Jon Snow

1 hour ago, Mr. Scot said:

If, as everybody suspects will happen, Evero gets a head coaching job next season, Bradley could conceivably be back in play (depending on what happens in Indy).

If Evero is true to the direction he was given his replacement will already be on the team. Remember, one of his directives was to hire and train his successor as part of his staff. I think Reich and the soon to be OC will be given the same orders. I like the concept of doing that, as they should.  How practical it will be is yet to be determined. 

Daniel Jeremiah just listed his top 50 players in the upcoming draft. He has 1 qb in the top 10. Young is rated the #4 player in the draft. He has Stroud, Levis and AR at 12, 13 and 14 respectively.  

Over paid like every other Marty Hurney extension he ever did. He didn't pay them based on past production he paid them by what he thought they would do in the future. It never worked out. He was an idiot. 

18 minutes ago, d-dave said:

Man, I loved Reddick.  He made some great plays for us.  The Panthers made other choices in who to pay, whether it was Rhule or Fitterer at the end of the day.  Reddick is a great pass rusher and impact player, but as we've seen, he wasn't truly a full time player in that he had to come out.  Is it a quibble?  Probably, but Frankie has been more than fine.  He's not the pass rusher that Reddick is, but he's really coming into his own as a player and I'm thrilled that we have Luvu.

Would Reddick have been as impactful this past season?  Considering we switched from our hybrid approach to more of a standard 4-3 when Wilks took over - I'm not totally sure.  I'm happy for him.

He was a pass rusher only. He could not cover a TE or RB out of the backfield. That is Burns problem as well. In a 3-4 the LBs have to be able to cover as well and those 2 cannot.  They can only do one thing, rush the passer.

1 hour ago, ladypanther said:

He signed a 5 year contract.

Good. I hope it blows up in spectacular fashion. 

2 minutes ago, Khyber53 said:

He'd probably make a good OC, to be honest. He understands offensive plays backwards, forwards, by the QB calls, the gestures of the opposing coaches, the sweat on the WRs...

 

Knowing Luke you're probably right.

1 minute ago, Mr. Scot said:

 

I can see why his interview with Tepper went nowhere.  

13 minutes ago, bythenbrs said:

Where do you ‘hide’ him until he can take that big step or, do you think he is ready now?  I agree he will make a great DC, just not sure the path within the Panthers that takes him there.

Would be a dream to have Evero for a couple years and then elevate Luke to DC, if he is ready at that point.

I don't think he wants to coach.  If he did I would certainly give him a shot. But the great ones never seem to be able to coach their position.  I think their expectations are so high that nobody can live up to them.

2 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

I didn't, but I believe you.

Sure did his best to screw over Ejiro Evero 

That guy is out there. He was all over the place. It was as if it was an improvised, last minute thing.

1 hour ago, razorwolf said:

JMO

Staff Id like to see join the staff:

OC: Brian Johnson

QB: Kevin Patullo

DB: Kris Richard

CB: Marquand Manuel

Asst. LB: Luke Kuechly

Luke, as good as he is, would be a terrible LB coach.  You can't teach natural abilities.  I think he would be one hell of a DC though.

10 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

Another one who might join Payton in Denver...

Did you happen to catch his introductory press conference a few minutes ago on nfl network? I am so thankful we didn't get that guy.

Just now, RenoCarolina said:

Great reads that went into detail.  Yet neither included the Nicole Tepper lack of training gaff.  Couldn't that have cost the Panthers a great deal?  Could it still cost?  Tells you how close these sources were to Tepper Enterprises that everything about the process came out "except" that detail.

It came out. It was in one of those breakdowns somewhere.  It took less than an hour to complete and didn't change anything. 

16 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

Related to the initial search...

"Substantial"

Head coach money.

1 minute ago, SaltAndPepper said:

Can anyone explain how the television report on Frank Reich was the reason they reexamined Frank Reich? Like... why is a television report influencing the committee?

I guess they hadn't considered him at first.  Most likely an oversight because they were thinking "young offensive mind".  I'm certainly happy it turned out this way.

26 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

FYI @Jon Snow, Breer did catch his mistake.

I spotted that right away! Lol. 

Just now, Thompcat said:

How about the remaining defensive staff, does Evero bring anyone from Denver?

It's been stated by Reich that the OC and DC will have the freedom to hire their own staff. He will most likely take a few if Payton will allow it.

2 minutes ago, rayzor said:

 

late to the conversation but i think you're talking about @Panthro

I was going to tell them but decided they would figure it out eventually. 

3 minutes ago, Mr. Scot said:

Albert Breer tells the story from his perspective...

If you want to know why the Panthers hired Frank Reich, you can actually go back to the fourth-and-3 that the Eagles converted early in the NFC title game. On the play, from the Niners’ 35, you’ll remember Philly held nothing back—Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts ended up escaping to his left, and launching the ball against his body to an open DeVonta Smith inside the 10. The ball was in range, Smith’s effort was spectacular and the chains moved.

