cranky

A lot has been made of how heavily the Carolina Panthers have invested in their offense to support Bryce Young — yet, despite that spending, he continues to struggle. Most here believe it’s Young’s lack of size and arm strength that is to blame and no amount of investment could compensate for what he supposedly lacks physically. That’s just BS. Yes, the Panthers allocate more of their salary cap to offense than to defense, but nine other NFL teams spend even more. And while those teams generally have established franchise quarterbacks, they also share another important characteristic: they invest heavily in wide receivers and tight ends. When ranking teams by total dollars devoted to receivers and tight ends, the Panthers sit dead last. So, while Carolina may appear to spend heavily on offense overall, that spending is not reaching the positions that most directly supports Young and the results are predictable. Against the Dolphins, for example, the Panthers’ receiving corps consisted of a rookie, a practice squad call-up, a reclamation project, an undrafted free agent, and Xavier Legette. The tight end group included Tommy Tremble, another rookie, and yet another practice squad player. Five of the seven pass-catchers who played in that game had never appeared in an NFL contest the previous season — three were still in college, one was watching games from home, and another was buried on a different team’s practice squad. And yet when the offense struggled, it was blamed on Bryce’s lack of physical talent - not on the lack of experience around him. The lack of spending on the receivers and tight ends isn’t a one year thing either. The Panthers have ranked near the bottom of the league in receiver and tight end spending in each of Young’s seasons. Their draft investments at wide receiver — Jonathan Mingo, Legette, Coker, and Terrace Marshall Jr. — have yet to yield consistent production. In addition, the front office has signed around nine free-agent receivers during Young’s tenure. Six were former practice squad players with little or no NFL experience. The remaining three — DJ Chark, Diontae Johnson, and Adam Thielen — offered mixed results. Johnson proved to be a distraction and lasted only 13 games before being traded to Baltimore, where he was released after four appearances. Chark was serviceable but unspectacular and departed after a single season. That leaves Thielen as the only proven, reliable receiver Young has played with in Carolina — and notably, he is also the only free-agent wideout from that group still active in the NFL. In other words, over two seasons, Young has had just one receiver who could reasonably be considered NFL-caliber. Combined with questionable draft evaluations, it’s been a recipe for persistent offensive struggles. Even with all of that said, in the second half of last season, Young showed significant progress. He played with poise, threw accurately and on time, and demonstrated command of the offense. With Thielen and Coker as his primary targets, he looked like a potential top-10 quarterback with pff and other pundits regularly praising him. This season, however, Thielen is gone, Coker is on injured reserve, and Young is left throwing to rookies and reclamation projects. Given that lack of talent, it should come as no surprise that both he and the offense have regressed. The quality of a quarterback’s supporting cast has a direct impact on performance. It’s that simple. When Young had receivers who could run precise routes and find soft spots in coverage, he did well. Without that, his production has suffered just like it would with any QB. Blaming the Panthers’ offensive struggles solely on him is not only unfair — it ignores the broader context of poor roster construction and misallocated resources and judging him within that context is simply unfair and shortsighted.

Or maybe they were 32nd because his other receivers were Jonathan Mingo, DJ Chark, and Terrace Marshall JR..

If you really believe that, then there is nothing else for me to say.

Damn. What a stud!

I don't know that I would call that a wild statement. I mean, yeah, Ginn had a good year in 2015 but his other two years with Cam were just average. I absolutly do agree with the statement that Cam was a big part of Olsens career and have no problem crediting him with Olsen's wildly successful career.

duplicated

I know the point you were making. My point is the original post stated a good QB elevates the talent around him. You are correct that Smith was better under Cam than Clausen. I agree with that. But he was also better with Delhomme than Clasuen as well. Cam didn't make Smith a better receiver - Clausen just made him worse.

LOL. Sorry, Didn't mean to ruffle your feathers. Please no more side eyes! I wasn't disparaging him. I just don't agree that Cam lifted eveyone around him. He was surrounded with talent when he was drafted - unlike Young. Cam was a unique talent that set the way for many athletic QBs to follow. We were fortunate him him play here. But again, part of his strength were in his legs as opposed to his arm.

Let's hope you're wrong as the Panther's FO became heavily invested in their system this year. So far, the results look promising. It's early, but the FA and draft picks this year are, so far, looking stronger than they have in years.

Ok let me be more specific. Smith was a stud before Newton got here do you not agree? Yes, LaFell improved under Cam but then had his best years after leaving the Panthers with Cam as the QB and going to NE. So he improved playing with someone else. Olsen was in Chicage the year before Cam arrived and statistically had the same numbers his first year with Cam. Hope that's clearer for you.

Olsen wasn't here and I am pretty sure Steve Smith was pretty fu*!ing good before Cam. Ask Delhomme.

LOL. Yeah Steve Smith, Brandon LaFell, Jonathan Stewart, Deangelo Williams and Greg Olsen were all trash till Cam got here to elevate their game. I liked Cam but lets be honest here. His strength was him being a two threat QB. At least for his first 4 years

Given the average ypp is around 7.1, I would say 20 is plenty long.

I'll just leave this here.

I guess I'm the odd man out. I did not care for him at all. Yuck!

Just pointing out that it's not all about arm strength.

So what. JaMarcuss Russell and Trey Lance both had cannons for arms and could have made that pass as good if not better than Darnold but I certainly wouldn't want them here just because of that.

I think it's because of this (not mine, tukafan 21 posted it earlier) "So I just went and looked at the play by play and he had 162 of his 206 yards on just 6 of his 23 carries, which means he had 44 yard on his other 17 carries, or just 2.6 yards per carry."

Please let this happen. Even if they continue to lose, at least they aren't playing timid. Plus the playing time would be great for next year as this year is looking like a loss.

I am pretty sure we can agree that the defense was ignored too long trying to build up the offense and it did not work.

And for what it's worth, I never would have drafted Tet. I would have gone defense all the way but that's not my decision.

They spent 135,068,468 on offense and 93,947,983 on defense. So they are spending 1.43 times the amount on offense than defense. So yeah, they are spending more. But compared to other teams, it's not as lopsided as you make it out to be. The Rams are spending 2.83 times more on offense than defense, the Eagles are at 2.29, the Bengals 1.6, the Falcons 1.5, the Chiefs 1.43, the Saints 1.35, the Dolfins 1.35 etc etc. Now if you want to talk about draft capital, then yes, the Panthers have spent more on the offense than defense. That happens when you use your top draft pick on a reciever for three straight years because you keep missing on it.

At this point, I would take an average QB IF I could also have a stout defense and good ST's with it. Give me a team that plays competively, with the defense keeping games within reach. Give me some sacks, hits behind the line and interceptions. Give me a team that plays with some intensity, that is constatnly trying to impose their will on the opposing team. Just don't give me another soft ass team wiffing on tackles. I'll be more than happy wiith that - at least for a while.

Not really. I certainly wouldn't call it comical. There 8 teams spending more so it's not like they are way off the scale. Secondly, and more importantly, the majority of the spending is on the OL which I don't mind as much. It is a little high but I would rather have it there then being locked up in a bad QB.

I can agree with that but I don't think it was the college part that was the mistake - it's the lack of NFL experience that was the mistake. It's the same mistake he has made with Canales. Both had limited experience in the NFL. Canales had a little more but he only had 1 season as an OC and that was in a system with a strong support system as well and a developed QB. It's hard to know how much of the offenses' success was because of Canales, and how much of it was because of the sytem he worked in. Especially given how successful that team continues to play without him.