad game this year came against the Vikings - who are the #6 scoring defense in the league. Otherwise he's been fine. He was really good last year. It seems the light finally came on for him. He had passing stats like Kyler Murray, Matt Stafford, Lamar Jackson and David Carr. Carr is making 20 million on a contract signed in 2017. Stafford is also on a 20 million deal from 2017. Jackson and Murray are still on rookie deals. Goff, Cousins and Wentz are making 33 million. Bakers stat line was better than Goff and Wentz, and not that far behind Cousins. What happens there is likely to have a bearing on the entire QB market.

Baker is actually a very interesting problem for Cleveland. He's a good QB. Not a great one, but a good one. Rumor has it he's going to want 40 large per year. That's crazy money. As bad as QB play around the league is, it wouldn't surprise me.

I just realized this a little while ago. He was a risk, and everyone knew it. You can argue whether someone should or should not have accepted that risk, but there was never any question that he was a risk. You know what does bother me? Every other QB on our roster. There was too much opportunity to put another QB on the roster who might be able to complete a pass. Tyrod Taylor, Jacoby Brissett, Joe Flacco and Mitch Trubisky all signed deals under 6 million per year last spring. Surely it wouldn't have broken us to sign ONE of them to be competition / backup. If you want to develop PJ, fine, whatever. He's not an NFL QB, but whatever. Stick him on the practice squad. But don't walk into the season without SOMETHING behind your starter. This is definitely something I'll be watching closely this coming spring.

If you're looking for a silver lining, 2022 free agency may be it. We have a TON of dead money coming off the books this spring so we should be in a much better position to pick up quality players. Next year our dead cap is 7 million or so.

I actually wouldn't have a problem with it . . . But who calls the plays? We don't have any other play calling experience in our staff that I'm aware of.

Actually, they didn't. DJ averaged 13 yards per reception in Cam's last season. He averaged 18 yards per reception with Teddy. Yardage overall nearly identical, but fewer balls meaning fewer hits with Teddy. I know. Weird. But statistically accurate. Also, Cam always, ALWAYS had a habit of throwing high. Not great for DJ.

Setting aside the legal issues for a moment . . . The problem the Texans have is that no trade clause. Deshaun can artificially limit the market, driving his own value (to the Texans) down. It's one thing if the Texans say to the entire league "Deshaun Watson for sale". They'd have tons of suitors. But with the no trade, Deshaun can simply say "Only to teams I choose". That's a big deal, and quite a lever for him to have. I think in the end neither Deshaun nor the Texans come out happy.

Ok, fine, I'll bite. Cam is done. Washed up. As bad as QB play is around the NFL, if anyone thought Cam had a snowballs chance of being just average he'd already have a contract.

Just so you know . . . when you look at the combined stats of the QB's who have left Carolina . . . you get: 385 / 572 (67%), 4106 yards, 27 TD, 13 INT The problem might not be the QB's we trot out, but the team we put around them. I still hope that the new regime can fix it, but there are definitely other issues.

Sigh. Do you watch? Watch him play. Yes, his hands are not great. This can be said for a TON of backs who have successful careers. He's played in six games this season. He's had exactly TWO where is YPC was less than 3.7. Coincidentally, the same number of games Derrick Henry has been below 3.7 YPC. I don't see too many people questioning Derrick Henry's viability. Let's also not minimize just how BAD our line is. They are tragic, especially in the middle where the push for running really starts. Let's say that Chuba is "average". It's pretty widely known that the rushing champion hasn't won the SB since 1998. Is it REALLY that important to be "great" or can you get away with an average RB? Seems pretty easy to argue that you can get away with an average back.