Bear Hands

Yeah that's close to where I'm falling, I'll give him the start of this season to check where he's at. 4-6 games should give a sense of how things are shaking out. But you're right, we saw him play for a full season. Now that was in a bad offense & on a bad team, but we still got to see him at times for what he can be. His ceiling is an above-average starter if everything goes perfectly. And those types can win a playoff game, maybe get lucky and go on a run one year. But the thing is, I just never saw him do anything that was like, "oh damn, 1 overall makes sense, this kid was made to be a QB". He was either completely off or executed according to plan. Never went above or really created out of structure. That's the issue for me, we were sold otherwise in that regard. And even taking out the idea of finding another Cam, I just want someone to create as much as Jake did. A decent talent with below average tools simply isn't fun. Especially when he looks out of his depth. That's my bottom line - you need a certain baseline toolset and he's such an outlier, I'm unsure if he's at that required floor. His tools don't give you a plus in any of the big categories you look for these days: arm strength, size, intermediate accuracy, speed, elusiveness, vision, timing. He's got toughness, professionalism, & smarts, but I mean, that can only take you so far in sports. We'll have an idea fairly quickly if he's more than what we saw last year and can create something in the QC.

I like the pace of conversation on a message board compared to other platforms. I'm also not with it enough to grasp that discord stuff or whatever it is, and I'm not talking my sports fandoms on my IG (which is my only social media account). Now, if anyone uses Sleeper for Fantasy, that can get fun if you have an active league. I've got a 12-team dynasty of 30-somethings that's been going on for 5 years and we love talking football & smack. It's a group of Packers, Browns, Steelers, and Panthers fans.

I mean it was. And he's not on the PUP so it's actually a good indicator, he can be made active at any moment.

For Bryce, it's not a stat line I'm looking for, although advanced metrics can be good indicators for improvement. What I can't unsee are the Indy, Chicago, Jags and NO games last year. Those were specifically the ones you don't want to see from anyone at this level, at any moment. Completely stunted, can't move the ball, can't sustain drives or get points. He really needs to figure a lot out this year at that fundamental level. We'll be able to tell fairly quickly when things start up if he still looks like a fish out of water. I'm giving some slack going into the season, but it will apparent early IMO. It will be telling if he has the growth in him/what it takes to be at least an average starter. Patience is indeed a virtue, but last year was bad enough that there needs to be a certain bar that's reached.

Brooks is expected. He's moving along with his recovery. All fairly notable guys though: 1-Yoshi will be an important OL piece if we want to maintain a decent level of play if a starter goes out. 2-Wonnum is expected, recovering from his injury last season 3-Barno looks good in spurts as a pass rusher, hopefully he's not out long 4-Coker is the UDFA most probably want to see succeed at WR

Attempted rebuild #3 since 2018. Let's ride.

It’s definitely migrated from a central focus—things change. Also- Online forums/message boards are pretty much dead. Sports fans are some of the few people keeping them afloat and from drifting into the interweb’s great beyond. Consider us lucky haha

The last 5 years has taught us there’s always more room to fall lol, we keep retooling, but haven’t figured out how to climb back yet. Only time will tell.

Oh Lordy we’ve reached “at least we aren’t the Jets” territory. This is close to rock bottom lol

Crazy to think our last playoff win was the NFC Title game nearly a decade ago. Only a handful of dwellers have playoff win drought longer than us. Go Panthers!

I'm a Daniels fan. They made a really promising swing at QB. Also think they got great value in Newton at DT and then Sainristil and Sinnott. Solid solid draft. There's good pieces, but if I was a fan, missing the coaching hire along with the shear amount of former-Panthers they've brought in would make me nervous. There's no disputing we've been the real cellar of the league for a minute now so why reunite so many from that regime? They've also had some shaky picks (Forbes, Allen, Dotson, etc.)...just a real roller coaster there.

oh yeah they got Trent Scott from our discards too.

Hurney & Fitt are officially commie colleagues. Not to mention, Jeremy Chinn, Frankie Luvu, Damiere Byrd, CMC's brother all there (am I missing anyone?) Poor Jayden haha.

WR will be a big focus. If we expectedly land in the top-10 again, Egbuka, McMillan, & Burden are the ones to watch. If we can't land Pearce, Jack Sawyer & Tuimoloau are the two I like. Drew Allar and Cam Ward at QB.

And this is why, this day and age, being responsive over reactive is a lost art.

I see your angle and don’t disagree. Having a guy to be the lynchpin on offense is critical and could very well be Brooks. He’s a damn good RB. Outside of him and Benson, I don’t think there’s many in the past 5 years better than them as prospects outside of Bijan, Jacobs, Gibbs and Breece.

Well that's terrible.... Looks like he never even bothered moving to the QC so good riddance.

I'd say 4-13 and enough close ones to not look completely terrible. Hard to see us above the bottom 3-4 in the league. If we're lucky, 6-11. Probably the lowest my expectations have ever been but we don't have a proven playmaker on offense. Can't say for sure about the OL either or the playbook. On defense, could be aight, ceiling is around #13-15 DVOA. If we still seem incapable of moving the ball against the bad teams, it'll be a problemo.

So sad. He was a mid-rounder I really liked for us - just brutal. Had a great story and sounded like he was really impressing the Vikes. RIP my dude.

Brayton, Bittle and Fua walk into a bar…

What we got was marginally less than what I was expecting - feel like we could have squeezed a bit more out of them, but whatevs. I mean, if we drew a hard line and said, nah, a 2nd and 4th, no less, I doubt the Giants are walking due to a difference between a 4th and 5th considering the asset received in Burns. Heck, maybe it could have been a 2nd and 3rd. But it's water under the bridge at this point.

D’Shawn Jamison or Chau Smith Wade. Evero has taken a lot of undersized slots in his career and utilized them very well. I think he gets one of these guys to make some noise.

This is going to be the Seventh year with this guy...SEVEN!! All I'll say is he better not be positioned in front of Sanders and Tremble. This is a prove-it year for Tommy and the first 2 are big for TEs where Sanders will need exposure. Sanders has real receiving talent so he just needs to be out there. I mean, we're near the end of Thomas' second contract and he'll be 30 before you know it. So all in all, this is getting ridiculous at this point. You know what you're getting with him. He's been ineffective here for almost twice the average NFL career length. And this guy at best has been barely outcompeting Steven Sullivan and Giovanni Ricci for 30 target type seasons and a 18-180-1 td type line. I think this would be pretty jilting for the fanbase after you've been hyping up a 3rd round investment (who's been steadily improving) in Tremble and a fresh investment in Sanders with strong receiving potential. There is no clear benefit in playing Ian Thomas, but man, this guy must give off great vibes in camp.

Brown, Jewell & Robinson look to be the leadership on defense. Jewell is a guy who I think is pretty unheralded. He was really strong for the Broncos. On offense, Hunt looks like the dude on the line but it still maybe slim leadership wise elsewhere. Thielen is a good voice but he’s slowing down on the field. Really need a skill position guy that really makes this offense something/anything notable and helps create a culture. The next maybes are Legette/Brooks/Sanders.. we’ll see what they can do. Unsure on Bryce.

Really though, no alts. A little insight: Been a Panthers fan since they started, fam had PSLs from the start (finally gave them up this year), grew up in south Charlotte. CU alumn (Not a Deoin/Shedeur stan though), north shore Chi-town these days (was in Madison, WI for a while) Wanted to drive some good convo here/try to outweigh the spam-oriented stuff. So, brought into the mod team with the intent to help and keep bringing conversation. We'll see if the team keeps me entertained enough to keep at this haha.