The Hall of Fame case for two different NFC South quarterbacks

[kungfoodude]

16 minutes ago, AggieLean said:

Yea, I think for sure if Cam wins it in 2015, they would’ve found a way to get him in the hall. Guess the same could be said for Ryan. 
 

Sucks, because that 2017 year, I believe if they could’ve just got by the saints in the playoffs, we would’ve gone to the Super Bowl again. Cam carried that squad on his back like no other. If only one of Kaylin or Funchess catches their gimme TDs

Yeah. MVP, 1 loss season and a ring? That's a wrap.

If only we had some hindsight(especially Cam), maybe we protect him more, HE protects himself more and we are talking about the end of a lengthy, HOF career in Carolina.

[LinvilleGorge]

Cam definitely has the stronger case IMO but I think his career was cut too short for him to get into the HOF. 

[LinvilleGorge]

18 minutes ago, kungfoodude said:

Yeah. MVP, 1 loss season and a ring? That's a wrap.

If only we had some hindsight(especially Cam), maybe we protect him more, HE protects himself more and we are talking about the end of a lengthy, HOF career in Carolina.

The Shula saddling was criminal. Cam showed under Norv that he was fully capable of completing a higher percentage of passes in an offense that featured a lot more short to intermediate passes. Shula's entire offense was essentially "hey Cam, go be Superman". Cam was our leading rusher quite often and the entire passing game revolved around deep shots to subpar receivers. I mean, that's about the lowest percentage pass attempts in football. Panthers North learned from our mistakes with Cam and developed Allen and the offense around him like we should have with Cam instead of just relying on insane physical talent. They need Allen to be Superman here and there when Cam being Superman was our base offense. If we had replaced Chud with an OC like Norv I honestly think Cam is still our QB playing at an All-Pro level. I mean, just look at how hard Shula flopped at South Carolina with another extremely physically talented QB prospect. That guy absolutely needed Cam Newton to carry his ass. I don't think it was those hits that did in Cam's throwing shoulder as much as it was all those years of carrying Mike Shula's useless ass.

[kungfoodude]

2 minutes ago, LinvilleGorge said:

The Shula saddling was criminal. Cam showed under Norv that he was fully capable of completing a higher percentage of passes in an offense that featured a lot more short to intermediate passes. Shula's entire offense was essentially "hey Cam, go be Superman". Cam was our leading rusher quite often and the entire passing game revolved around deep shots to subpar receivers. I mean, that's about the lowest percentage pass attempts in football. Panthers North learned from our mistakes with Cam and developed Allen and the offense around him like we should have with Cam instead of just relying on insane physical talent. They need Allen to be Superman here and there when Cam being Superman was our base offense.

Gotta give it up to our organization for surrounding our only elite tier QB with the tools to fail slowly and painfully.

But, Cam deserves some blame too. He has as much as admitted it. He relished the Superman role to the point that he felt to need to be the guy that did all of it. He sacrificed his body all too often and never fixed bad mechanics that added undue strain on his body. 

It was a sad thing in the end. In like a Lion, out like a Lamb.

[Waldo]

1 minute ago, kungfoodude said:

Gotta give it up to our organization for surrounding our only elite tier QB with the tools to fail slowly and painfully.

But, Cam deserves some blame too. He has as much as admitted it. He relished the Superman role to the point that he felt to need to be the guy that did all of it. He sacrificed his body all too often and never fixed bad mechanics that added undue strain on his body. 

It was a sad thing in the end. In like a Lion, out like a Lamb.

Ron allowed it too. It wasn't until 2018 until they asked him to change it up. So infuriating 

[LinvilleGorge]

5 minutes ago, kungfoodude said:

Gotta give it up to our organization for surrounding our only elite tier QB with the tools to fail slowly and painfully.

But, Cam deserves some blame too. He has as much as admitted it. He relished the Superman role to the point that he felt to need to be the guy that did all of it. He sacrificed his body all too often and never fixed bad mechanics that added undue strain on his body. 