Whether Smith actually caught it is immaterial to this discussion.

What matters, in this case, is that Philly took that chance, something that illustrated the advantage that the Panthers thought hiring an offensive coach would give them. Where a defensive coach, in that spot, might throw at the sticks, or run a draw, or punt, Carolina saw an offensive coach more willing to take the sort of chance Nick Sirianni and Shane Steichen did, for a variety of reasons, and make Philly tougher to defend and more likely to convert.

Reich, by the way, is Sirianni’s mentor. And Reich actually wasn’t even part of the Panthers’ initial group of candidates. But when it came down to it, the Carolina brass leaned on what they learned from 12 games with Steve Wilks as interim coach, and tacked on that feeling they had all along—that they wanted a guy with an offensive background, and Reich is where they landed.

Here’s a snapshot look at how they got there …

• Through the fall, owner David Tepper’s research, as we’ve written in this space, focused largely on innovative offensive minds in general and young ones in particular. With 12 weeks of runway, the Panthers’ first list was short, and that was by design, with five names on there—former Lions and former Colts coach Jim Caldwell, Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson, Giants OC Mike Kafka, Eagles OC Shane Steichen and the incumbent Wilks.

• Wilks had at least made the Panthers think about pivoting, and the biggest reason why was because of how he’d been able to capture the locker room in an adverse situation and turn the ship by creating a very real identity. The biggest question coming out of that related to the sort of staff he’d be able to assemble. My understanding is Eagles QBs coach Brian Johnson was part of Wilks’s preferred group as offensive coordinator.

• So Reich wasn’t on that first list. But there was a television report late in the season that he’d be considered for the Panthers job, which caused Carolina to double back on the work it had done on the former Colts coach, whom the search committee liked. GM Scott Fitterer pulled on his connections to Indy’s front office, including ties to GM Chris Ballard and assistant GM Ed Dodds (his former Seattle coworker), and those guys told him, “No, you gotta talk to him. He’s a legit guy.” At that point, the Panthers’ thinking basically was, Why wouldn’t we talk to him?

• Because of the rules regarding coaches in the playoffs, Reich wound up being the third coach the Panthers talked to. And the command, presence and maturity both he and Caldwell showed in the process pushed the Panthers back to what they’d learned with Wilks as their interim coach—and it made some of the younger coaches seem green.

• Through the first round of interviews, which, again, was intentionally small, Tepper—still relatively new as an owner, and having run a truncated process that became a pursuit of then Baylor coach Matt Rhule on his first swing—noticed something. He was learning a lot about his own organization, and other organizations, through a grueling first round. So he decided to open it up to some new names and brought in Sean Payton with a second group, including Broncos defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero, Bills OC Ken Dorsey and Cowboys OC Kellen Moore.

• Moore made an impression at the wire, in part because he had to wait for Dallas’s season to end to interview. The Panthers offered to do it with him over Zoom after the Niners eliminated the Cowboys on Jan. 22, but Moore said he really wanted to come in. So that Tuesday, Carolina squeezed him in for an interview from 9 to 11 a.m., so Tepper and his wife would be done in time to prepare for the memorial service for Charlotte FC defender Anton Walkes (who’d died suddenly days earlier) that afternoon.

• Moore really impressed the Panthers. They had some of the same concerns with him they’d had with the other young offensive coaches, but they’d seen and heard enough to want to bring him back. So they called Moore, who was in a car on the way to the airport, and asked him to come back Jan. 25 to continue the conversation.

• At that point, Wilks had already had his second interview. Reich came in for his after the continuation of the Moore interview on the afternoon of Jan. 25. Where the first round included Tepper and wife, Nicole; Fitterer, assistant GM Dan Morgan; and lead negotiator Samir Suleiman, the second round looped in team president Kristi Coleman. And it turns out Coleman’s presence in the interview helped separate Reich from the pack—his big-picture vision for the football operation (everything from his coaching staff to player engagement to how the equipment room would work) impressed her, as it had the rest.

• Tepper, as he had after the first round of interviews, asked everyone to rank their top five candidates, abstaining from the vote (so as not to influence anything). Reich was first on everyone’s list. From Nos. 2 to 4, the lists varied, making Reich a pretty clear-cut choice—and leading to Reich’s hire, made official Jan. 26.

So the Panthers have a new coach, Reich has a second shot, and, it seems, Tepper feels like his organization, and everyone in it, is better for having gone through the process.

 

Matt Rhule? WTF?

I'm still dancing!

Just now, therealmjl said:

Under my old handle I received pie from Mr Scot once. I screenshotted it. I don’t have that phone anymore though.

I take it that's been a while.  I would have screenshot it as well. Goodonya mate!