I knew it was bad, but... well, see for yourself...

[civilizedgrit]

Titans just resigned Mark Jones...

[N1kkadeemuz]

Titans just resigned Mark Jones...

Just putting it out there that Mark Jones RETURNS those punt/kick thingy's, he does not do the whole tackling thing and all.

[Fireball77]

Yeah but it's bad the other way too. What was their average starting field position in Dallas? Probably about their 15?

[thejimmy]

Is there any part of our team that doesn't suck?

Seriously?

[mr beauxjangles]

That is just absurdly embarrasing. 27 yards?!?! We might as well go for it on every fourth down and never punt!!!

[Darth Biscuit]

Why is this not a complete shock... oh yeah, because I've watched all three games and stared in horror at the stunning lack of ST effort.

[Mr. Scot]

Baker has had good hang time in prior years. Could be a decline. or a coaching issue.

(we're screwed either way)

[Bonehenge]

That 80-something yard return for a TD the Eagles had skews the average a good bit. Not to say special teams aren't a mess, because they are.

[R0CKnR0LLA]

That 80-something yard return for a TD the Eagles had skews the average a good bit. Not to say special teams aren't a mess, because they are.

Even if you completely erase the 85 yard TD, we still give up 15.8 yards per return which would be good enough for 31st in the league.

[weyco2000]

Where's Ken Walters when you need him? He would have kicked it over the jumbotron in dallas, 30 yd punts and 30 second hang time. Seriously though, when the returner for the other team catches the ball, he runs straight down the field. Its like playing Madden in rookie mode, where's the speed?

[KatsAzz]

Here are the average yards each team has given up on punt returns through three games.

OK, we're dead last. Not a complete shocker there, but look at the gap from us to other teams. On average, we give up more than double the team sitting at #30.

We've given up more punt return yards on AVERAGE than seven teams in the NFL have given up TOTAL through three games.

We've done slightly better on kickoff coverage. We are at 31st overall (28.3 yards per return) ahead of the Oakland Raiders. So at least we're not dead last there :mad2:

There is no doubting the special teams are doing a horrible job covering kickoffs and punts.

The only bright spot about being last,is they have only one direction to go and that is up.

[CatMan72]

Some may want to blame Baker but look at his stats:

Avg. per punt - 51.8 thats ranked third in the league.

Net avg per punt - 30.5 thats dead last!

Thats a 21.3 yd difference! We have some serious problems here guys.

That tells me Baker may also be out-kicking our coverage. Was on the phone with my brother-in-law last night who is not a Panthers fan but watched the Dallas game, and he came out of nowhere and made a comment that our punter appeared to be out-kicking our coverage...

[CharlotteBeer.com]

That 80-something yard return for a TD the Eagles had skews the average a good bit. Not to say special teams aren't a mess, because they are.

So what you're telling me is if we excuse one of the Panthers' worst special teams plays of the season, the stats would look marginally better?

It's a novel concept, but you've kind of got to include that as an example of why the Panthers are so bad on special teams. We should be pointing to plays like that and saying, "This is the best example of why special teams is bad," not saying "Oh, well aside from that ...".

[GRWatcher]

That tells me Baker may also be out-kicking our coverage. Was on the phone with my brother-in-law last night who is not a Panthers fan but watched the Dallas game, and he came out of nowhere and made a comment that our punter appeared to be out-kicking our coverage...

So basically Baker shouldn't kick it longer than 20-30 yards? :mad2: