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Quick Analysis: Hate To Admit It, But Father Time Caught Up With Thomas Davis In 2016

Saca312

By Saca312,
in Carolina Panthers

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uncfan888 Grand Master

uncfan888

Posted
Posted
5 hours ago, DaveThePanther2008 said:

While I agree time catches up to everyone including TD.  I will wait to have a fully healthy defense before I pass judgment.  TD is an amazing athlete and hope he has another year or two left.

That said, we didn't draft Shaq to stay behind TD his whole career.  I think for both Shaq and TD that Wilks will find a way to utilize both of them.  Less snaps for TD means an extended career.  More snaps for Shaq means we work to eventually move past TD.

I don't know about most of you but that day that we lose TD will be a tearful day for us.  I don't think there is a Panther more beloved than TD.

Yeah, he's my favorite Panthers player. I'll hate to see him go

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GoobyPls Veteran

GoobyPls

Posted
Posted

Our secondary was fine? in what universe?? they were terrible 95% of the season

And yes Davis played mediocre in pass coverage last year, everyone knows that. At least everyone who watched a little tape.

 

And if you think Shaq is gonna take Davis's snaps you are in for a very rude awakening. Not only will Davis not come off the field, Rivera won't allow it. 

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EightyNine Newbie

EightyNine

Posted
Posted
10 hours ago, Saca312 said:

Thomas Davis is the epitome of what a Carolina Panther should be. Coming back from 3 ACL tears, his high level play has inspired and shocked the world. A HoF caliber man whose been underrated for the vast majority of his career, TD's elite play has garnered him the respect and love of Panther fans everywhere.

However, last season showed that even age catches up to human cyborgs.

I decided to take a quick look at the second-to-last Panther game of 2016 to see what went wrong. Our secondary (minus Tre Boston) did fine for the majority of the game, but our linebackers were the ones having issues. Taking a closer look, Thomas Davis takes some of the blame.

On this play, the Panthers are in Cover 2. It's 3rd and a longshot. Thomas Davis stays close to the LoS. Rest of Panthers focused on keeping the play short and preventing a 20+ yard first down. Falcons take notice and elect to draw up a play to exploit Thomas Davis. 

TD.thumb.PNG.b1ee5ac330d836c9893ea2c16865212d.PNG

Falcons use their WR to draw away Bradberry, keeping him out of the equation. The leftover match-up is a one on one of Tevin Coleman and Thomas Davis with a lot of space in between them. In the past, you would see a blinding Thomas Davis run over and cut Coleman for a shorter gain, but this is 2016 Davis we're talking about. 

The result? Coleman comes blasting in for a 31 yard gain with a lumbering Davis behind. First down on what should've been an easy 3 and out.

td_beat.gif.78f31d77b745e121988b5ee6fce87861.gif

To be fair, Luke Kuechly wasn't on the field. Without Luke Kuechly, Thomas Davis had to shoulder most of the Panthers coverage responsibility. He had a much bigger job and task at hand. It's fair to say Luke not being there led to most of our def

Thomas Davis is one of my favorite Panthers of all time. However, he showed in 2016 he's not as fast as he used to be. It's obvious Davis is entering the twilight of his career. Shaq Thompson just became more important more than ever, and splitting time with Davis should only be beneficial for the defense.

Just something to chew on this offseason.

 

Using this one clip isn't enough to back up your point.  All it shows is that on one play, TD got caught out of position.  

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thefuzz Mentor

thefuzz

Posted
Posted
44 minutes ago, Bogart said:

I've noticed a slight drop off in his speed as will.  I love me some TD but father time is undefeated.

Yea, it's there...but he's still much better than most.

I think this is probably his last season as a "starter".

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KSpan Grand Master

KSpan

Posted
Posted

It's perhaps a questionable example of a play but to anyone watching objectively TD definitely slowed a bit last year. He started slow in 2015 as well but was able to pick it back up as the season went on.

Now, this is not to say that 'slowing' automatically equals bad; it doesn't. It means that TD was a physical freak in his prime and is starting to decline, which still leaves him in a tier of very good players. it's not black and white.

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