The Darnold Decision

[Aussie Tank]

5 hours ago, DaveThePanther2008 said:

I agree that Darnold sucked last year and makes our trade look foolish.  How could anyone look good behind our line?  It didn't matter who was under center they weren't going to have much time to make wise decisions.

If we somehow manage to fix this line and I hope we do.  Darnold, IMO should have just a slim bit of faith that maybe, just maybe he can perform better. 

I still believe that we need to address the QB position but we need to be wise in doing so.  Throwing money at Vet QBs IMO is just as bad as reaching for a rookie QB that might not pan out.

Run with Darnold and hope we fix our line.  

Plan for a QB in 2022 when Darnold is no longer on the books. 

Hit the nail on the head 

[SizzleBuzz]

3 hours ago, CPantherKing said:

I group Teddy with QBs like Kerry Collins, Trent Dilfer, Ryan Tannehill, Jimmy Garoppolo, and Ryan Fitzpatrick.

Not a bad group...

...I supported TB5.

The old "be careful what you ask for" axiom has come home to roost

[ForJimmy]

I love football and should never be on a NFL roster. I get he was in a mess in NYJ (not much better here no OL/terrible coach), and I was even ok with acquiring him. The 2nd rounder ruined the trade from a value standpoint. The worst part of the whole deal is they had no Plan B and extended him before the season started for a stupid amount of money. When Fields fail to 8, we should have drafted him and had a “open competition” at QB. Overvaluing him and going all in on him was all around terrible. We should be letting him walk at no cost right now and probably getting a comp pick for it.

[Breakpoint4510]

1 hour ago, TLGPanthersFan said:

Broncos had a great defense and Teddy still failed. He is not a player "you can build a team around". He is a backup not a starter, but people in the NFL keep making him a starter. You can't win with a QB like him in todays NFL unless you have a historically great defense. Like the 2015 Broncos.

That Bronco defense was not great. They could not stop the run, and the 17-14 win over Washington was the only game the defense won for that team. Yet the defense was directly responsible for losses to Pittsburgh, Baltimore, Philidelphia, Las Vegas(2), the Chargers and the Chiefs. Yet in the 12 games that Teddy started and finished, the Broncos were 7-5. He bettered his career high with 18 touchdown passes, and his career low in interceptions with 7, despite losing his two fastest receivers and playing with 10 different lineups on the o-line. Teddy did not fail. His best wide receiver had worse numbers than his third option here. If the Broncos were smart, they would tag him. 

[CPantherKing]

3 hours ago, TLGPanthersFan said:

Broncos had a great defense and Teddy still failed. He is not a player "you can build a team around". He is a backup not a starter, but people in the NFL keep making him a starter. You can't win with a QB like him in todays NFL unless you have a historically great defense. Like the 2015 Broncos.

Teddy was a .500 QB in a new offense against the NFC West. The Broncos are the least developed team in the NFC West.

The other teams have their franchise QBs who can win a close game. The Broncos defense needs to be 49ers level good to win that division, and the 49ers finished 3rd in their division. Broncos were 1-5 in the NFC West. That is not on a QB you bring in to be a game manager. That defense has to make plays and they need offensive playmakers at WR/RB. Teddy is an above .500 QB. The only team he had a losing record with was Rhule's Panthers.

[SizzleBuzz]

1 hour ago, ForJimmy said:

The worst part of the whole deal is they had no Plan B and extended him before the season started for a stupid amount of money.

They also didn't make him compete for the job ...

...nobody else seemed to have a problem with that at the time...

[TLGPanthersFan]

13 minutes ago, CPantherKing said:

Teddy was a .500 QB in a new offense against the NFC West. The Broncos are the least developed team in the NFC West.

The other teams have their franchise QBs who can win a close game. The Broncos defense needs to be 49ers level good to win that division, and the 49ers finished 3rd in their division. Broncos were 1-5 in the NFC West. That is not on a QB you bring in to be a game manager. That defense has to make plays and they need offensive playmakers at WR/RB. Teddy is an above .500 QB. The only team he had a losing record with was Rhule's Panthers.

Whatever you say Teddy-stan. Bridgewater sucks. He is a backup. 

Edited February 27, 2022 by TLGPanthersFan

[Mr. Scot]

19 hours ago, Sgt Schultz said:

Darnold was a panic move.  They burned the bridge with Teddy publicly (to the applause within the Huddle), swung and missed at a couple of veterans who wanted to win now, and apparently only liked Lawrence and Wilson in the draft class both of whom were going to be long gone by the time the #8 pick came around.    That left very few options.

Tannehill did become better as time went on, and Gase was horrible.  That does not mean Darnold can follow what Tannehill did, and Gase being horrible may have only added to Darnold's deficiencies, not been the root of all of them.  Our coaching staff liked what they saw of his raw talent and had some misguided belief that they were good enough to resurrect him.

Don't agree with this being a panic move any more than I bought into the notion people suggested last year that he was just insurance in case we missed on one of the draft picks. Hell, if it was a panic move, we might have reason to be more forgiving.

But nope. They sat down, discussed it, reviewed the tape and went in eyes wide open, fully believing that they could make this work.

I think what they saw is what I characterize as an "every few plays" type quarterback. It's a certain style that tends to be average to mediocre on most downs but occasionally makes a big play. That's basically PJ Walker too, although his "in-between" plays are worse than Darnold's.

