Team Player

In the last ten weeks, I feel as if I have let my team down. I know that I am not actually a part of the Carolina Panthers, but I feel like as a dedicated fan, that I am part of the team (as I am sure many fans feel the same way). I analyze the stats before and after a game, I look at the good calls, the bad calls, and what we did right and wrong. I act as if I am a coach, a player, hell, even a cheerleader at times. But this season, I feel like my first posts were constantly belittling the progress being made or ignoring the signs of future growth. Starting with this post I will be looking at the light at the end of the tunnel, no matter how dim that light may seem at times.

Sunday afternoon we (again, I am not part of the team, but lets just pretend) traveled to Tampa Bay to play another division rival. Of course they start the game by giving the amazing statistics (as in, stats that favored Carolina) of our organizations playing each other. The Bucs have not swept the Panthers in a single season since 2002 (similar to New Orleans the week prior) and Carolina had won six out of the last seven meetings between the teams.

Carolina throughout the game put together some great offensive drives. Jimmy Clausen was not amazing, but he was not horrible either. He had a solid performance, along with Brandon LaFell. Jeff King had some troubles throughout the first half, dropped passes and penalties. Steve Smith was also having some difficulties, but played well. Mike Goodson, the last of our healthy four backs, played his heart out and had an outstanding game. We had a couple costly turnovers and we had even more costly penalties, both of which tend to kill our momentum and put more pressure on our defense, which has already been holding us together. But this week was a little different; I saw something that many fans should be ecstatic about. Steve Smith was penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct at the end of the game for a hit against Aqib Talib. Now I know it sounds bad that we should be happy over this penalty, but lets really look at it.

Now, we all know the passion that Steve Smith has for the game of football, we all know his abilities as a player, and we all know of his temper (i.e. reference Ken Lucas). But what expired there on the field on Sunday was another quality that Steve Smith has, respect. Steve Smith was penalized for a late hit against Talib, but what he was really doing was hitting back in response to Talib's "late" hit on Jimmy Clausen. Smith was standing up for his rookie quarterback, which shows great promise for our future on this team.

When Steve Smith was asked about his frustration and his late hit, he replied "No, actually that was not frustration. It was a quarterback sneak, Jimmy went in, the D-line obviously cut, so it made (center Ryan) Kalil and the guards raise up. Jimmy was over the top, and 25 and 26 (Talib and Bucs safety Sean Jones) went head-first into Jimmy, and I followed. So that wasn't frustration." He said, "Despite what people think, I actually am a team player. I'd do it again; I'd do it 10 out of 10 times, 100 out of 100 times. Guys going in there, he's going head-first in there, I'm going to follow. That's not frustration. That's the fight in me. I'm not going to quit, I'm not going to let whoever it is come in there and cheap-shot my guy. Call it what you want, label it whatever you want to label it, but that's football."

Many questioned the leadership abilities of Steve Smith at the beginning of the season, many questioned his connection with the rookie quarterback throughout the few weeks that Clausen started; but as we can clearly see Steve Smith has a connection to this team and will stick by it through thick and thin. Although some will question the way of showing this connection, those of us that know Steve Smith know that this is a good sign for future Carolina football.

Looking forward to another Sunday with the team, GO PANTHERS!

Bad Became Worse Which Became Devastating

The reality had already set in on a disappointing season, long before entering week 9 at Bank of America Stadium. Most of the fans had come to the realization that our beloved Panthers were not going to be making any miracle run to the playoffs. And sadly, this realization became even clearer throughout the next 60 minutes of football.

Now some may say this became clear before this week and some can argue that it is clear by the final score of the game 34-3. But I say neither was absolute until the events that followed took place. What can I say, I am a hopeful and sometimes naive.

Carolina has always played solid football against the New Orleans Saints, even in times when they were considered unbeatable or vice versa. John Fox is 11-6 against the Saints in his time with the Panthers, three of those loses coming in the last three meetings and until this year, we had not been swept by the Saints since 2001. Now given all of these statistics, we knew that this was going to be a good game and the opening drive did not dispute this argument.

