WarPanthers89

If long reads are your thing, ESPN.com has a new item that explores a full field of rabbit holes regarding the relationship between the NFL and the NFL Players Association over the past decade. The item from Seth Wickersham and Don Van Natta, Jr. focuses largely on the tenure of NFLPA executive director Demaurice Smith, mainly by focusing on the key events of his 12-year tenure with the union. Reasonable minds will differ on whether the article paints a fair or unfair portrait of Smith; as someone who has followed the twists and turns and pushes and pulls carefully over during Smith’s tenure, the portrait painted of the man who succeeded Gene Upshaw at times seems a little harsh. There have been wins and losses for Smith. Good things and bad things. Ultimately, however, Smith has had to represent the bargaining interests of a rank-and-file that has no inclination or desire to give up regular-season games or regular-season game checks. That point became clear 34 years ago, when the players went on strike, when the NFL hired replacements, and when within just a few weeks players streamed across the picket line and the strike crumbled. Has Smith done a perfect job? No. Has he done the best he or anyone else could given that management can and will take a full-season work stoppage and the labor force won’t? Reasonable minds can differ on whether he has; multiple alternate universes would be needed to prove whether he or anyone else could have done better in the various negotiations. Regardless, our primary purpose for currently shedding light on this lengthy item is to share an exchange between former Panthers owner Jerry Richardson and former NFLPA executive committee member Domonique Foxworth regarding the 2011 labor negotiations, which culminated in a lockout followed by a CBA that stripped from the NFL its ability to unilaterally add up to two regular-season games. “We’re not playing 17 games, Jerry,” Foxworth told Richardson. “It’s not going to happen.” “We can make you,” Richardson said, accurately characterizing the status quo under the 2006 CBA. “We don’t have to ask you. We’re being nice by not saying, ‘F–k you, you have to do it.'” “We’re being nice by not telling you, ‘F–k you, we’re not playing,'” Foxworth said. “We’re being nice by not telling you, ‘F–k you, we’ll play with replacement players,'” Richardson said. “We’re being nice by not telling you, ‘F— you, good luck filling up stadiums with Ryan Leaf at quarterback,'” Foxworth said. Smith interjected at that point, saying, “That’s a lot of f–k yous.” He then adjourned the meeting. Check out the full article, a well-written and detailed account that includes more than 10,000 words. https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2021/02/23/jerry-richardson-domonique-foxworth-once-had-a-heated-and-entertaining-exchange-over-17-games/

Stealing an already made thread a day later. Mods please lock for further reply’s

Yeah with everything going on and all the info coming out, I would be extremely disappointed in not having something to look forward to. No excuse at 8 to not come away with a rookie QB or to trade up for your guy if it came to that. I have no problem sitting a rookie for a year but cannot accept not trading for a franchise QB or getting a top rookie. A bad year will be worth it if we have hope that the future is bright, similar to Cams first couple years in the league

I have no doubt he will play into his 40’s as he stated. I would absolutely do it, but part of that is so that we can finally stop the franchise QB rumor threads on the huddle, so my opinion is flawed.

I don’t agree with your plan, but it is still saxy.

True but Tepper clearly wants a franchise QB desperately. I don’t think he viewed Cam as that, definitely not after the injury issues that happened, and his performance when he tried to return.

Your opinion is fine, and maybe we should have let him stick with us his final year (if he was even willing to do that) but it will be hard to convince anyone that watched him last season, that he should have received an extension with us. It was time to move on and I don’t feel bad as a a panther fan that we ultimately made the move. Signing Teddy is an entire different conversation, but neither Teddy or Cam was going to lead us to be a playoff contender.

We were intimidated by that shoulder. Teddy was a bad signing, and I’ll always be a Cam fan, but it was the right decision to move on from him.

Looks like Teddy created another burner account

Odd

I would be absolutely thrilled if we trade Teddy. Idc if we don’t have a backup plan, just get rid of the dude. Also the guy who tweeted this is having Adam Corolla on his radio show, so he must be legit

My ultimate dream is that lance drops to us at 8 and sits a year. We seem to be a team built to challenge teams after two more offseason/drafts to re tool all the remaining holes. This way we go into 2022 in great shape with cap after Teddy is cut, and a rookie QB wage for another 4 years, along with plenty of money to build around him. With all that being said, have you heard anything else about a Moton? Is he still asking much more than the Panthers are willing to pay? Seems like it could be a one year rental

Good points but it’s a good starting point. At least this isn’t like after Hurneys first stint where we were in a deep hole when Gettleman started, and had to hear about shopping at the dollar store compared to Tiffany’s for multiple years.

No, we have 35 million available after dead cap.

And with Teddy eating up most of our cap.

This year we are not bad, next year we don’t have many under contract, but our cap space goes through the roof, so we will have plenty to fill out the roster with.

Lol true but he has a good starting point to work with. We do have a cap specialist working along with him, so that alone is promising over the past years of Marty “kick the can down the road but never have a winning team” Hurney.

#7 most cap and #3 in worst dead cap

No matter what moves we make this offseason, we should be in a healthy spot this year, and GREAT shape next year. We currently sit a little above 35 million after we gained money from the Matt Paradis restructure.

Moton is going nowhere, and Tackles are 100x easier to find compared to a top 5 franchise QB. I understand we have holes, but my point is that a teams success starts and ends with a franchise QB. Building a team first compared to getting a franchise QB and building a team around him is the chicken or the egg debate. At the end of the day I can name a lot more talented teams without a franchise guy who can’t make it deep into the playoffs than I can teams with franchise QBs. Watson was the exception to this last year but almost every other team with a franchise QB was in the playoffs last year....the teams without one were not.

Totally agree I would not part with any of them. Shaq and three 1st absolutely. Side note I’m also excited about Moore and CMC as the future on offense. If we get a franchise QB, this could be a very exciting team for years to come

I’m not a fool, I know you have to have a team around a franchise guy, but comparing the Texans to a normal team isn’t fair either. They did nothing to build around him, as a matter of fact they traded away one of the best WR in the game for peanuts along with other terrible trades. The entire organization was bad from gm, to coaches, to the people they put around Watson. He put up MVP numbers despite how horrible the team was. You plug his numbers into our offense last season and we are easily a playoff team

After the 4.69 million saved with Paradis we are sitting right above 35 million in cap AFTER the dead money

Your rebuild gets a snort of coke with someone like Watson. No first round draft pick will ever have the impact of a true top franchise QB. Greenbay will always compete with Rodgers. No draft pick like Shaq, Brown, Moore, even CMC will ever allow you to compete unless you have a QB that can change the game. Only then do the puzzle pieces fit in, and Rhule has shown the ability to coach up players into the system. You can’t coach up a franchise QB, but you can the pieces around him.