Perspective, Directive, and Erective - The Panthers offensive woes and you

[Zod]

Hello all. Thank you for visiting the Huddle on this glorious Sunday morning. 

I have a few thoughts on the preseason game last night and the Panthers ability to score points. You know, you won't win many games unless you score some points. #analysis

Let us begin. 

 

The Red Zone Woes

I see a whole lot of complaining about the Carolina Panthers play calling and execution in the red zone. I would like to take this opportunity to remind some of you that red zone play calling in the preseason is almost always vanilla. Base offense, simple plays, freshly pressed with no wrinkles. Joe Brady is not interested in tipping his hat to the finite amount of plays in his playbook to the opposition this season. 

The execution is another matter all together. The Panthers offensive line was blown up last night on the goal line. Observe...

We have all been so concerned with the pass protection the lack of run blocking snuck up on us. What the hell happened to Pat Elfein here? #60 is blown up and turned around into the backfield immediately. The rest is a domino effect. 

Which brings me to my next point..

 

Offensive Line improvement is on the way

I cannot imagine Elfein staying in the starting lineup for long. The good news is the Carolina Panthers seem to have hit on two of their offensive line draft picks. Brady Christensen and Deonte Brown both look like ballers than can contribute right now. Put them on the right side of the line and leave them there. This frees up Daley and Miller to play the left guard spot and Moton as our starting left tackle. Bada bing bada boom we have a legitimate NFL line. 

 

Kick the kicker

Slye is gone, so don't even worry about this. Would not shock me to see the ECU kid on the Ravens get picked up by us. He looked pretty good. 

 

See the potential. Be the potential.

I am actually very encouraged about the offense as a whole at this point. Darnold has had close to 100 snaps against the defenses of other teams over the past two weeks. Last night he looked like a vet QB in the limited time we saw him. 

What has me really excited are the number of play makers. It looks like Terrace and Shi are both legitimate NFL receivers. That gives the Panthers FOUR play makers at wide out. Has that ever happened before?

Also, I am equally excited about Chuba. It will be important for the Panthers to keep CMC spelled throughout this 17 game season. Chuba seems fully capable of filling in when needed. 

[NAS]

6 minutes ago, Zod said:

Slye is gone, so don't even worry about this. Would not shock me to see the ECU kid on the Ravens get picked up by us. He looked pretty good. 

This please

[NAS]

Good post Zod

I share your excitement about our draft picks and young talent on offense

Still nervous about Darnold and our kicking situation. I hope we will see enough evidence from Darnold in the last preseason game to gain more confidence 

Edited August 22, 2021 by NAS

[Harbingers]

CMC-Chubba are gonna be a hell of a combo. The only issue with it is they appear to be nearly identical in style. Power Back plays may be an issue. Don’t want to send either of them up the gut continuously, especially with what we’ve seen from the OL. 

[hepcat]

Red Zone play calling is an issue again. Brady should have called 4 pass plays to test Darnold at the goal line. They’re coddling his ass way too much.

[Khyber53]

Those back to back to back rushing attempts at the goal line were vanilla plays. Against a vanilla defense.

If your offensive line can't get push for that, in that many attempts, well, errrr... you have a motivation problem. Goal line stands are about pride and the Ravens showed how seriously they take it. 

Maybe we should take that little note from Teddy B and practice that red zone stuff a bit more this season. 

[Captain Morgan]

also think about how young our weapons are.  We are set for a good 4 to 5 years...if Sam can be the man, we can focus on improving our OL next year in the draft.

[Mhedrick]

I was there and saw the first drive.  Does anybody have a clip of Darnold’s pass to Anderson?  I was thinking that he had his eyes on him the entire play, other than maybe a split second.

I’ve pretty much stayed out of the QB discussions because, to date, seems more emotional than objective due to lack of observable field time.  I really hope he can be successful, but was curious about that play.

 

I also thought Will did a good job with the opportunity he was given.  Hope he gets a chance somewhere, if not here, to get more experience.

 

Main take-away was whoever is working with the 3’s, 4’s, will most likely have a rough night…..

 

 

[Zod]

2 minutes ago, hepcat said:

Red Zone play calling is an issue again.

IT IS PRESEASON. THEY ARE MORE CONCERNED ABOUT GETTING FILM OF PLAYERS IN CERTAIN PLAYS THAN THEY ARE SCORING POINTS. 

 

 

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

That goal line run looked like that one year at the Pro Bowl (I think it was 2012 or 2013) where nobody gave a poo and the OL just kind of fell over each other after the snap

[Zod]

5 minutes ago, Mhedrick said:

I was there and saw the first drive.  Does anybody have a clip of Darnold’s pass to Anderson?  I was thinking that he had his eyes on him the entire play, other than maybe a split second.

Chuba was right there too at the same angle to him. Likely trying to decide on whether to check down or not. 

[Eazy-E]

Our depth is alarmingly bad. I'm expecting a lot of pick ups from other teams once final cuts happen.

[hepcat]

8 minutes ago, Zod said:

IT IS PRESEASON. THEY ARE MORE CONCERNED ABOUT GETTING FILM OF PLAYERS IN CERTAIN PLAYS THAN THEY ARE SCORING POINTS. 

 

 

They needed film on running into a brick wall on 4th and goal?

[Zod]

Just now, hepcat said:

They needed film on running into a brick wall on 4th and goal?

Actually, yeah. Maybe thats the play that gets the starting lineup changed.