The Saints began the game with a couple exploding running plays, which made all Panthers fans immediately regret watching the game, thinking this was going to end up like weeks 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 8. However, Drew Brees fumbles the snap and made a bad throw, it was intercepted and returned 66 yards, by Richard Marshall, setting Carolina up with good field position. New Orleans Defense held us to a field game (which I still think we should have gone for it... 4th and goal on the 2 yard line, either walk away with a TD or make them drive 98 yards for theirs, oh well). It was after this point in the game when the reality began to creep into the picture.

Not even four minutes later in the game, Carolina had the ball back (and NO had yet to score) when Jonathan Stewart rushed for 5 yards and fumbles the ball; however what makes the play bad is that Stewart was injured on the play (never mind the fumble). Already having our starter, DeAngelo Williams, out with a foot injury, we were now down to our number three and four backs, Tyrell Sutton and Mike Goodson enter the picture.

Nine minutes more pass in the game and Carolina is on our own 38 yard line, when Matt Moore is sacked by Ellis. He would leave the field holding his arm close to his body. He tried throwing a couple of times on the sideline (in agony), but proceeded to the locker room shortly after. Jimmy Clausen would take over at quarterback.

Twelve minutes more pass in the game and Carolina is now down a quarterback and their two starting running backs, when Tyrell Sutton gets tackled on a 1 yard rush and is injured. He does not make it back for the rest of the game, making Mike Goodson the only healthy running back remaining for Carolina.

The game would come to an end with yet another tally mark in the loss column, but Carolina had questions that needed to be answered. What is the status of our running backs, our quarterback, and will our defense get the help they need from Otah and Davis anytime soon(I mean our pass D is ranked fourth, not needing a ton of help there, but we can always improve)? This morning a number of these questions were answered.

Matt Moore, Thomas Davis, and Dan Connors were all placed on Injured Reserve. They are joining the group of Charly Martin, Duke Robinson, Hilee Taylor, Jamar Williams, and Wallace Wright. Not to mention the injury report of DeAngelo Williams, Tyrell Sutton, Jonathan Stewart, and Jeff Otah.

The season has been hard to watch, unbearable at times, but when you see the possibility of any hope being carted off the field player after player, it moves to an entirely different level. The Panthers move to 1-7 with a road game against the Tampa Bay Bucs this upcoming week, who are looking to bounce back and stay in contention with Atlanta for the conference title, but hopefully the Panthers will be able to muster up some offense to compliment our outstanding defense and put another tally mark in the win column.

I wish each and every Panther a speedy recovery, not for the sake of the team and the fans, but for their own health. In the mean time I will be keeping my fingers crossed, but not holding my breath, GO PANTHERS!

Week 8: And We're Back!

I guess I should have never commended the coaching staff on making Matt Moore the starter for the Panthers. I feel like the news media, where I am just complaining about everything; even in times when the coaches seem to be doing exactly what I am asking them to do. You can see from one of my previous posts that I was completely against the 'switch' at QB coming out of the bye week. I was quick to swallow my tongue when we pulled out the narrow victory over the San Francisco 49ers. And you can see by my post that week I said, even though "I had some strong arguments opposing Matt Moore, I was happy he lead us to a victory" and I even said "John Fox was right decision making the switch". It turns out; I gave credit where credit was not due.

I tried to leave the past week victorious post up for as long as possible, it was such a good turn around for our team, it is hard to believe that I am back to looking at all of our problems.

The game started off as one of the slowest games I had seen in a long time. However, it did give us a chance to showcase just how dominant our Defense has really become under Meeks direction (even with losing the large salary Julius Peppers). But when our Defense continues to hold them to 0 points even after turnovers giving them great field position, we need our offense to make something happen.

The first issue that we had problems with was the play calling. Now I don't know if Jeff Davidson was drinking heavily the night before/during the game or if John Fox over stepped Davidson and said we are going to do something a little different today. Regardless the first two offensive play calls of the game were HORRENDOUS! ABSOLUTELY HORRENDOUS!! We have started the season at this point 1-5, clearly demonstrating that we are having trouble carrying out plays that should come second nature to a professional athlete; however our coaching staff decides that we must be so advanced (due to our first win of the season the week prior) that we should try trick plays and then yet another trick play (for an INT and a loss of 12 yards) because the first one worked out so well for us. When you are starting the season at 1-5, with a rookie heavy team, you do not go to trick plays, you work on getting the plays you got down pat. After those first two plays Jerry Richardson should have made a call and fired both of them on the spot.