It was a sad thing in the end. In like a Lion, out like a Lamb.

Oh, for sure. But that's where coaching comes into play. It was the perfect storm. You had a young, super confident, super talented QB paired with an extremely limited OC. That's a recipe for disaster. That limited OC is gonna lean into that all world talent and burn the candle at both ends with a blowtorch. UNC went through this with Drake Maye. Early in his starting stint he was doing a lot of the Cam stuff. The crazy cartwheeling Superman dives and lowering his shoulder powering through DBs, etc. A not great college staff reeled that in but Shula was just like yeah, this is fine. I really wish he had been able to leverage Cam's MVP season into a HC offer to save us from ourselves. We would've had our pick of the litter of excellent OC candidates groveling to come to Carolina.

[Mr. Scot]

Nice work, Verge.

I agree with the general conclusion. Don't think either guy will make it. 

[Mr. Scot]

1 hour ago, csx said:

Ben R. Who won superpower 

48 minutes ago, csx said:

Superb Owl

I was wondering...

[SCMunnerlyn1]

Cam has potential to get in simply from all the stuff he did as a runner. But with Josh Allen passing him this year in that regard it will make it much harder. 

[Mr. Scot]

36 minutes ago, SmokinwithWilly said:

In order to get in, Cam has to actually retire. I don't believe he's done that yet and has no intentions of doing so any time soon waiting for an opportunity for a comeback. 

I think that ship has sailed.

You could say "But what about Philip Rivers" but that begs the question "Why did the Colts sign Rivers rather than Newton?"

Familiarity plays a role here, but still...

[Mr. Scot]

30 minutes ago, LinvilleGorge said:

The Shula saddling was criminal. Cam showed under Norv that he was fully capable of completing a higher percentage of passes in an offense that featured a lot more short to intermediate passes. Shula's entire offense was essentially "hey Cam, go be Superman". Cam was our leading rusher quite often and the entire passing game revolved around deep shots to subpar receivers. I mean, that's about the lowest percentage pass attempts in football. Panthers North learned from our mistakes with Cam and developed Allen and the offense around him like we should have with Cam instead of just relying on insane physical talent. They need Allen to be Superman here and there when Cam being Superman was our base offense. If we had replaced Chud with an OC like Norv I honestly think Cam is still our QB playing at an All-Pro level. I mean, just look at how hard Shula flopped at South Carolina with another extremely physically talented QB prospect. That guy absolutely needed Cam Newton to carry his ass. I don't think it was those hits that did in Cam's throwing shoulder as much as it was all those years of carrying Mike Shula's useless ass.

Even if we couldn't have gotten Norv sooner, there were viable options other than Shula.

[Khyber53]

2 hours ago, Verge said:

Hey y'all, a topic that has been on my mind has always been the parallels between two of the best quarterbacks in the history of the NFC South and ultimately their place in history and how they are viewed moving forward through the rest of NFL history. These two quarterbacks as you might have guessed are their respective franchises greatest signal callers, Cam Newton and Matt Ryan. 

Cam Newton (144 Games Started):
269 TDs (1.8 per contest), 123 INTs, Super Bowl Appearance, OROTY, MVP 

Matt Ryan (234 Games Starter):
 394 TDs (1.6 per contest), 183 INTs, Super Bowl Appearance, OROTY, MVP 

Obviously on first glance, these are very similar players with identical top accomplishments. Let's zoom in a little bit on their surrounding talent. C

Cam Newton top offensive producers: 
Greg Olsen (TE) (9 Seasons) (3 Pro Bowls)
Steve Smith Sr. (WR) (3 Seasons) (1 Pro Bowl)


Matt Ryan top offensive producers: 
Julio Jones (WR) (10 Seasons) (7 Pro Bowls) 
Roddy White (WR) (8 Seasons) (4 Pro Bowls) 
Tony Gonzalez (TE) (5 Seasons) (4 Pro Bowls) 

