frankw

His biggest issue was buying into his own hype. It didn't help he had his brother in his ear at every turn building him up even when he was disappearing out there on the field and stinking up the joint. But they got what they wanted. The big payday. That was more important to Brian that cementing his place as an elite pass rusher amongst his peers. But listen let's get down to it here. Regardless of how one feels about Mykel Williams or any other DL prospect maybe we should consider an alternative measuring tool going forward for our historically bad defense that isn’t defined by just being marginally better than Brian Burns. I'm just saying.

Burns had a big ego on top of it all. Legend in his own mind. I'm certainly very intrigued by Mykel as a prospect it's the notion that we are rolling the dice on a top 10 pick with only the hope that he can become a force as a pass rusher. That being said I'm certainly more upbeat about the possibility of Mykel Williams honing his craft than I am someone like Shemar Stewart. But who knows with our Panthers. We continually seem to make the wrong decision.

Shades of Brian Burns.

Possibly. He's comparable to Pinero in overall accuracy but I don't think we can understate just how useless Eddie has been in long situations we basically all but waved a white flag if it was more than a 45 yard attempt and even that was iffy. Whereas the kicker in question here at least has a proven history of making those 50+ yard kicks. I'm not trying to argue we should limit ourselves certainly we should consider multiple options. But long range has been an issue for us for some time now.

Every time I look at this division I just laugh and cannot understand why we continue to stumble around and end up in last place. Even with our needs there's no reason we can't compete for this division in the sorry state it's in.

Depends on who is available. DL should be the pick. But a case can certainly be made for offense depending on how the first seven picks fall.

No reason not to kick the tires.

The spat with the restaurant owner while ultimately harmless was as good of a glimpse into David Tepper's thought process and overall approach to owning a sports franchise as anyone needed. I've got a lovely bridge to sell anyone that would believe that thin skinned middle aged adult man would sit back and let someone else make any and all decisions for a team he paid billions for.

I've been very critical of the Tepper's. But. If they are actually learning and evolving then great. I will give them credit for it. My issue is though I'm just not seeing any wholesale changes. Same draft scouting staff. Hired the worst GM in franchise history's righthand man. Our first round pick last year Xavier Legette was handpicked and publicly endorsed by Bryce Young's father. Our 2nd round pick was an absolute vintage classic Panthers pick. From there largely meh. Then we have the situation of Evero sticking around again after being forced on our first year head coach last year. To me the Tepper's are still behind the scenes pulling strings until proven otherwise.

In the weeks before the draft the consensus swung back and forth and then finally hard to Bryce Young once the "sources say" character assassination of CJ Stroud and the publicizing of his alleged S2 scores (lol) began. As far as the huddle there were people here in the months before the draft wanting Stroud and some wanting Young. Idk why we have to continually reestablish this.

The Tepper's are meddlers. We all know it.

Greg Olsen all day fug Tom Brady.

Obviously that would be a nice compensation package but if it sounds too good to be true it is.

Chuba was a 4th round pick. That's where you're supposed to take a shot at that position. Who other than a few knuckleheads were truly mad about the pick? As far as overall the last several years the sad truth is some people in the fanbase could have made better choices in the draft. That's not hyperbole or a hot take. We have been dreadful.

Unfortunately this is what the current ownership has done to our Panthers. Lower than joke status. Don't want to see either of them in the draft room this year. But you know they'll be lurking like vampires.

Eh. Evero has been here through now 2 coaching regimes. He also pushed for guys like DJ Johnson and has apparently had significant enough input on some free agency moves too. At this point nobody knows about Canales. Even Bryce Young's progress has to be taken with a grain of salt. The rubber has to meet the road in a big way in 2025. But I think it's fair to say the plan from the front office seems to be to let Canales focus on the offense. Although some people could rightly argue he needs to be more hands on across the roster given the fact his defense was 32/32 last season. And look let's be real here. Virtually everyone here is going to agree Rhule was a conman and not a good NFL head coach by any means. But he did swindle our owner out of a generational amount of money. That cannot be understated. With Reich though while he was not the man for the job he didn't even coach here a full season. Saying he didn't develop anyone while giving our front office a pass for their egregiously subpar drafting before and after he was gone (see our 2024 2nd round pick) seems odd. The simple fact of the matter is we need to both draft significantly better and we need to develop talent better.

All roads lead back to David Tepper.

Might as well leave no stone unturned I guess.

I want to laugh but we've gone out of our way to retain the same draft scouts that have helped us navigate some of the worst drafts in franchise history the last few years. The RAS obsession began with Tepper. Ultimately I think he is the one pushing for it the most. Don't need to hire any new draft scouts if the owner is the one calling the shots.

Well I don't disagree with you. But that isn't in the cards this season although we should IMO absolutely consider a QB in the mid rounds with some potential just to have on the roster because Jack Plummer is the definition of an afterthought and Andy Dalton while he is a great guy he is simply cooked at this point in his career let's just be honest. Certainly this year is the put up or shut up year regardless of circumstances. Or at least it should be. I've said all along my concern is this regime led by the Tepper's who have a built in need to save face for pushing for the trade will be willing to accept even marginal improvement as a "win" and seek to explore contract extension options with Bryce. While I like Dan Morgan he certainly is and was a direct part of that as Fitterer’s right-hand man so he also has a key stake in saving face too. I'm just hoping 2025 for the most part is a campaign that will silence any and all doubt and leave very little to be debated. At least then as a fanbase we could come together and end most of these constant feuds over the starting QB at least temporarily. We'll see.

Some of your points here have validity to a certain extent in general but drawing a line in the sand over some of these things like diamond necklaces in relation to pro athletes and particularly professional NFL quarterbacks just sounds like something Nolan Nawrocki would say. And that's not anywhere anyone should want to be if they also want to be considered an intellectual. That to me sounds like the complete opposite of intellectualism. Anyways. If one wants to be skeptical of Sanders they can do so without the above. First point of order would be how he will fare in the NFL if he publicly throws his teammates under the bus after a loss as he did his offensive linemen in college previously. People can say what they want about Cam Newton but he never did that and he had every valid reason to. But there's a line you will struggle heavily to come back from in an NFL locker room if you cross it and that is one. Time will tell how Sanders will navigate these things.

And I'll say it again. We really need some opposing viewpoints from other fans here again. Some people have resided within an echo chamber for too long.

Bryce Young as a now third year QB has arguably even more to prove than a rookie Sanders. He's got a tremendous amount of work to do to slam the door shut on a very significant amount of bad tape.

I completely agree. Evero has arguably the most to prove out of anyone this season especially considering he's had significant input on roster moves. You could make the argument both parties should have moved on. But what's done is done. I just hope it works out in our favor. But if it does not then it will just be one more Panthers blunder many fans could see coming. We'll find out.

As far as WR goes it's worth noting the amount of movement with the position via trade compared to years past. Other than bonafide guys like Jefferson and Chase teams are much more open to moving talented receivers now. That has worked out for and against different teams to varying degrees but if you look at the Super Bowl winners as of late a balanced roster paired with high level coaching is the key. With that in mind. Give me all the pass rush.