The "in-betweens" are what you have to fix with a quarterback like that. If you can create some consistency on those while not losing the occasional big play shots, then you've got something.

For about three to five games, it looked like they'd been successful at doing that.

And then, well...

But this is why I always say people shouldn't fall in love with highlight reels. They watch film of a guy making a few spectacular plays and think "wow, we need that guy" when if you actually watched the full game tape, it'd tell you a different story.

Edited February 27, 2022 by Mr. Scot

[raleigh-panther]

4 hours ago, Mr. Scot said:

Don't agree with this being a panic move any more than I bought into the notion people suggested last year that he was just insurance in case we missed on one of the draft picks. Hell, if it was a panic move, we might have reason to be more forgiving.

But nope. They sat down, discussed it, reviewed the tape and went in eyes wide open, fully believing that they could make this work.

And this right here, is why  all of them should have their collective asses kicked out along with Snow, Rhule and, yes Fitterer 

there isn’t a person in the nfl that would have given that much for Sam freaking Darnold 

add to it Anderson’s contract and now, Ian Thomas 

the Panthers are doing what every losing franchise does and they are getting really good at doing it 

[Sgt Schultz]

2 hours ago, Mr. Scot said:

Don't agree with this being a panic move any more than I bought into the notion people suggested last year that he was just insurance in case we missed on one of the draft picks. Hell, if it was a panic move, we might have reason to be more forgiving.

But nope. They sat down, discussed it, reviewed the tape and went in eyes wide open, fully believing that they could make this work.

I think what they saw is what I characterize as an "every few plays" type quarterback. It's a certain style that tends to be average to mediocre on most downs but occasionally makes a big play. That's basically PJ Walker too, although his "in-between" plays are worse than Darnold's.

The "in-betweens" are what you have to fix with a quarterback like that. If you can create some consistency on those while not losing the occasional big play shots, then you've got something.

For about three to five games, it looked like they'd been successful at doing that.

And then, well...

But this is why I always say people shouldn't fall in love with highlight reels. They watch film of a guy making a few spectacular plays and think "wow, we need that guy" when if you actually watched the full game tape, it'd tell you a different story.

From everything I've read (which could be completely wrong), they only liked Lawrence and Wilson in the draft, so you are correct, Darnold was never insurance in case they missed out on either of them....because unless they traded the farm to move to #2 or #1, missing on them both was a virtual certainty and they knew it. 

The panic was the situation they created by engaging in a public tit-for-tat with Bridgewater for daring to criticize Camelot.  It torpedoed the original plan of starting him for a second year, or even a third.  Suddenly, they realized their QB was PJ, Grier, the non-existent chance they were going to get their hands on Lawrence or Wilson, or a FA/trade.  Add the delusion that we were a playoff team if we just had a better QB.  It is at that point where I believe reality and panic set in.  They now had to get their hands on a QB, and looking at the options above, the answer was not PJ, Grier, or the availability of Lawrence/Wilson.  That left a trade or FA.

I'm sure they sat down, discussed, and did weighed the pluses and minuses of Darnold and others.  That part of the decision was calculated.  It wasn't even a horrible gamble, because on the surface all they were doing was swapping out the second year of Teddy for Darnold in the original plan.  Fair enough.  If Darnold works out, it was the same as Teddy working out.  If not, they buy time to find the next temporary or long-term solution.  It was still a reasonable situation.

But they made it unreasonable when they overpaid for him in the trade and then exercised the 5th year.  All because they thought he was a modern day $6M Man, adjusted for inflation, given their impeccable coaching.

So, the process of settling on Darnold was not panic.  The fact that they had to use that process was.  And again, self-inflicted.  Truth was, Teddy's criticisms were largely correct.  Instead of launching the nukes, they could have kept their mouths shut, decided he was not going to see the third year, and gone about the business of finding somebody to replace him after his second.  Pretty much exactly where they are right now, only $18.5M of cap and a few draft picks better off.  But they were much too clever for that.

[Newbie]

On 2/26/2022 at 3:49 PM, PNW_PantherMan said:

I'll admit I was part of that and I was dead wrong.  At that time, I thought Matt Rhule knew what he was doing, and Teddy was a scrub.  It turns out, Teddy knew what he was talking about and Matt Rhule is the scrub.

You’re not the only one. I didn’t realize Rhule was the problem until Teddy was long gone. I miss ole’ Teddy Two Gloves.

[KSpan]

On 2/26/2022 at 2:49 PM, PNW_PantherMan said:

I'll admit I was part of that and I was dead wrong.  At that time, I thought Matt Rhule knew what he was doing, and Teddy was a scrub.  It turns out, Teddy knew what he was talking about and Matt Rhule is the scrub.

They're both scrubs, and while Teddy really showed it this year (letting Slay waltz on by...) Rhule has indeed shown himself to somehow be even more inept at his job. While moving on from Teddy was the right move and signing him in the first place a terrible one, Rhule and the FO managed to make the situation worse with an awful choice in Darnold.

In a competent organization this type of ineptitude gets corrected, but the scrubbery and ineptitude seems to go even higher than Rhule.

[thefuzz]

On 2/26/2022 at 6:05 PM, stirs said:

A far better trade would have been for a LT and Center.

Screwing around with all the middle of the road QB's in the league is useless until we get the Oline established

Agreed.  Only special guys can operate with terrible O Lines...Rhule either doesn't know this, or thought the line was better than it was.

Both are grave mistakes.