Wow, quite the difference here. Through Cam's career his top option was Greg Olsen, who was one of the best tight ends of his generation and a real difference maker in an offense reliant on their quarterback making plays outside of structure. Newton post Steve Smith Sr was saddled with a revolving door of Chicken McNobodies at the receiver position and the offense had to be funneled through the tight end and running attack as Jericho Cotchery, Corey Brown, Jason Avant, Kelvin Benjamin, etc was not getting the job done. Ryan on the other hand was consistently surrounded with top level offensive weapons, including one of the best receivers and tight ends in the history of the game, thanks in part to an aggressive general manager who wanted to ensure they could maximize the arm talent of their franchise quarterback. 

How about protection? 

Cam Newton top offensive lineman:
Jordan Gross (3 Seasons) (1 Pro Bowl) 
Ryan Kalil (8 Seasons) (2 Pro Bowls)
Andrew Norwell (4 Seasons) 
Trai Turner (6 Seasons) (5 Pro Bowls)

Matt Ryan top offensive lineman: 
Jake Matthews (8 Seasons) (1 Pro Bowl) 
Alex Mack (5 Seasons) (3 Pro Bowls) 
Andy Levitre (3 Seasons) 
Todd McLure (5 Seasons) 

While Matt Ryan certainly had more consistency and high level talent on his offensive line, one could argue they had similar protection through the bulk of their career. Though one has to acknowledge some of the absolute dog water lineman that were trot out to protect Newton at his tackle spots post Jordan Gross retirement. Byron Bell, Mike Remmers, Matt Kalil, Chris Clark, Amini Silatolu, Nate Chandler, etc were all a collective pile of garbage save for two seasons from Remmers and a few splashes of brilliance from Michael Oher, Daryl Williams, and early career Taylor Moton. 

Defense should be fairly simple. 

Cam Newton defense average rank: 
17th/32

Matt Ryan defense average rank: 
18th/32 

Honestly I was a bit surprised by this, I had thought Cam consistently had the better defenses, but when you look at the average it's shockingly close. While Newton did have the higher peaks of defense, Atlanta placed higher more consistently and only really faltered towards the end of Ryan's career. Both these players had on and off again defenses to rely on. 

So what does all this mean? 
1. I am bored at work 
2. Cam Newton has the better body of work given the talent around him 

While I am not sure either is necessarily a lock to get a gold jacket, it's undeniable that Newton carried his franchise on his back for the better part of his career and changed how quarterbacks are viewed as a whole. Newton became the blueprint for a new breed of signal caller, and Ryan is the standard that is set for pocket quarterbacks in the modern league. Both players deserve their kudos for what they did for their franchises and how they morphed their team's identity, but Newton I think was clearly the better of the NFC South quarterbacks, especially if he had remained as healthy as Ryan did. 

Cam will have a better shot at HoF simply because of his highlight reel. Stats be damned, there were things on the field he did that still haven't been duplicated, no matter how much Josh Allen tries.

Ryan, while he catches a lot of flak here, was a darned good QB, but as Peter King once opined, if there was a Hall of Darned Good, he'd be a first balloter. 

[nogoodbum]

If it comes to a choice between the two, Cam is much more deserving. Even today there are still sports media & coaches that compare present day & upcoming QBs play to Cam's & not just those with a direct connection to the Panthers.

[CRA]

2 hours ago, SmokinwithWilly said:

In order to get in, Cam has to actually retire. I don't believe he's done that yet and has no intentions of doing so any time soon waiting for an opportunity for a comeback. 

I don’t think Cam isn’t retiring because he is waiting for an opportunity to comeback.   That wouldn’t stop you.   Think he has verbally conceded he is done. 

I think Cam isn’t retiring so he can always use that in HOF talk. Never make himself even eligible.  Never give people a means to say no.