raleigh-panther

Lol hope man, a helluva drug. You gotta admit he can complete passes even to the other team

To be fair, Walker is 2 and 0 ……

Since you’re reading this, Dave Tepper, here’s what I want — and it’s not an apology BY SCOTT FOWLER OCTOBER 11, 2022 11:30 AM Read more at: https://www.newsobserver.com/sports/nfl/carolina-panthers/article267139666.html#storylink=cpy If you’re reading this, Dave Tepper, and I know that you are: I’m not mad. You got testy with me at the end of your 25-minute news conference Monday afternoon, a few hours after you fired head coach Matt Rhule in your role as the Carolina Panthers’ billionaire owner. We had a 60-second exchange that ended up being fodder for social media, as I asked you when exactly you decided to fire Rhule — Monday morning? Sunday night? — and you got annoyed and said I should “know better” than to ask that question. It went on awkwardly from there, as I asked again about your reasoning on firing Rhule five games into a 17-game season. Was it anything other than his overall win-loss record of 11-27? “You’re not being very specific,” I said. “Is there something I’m missing?” You said: “I actually read your columns, and I can go back to your columns and regurgitate them. So you can read your own columns, okay, for that answer.” Well, thank you for reading and for your Charlotte Observer subscription! Although when I heard the word “regurgitate” right next to a reference to my work, I realized maybe this wasn’t a compliment. Before it was asked, my question had already been pre-determined to be the final query of Tepper’s news conference. So it all ended on a jarring note. I wasn’t offended by any of it. Look, my wife and I have raised four teenagers. I’ve got a thick skin. As for my actual job, I’ve had a bunch of prickly exchanges like that, but few were live-streamed. Since Monday I’ve gotten a lot of supportive messages from readers, picked up a few hundred new Twitter followers, saw some videos of the exchange combine for 100,000 views and laughed at a few social media comments like: “Tepper about to buy the Charlotte Observer just to fire Scott Fowler.” This sort of thing does happen to journalists if you stay in the business long enough. In the 1990s, a few Panther fans once made banners that read “Fire Fowler” and “No Creditabilty” in Bank of America Stadium after I’d been involved in a small dispute with then-quarterback Kerry Collins, and yes, they spelled credibility exactly that way. Some people like my column. Some people don’t. Either is fine. I just want you to read it. I pride myself on compassion and fairness, but I’m certainly not a cheerleader for the home teams. This isn’t the team website. What the people watching the news conference don’t know is that after four years of you, Dave Tepper, making news in Charlotte, and me writing about it, we’ve bumped heads several times before. But we’ve also had enough honest conversations that a bit of teasing and/or testiness doesn’t matter in the slightest to me. I respect what you’ve done in Charlotte and in the business world and find you to be blunt and charismatic, which is catnip for a sports reporter. So not that you’re offering, and not that I’m asking, but I definitely don’t need an apology. What I do need and want, though — and what this city needs and wants — is for you to become a better owner. What do I mean by better? Let’s start with what you declared to be the most important thing Monday — winning. You’ve been the owner of the Panthers for 70 games, and they are 23-47 during that time. You bought the Panthers in the summer of 2018. They weren’t a very good football franchise by the second half of that year, because a bunch of standout players — most notably Cam Newton — were getting old. But they’ve actually been worse since you got here, if you judge by winning percentages (and both you and I do). If you count interim coaches, Steve Wilks will be your fourth head coach in just over four years owning the team. And if you don’t hire him for the permanent position in January, you’ll be looking for your fifth. An NFL team runs on its quarterback and its head coach, and you really haven’t found either one yet. You’ll start over at both spots before the 2023 season, maybe with a high draft pick that will save the day (we can only hope). 3 COACHES FIRED IN MIDSEASON It has felt like this team has been spinning its wheels for years, and the crowds of opposing fans at Bank of America Stadium speak to that. Rhule understands that a lot of that is his fault. In a bottom-line business, he was 11-27 in two-plus years. Then again, you signed Rhule to a seven-year, $62-million deal in January 2020 and kept talking about the “five-year plan” you were going to give him to succeed. He made it through less than half of that before getting the axe just before a team meeting Monday, where he at least got to say goodbye to the team and then was gone. You mentioned that the Panthers lost some intensity in Rhule’s final game, a 37-15 shellacking Sunday courtesy of San Francisco in a stadium that was taken over by 49ers fans. I agree. It’s also true that Rhule was the third coach you’ve fired in the middle of the season, joining Charlotte FC’s Miguel Angel Ramirez in 2022 and Panthers coach Ron Rivera in 2019. You share the blame here. You’re accountable, as you’ve said. As for these high-profile departures over at 800 South Mint Street — they come from out of the blue sometimes. That was part of the reason for my original question about timing Monday. It wasn’t to imply you hadn’t been thinking about it firing Rhule and just did it on a whim. It was more like I know you’ve been thinking about this for many months. But why now? Specifically, what has changed between January, when you decided to keep Rhule for another season despite a 10-23 record, and October, when the Panthers started 1-4 but still had 12 games to go? And of course there are other issues we didn’t even get into in that football-centric press conference: The Rock Hill rock fight. The Eastland Mall site that was going to host a youth soccer academy, until suddenly it wasn’t. The high-ranking Panther and Tepper Sports Entertainment execs who suddenly vanish without a trace. It all feels a little unstable. THE GOOD PART ABOUT TEPPER It’s not all been bad under your leadership, of course. The stadium feels a lot more like a public trust these days than the private playpen it mostly seemed to be under original owner Jerry Richardson. I went to the Billy Joel, Garth Brooks and Rolling Stones concerts, and they were all a blast. You claiming that “there never was music in Charlotte” until you got here was a bridge too far Monday — we weren’t all out there watching Andy Griffith and wishing somebody had a guitar before you showed up. But I understood the point. In 2018, before you started to ramp it up, Bank of America hosted 15 events in the stadium. In 2022, it will host 39. That’s significant. So is the fact that you’re ambitious and pursued and won a Major League Soccer team, which was a perfect fit for our growing and diverse city. That team drew roughly 35,000 fans per home game in its inaugural 2022 season, which ranked second in the entire MLS. If you ask people around town, Charlotte FC has been a massive hit. If you ask them about the Panthers, though, they’ll shrug. Or scream. Or bemoan all the money they’ve spent on tickets to watch bad football. And now that Rhule is gone and can’t be their scapegoat anymore, most of the fans’ venom will be directed toward you. All of that changes, of course, if the team starts winning regularly and the Carolinas start believing in you again. The partnerships you often speak of will start to form. The new stadium — or the nine-figure renovation of Bank of America Stadium — will happen in Charlotte. It’s not too late. You’re not Dan Snyder, the Washington Commanders owner who seems to be the last to know that he’s forever doomed in D.C. But Monday wasn’t a good day for anyone around the Panthers except the “Fire Matt Rhule” crowd, which got its wish and now probably wonders why it doesn’t feel any better. I’ve covered the Panthers since their inception in 1995 and now watched five different head coaches get fired. Those days are always stressful. But then comes a brief honeymoon period, built on renewed hope that maybe things will now change for the better. Make the most of that period. Don’t worry about me. I’m not going anywhere. Just fix the team. And don’t ask for any public money until you do it. Read more at: https://www.newsobserver.com/sports/nfl/carolina-panthers/article267139666.html#storylink=cpy

I can share it. If no one has

I think Wilks is smarter than Rhule and he is going to say, probably already has, to McAdoo ‘you need to come up with 10 plays that this offense can run for positive yards period. 10 plays that can be executed with timing and precision and in practice this week, they are going to be run over and over again and I’ll be there overseeing it’. im dead serious on this. You don’t learn to be a ballroom dancer if you can’t do a box step or a foxtrot this offense is at the box step level. the defenses already know McAdoo’s offense. He isn’t going to fool anybody but himself Walker gets rid of the ball quickly…even if 50% of the time it’s to the other team

They are in many ways but as I spend a great deal of time on the West Coast whether I want to or not, I wind up hearing about them and watching them more than most they are quite beatable this year .. did not say the Panthers are better as from a personnel and coaching perspective, they aren’t but we see it all the time in sports, kinda like ‘the candle burns brightest just before it goes out’

The Rams are frankly a mess this year. Offensive line terrible defense, other than a player or two, just meh this year much depends on how the Panthers players respond, but sometimes just the relief of not hearing about a coaching change could have them doing better I believe for the offense as well they may rally around each other ..not maintainable most likely but maybe for one week with Pj who can complete passes, some to our team, some to the other team..lol…who knows it will be interesting I also think that a lot if players might not have been as fond of Rhule as the press led is to believe… Starting with DJ

When a change is made to the General, his aides and friends are not going to be kept same in the business world as in the Army as in pro sports Wilks has enough to worry about without dealing with Snow, Rhule’s mentor and Father figure in college and pros

When Cam said this, I knew there were problems Why? because in all of Cam’s years with Carolina and the Pats, including when Rhule threw him under the bus for not knowing the playbook after 17 days, an incident Steve Smith recently referenced, Newton NEVER SAID ANTHUNG BAD ABOUT ANYONE Ever

He talks far far too much my business experience tells me someone who does that is ‘all mouth and no do’

Why is anyone surprised the guy is a weasel

This ….a million times if ever there was a regional mismatch with an owner it is Tepper and the Carolinas he just doesn’t get it …never will, why the treatment of Newton, the disdain for Keep Pounding , the removal of seats where footballs were given away, mattered there was a time when it mattered to be a fan of this team. There was a bond with the players. No more and he just doesn’t get it, bless his heart.

Lol He should be in New York. They would have skewered him

Some of these questions are hhmmm

I thought that was to Rhule over qb signings

He reminds me of a coiled, defensive snake

He sure isn’t the ‘bold’ speaking owner from 2018

They got rid of snow and foley too

Does anyone know who is carrying it?

No loss and neither is Christian split his salary and move him Better for him better for the Panthers The salary cap seems to not matter to other teams. Not sure why it is a death knoll for the panthers year after year Not sure what benefit it had in being under this year

Id rather keep Tabor

It’s a lot more attractive, in my opinion, to have more cap and more draft picks to rebuild into the new coach’s imagine than to be hamstrung with many of the current over valued players and their over valued salaries they need a QB and nothing to get one with unless they continue to lose and are at least in the top 3 of the draft but that’s just my opinion

Wilks is …he has a set of Lego pieces that do not work together if I were him, I’d get the staff and the captains together and come to a consensus of what they are going to be in all 3 phases. I don’t give a damn if that offense only has 10 decent offensive plays, execute them to perfection Thus, the main foundational issue with Rhule, of many, he had no idea what he wanted this team to be to a decompositional level vs ‘pie in the sky’ image and without that foundation, a staff can’t be developed, players drafted etc This shows in no better place than his egregious handling of the QB position It’s like building a house with no foundation in quick sand I wish Rhule and his family well and I’m sure he will return to college where he belongs but he never belonged in the NFL

Unfortunately, the Rams are very bad this year. The Panthers may actually win a game and take heat off Rhuke for a week …..nah, it will be another get well game for the opponent

Thought you might have been there. I didn’t go today