The second issue we seemed to have was turning the ball over (surprise surprise), however we can not blame a couple of them on rookies. Two of the biggest momentum killers in the game were turnovers by none other than veteran Steve Smith. Steve Smith is one of the greatest WR in the league; however when he complains about not being involved in our offense and then we put the ball into his hands and he has multiple drops and fumbles. We have some issues. I admire Smith; I admire his will, his enthusiasm for the game/team, and his abilities as a player, but we must take care of the ball.

Lastly, our issue this week was the same issue we have had for the entire season. QB performance. We passed for just under 200 yards and had 1 TD to our 3 INT. If you look up the definition of Interception in the dictionary, they now have a picture of the Carolina Panthers. We are 1-6 in the first couple of weeks, we are not going to make the playoffs. This is marked up as a throw away year, a growth year, a rebuilding year, whatever you want to call it. Put in Jimmy Clausen and get some experience under his belt. Why wait? What are we gaining? What are we losing? It is becoming more and more painful to watch this team each week, committing the same mistakes, having the same problems, following the same game plan that continues to fail. I am just hoping that by the grace of God we return to our week 7 team!

ALWAYS AND FOREVER, GO PANTHERS!

Posies, Pansies, & Panthers**

It is always hard being a fan of an NFL team in another NFL team market; it is even harder to be a fan of another team, when the home team is described as a dynasty of the most recent decade. However, through thick and thin, I will remain a Carolina Panthers fan and this Sunday, I was not only shouting from the mountain tops that I was a Panthers fan, I relished in it.

You may say it was only one win! But if you look at all the progress we made in two weeks, it is hard to believe that this is the same team that started off the season 0-5. We drove down the field with a passing game, which was obsolete before. This in turn opened up our running game. We didn’t turn the ball over nearly as much (although we did have some trouble with fumbles). And we didn’t repeatedly commit penalties that offset the progress that was made. We performed so well in fact that we have our QB nominated for the FedEx Air Player of the week. (Vote for him here) And we have our rookie WR David Gettis nominated for Rookie Player of the week. (Vote for him here)

Now my previous post was in regards to how Matt Moore should not have been made the starter, and although I had strong arguments for my opinion, I am glad that he was the leader to our first victory. I am not saying Jimmy Clausen would have let us down, but I believe John Fox and the staff made the correct call. I just wish he would have performed this well from the beginning.

I wanted to call out a few stats of the game:

MATT MOORE:
- 28/41 for 308 yards 2 TD/1 INT

DAVID GETTIS:
- 8 rec. 125 yards 2 TD

BRANDON LAFELL:
- 6 rec. 91 yards

JOHN KASAY:
- 3/3 with a 55 yard FG

OFFENSE:
- Over 300 yards passing
- almost 50% on third down conversions
- 22 First Downs

DEFENSE:
- moved from 5th ranked pass D to 4th allowing only 183 yards
- allowed only 15 first downs and only 30% on 3rd down conversions


As you can see we had a lot of good things to talk about, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves, we are entering week 8 and we just got the first W. So let’s take a slice of "humble pie" (as that home team of mine is always talking about) and get ready for the visit to St. Louis, they are not the same Rams that they used to be.

**You may be wondering why I labeled my blog this week "Posies, Pansies, & Panthers". It is a tribute to an inspiring co-worker who will be leaving the company that I work for this Friday. She will finish her 7 year career here and be moving to Miami to take on bigger and better things. Although my company will miss her in many ways, as she will miss Boston in return, I know that the one thing she will miss the most is the weekly Panthers update that I bring to the office. I only wish I had more time, because after three years of being here, I truly believe I was very close to turning her into a Carolina Panthers faithful. I wish you nothing but the best in your future endeavors; and just because you’re moving 1,505 miles away (according to Google maps) does not mean you have heard the last from me or of the Carolina Panthers.

Posies, Pansies, and Panthers, all names that could have described this team prior to week 7, but rolling into St. Louis, we are simply the Panthers. GO PANTHERS!!!

The Switch

No, I am not referring to the movie directed by Josh Gordan and Will Speck where Jennifer Aniston gets artificially inseminated. I am talking about the Carolina Panthers switching the starting quarterback once again. We are approaching week 7 (not even half way through the season) and we are about to embark on the third "switch" of the season.

I have defended the coaching staff (minus Jeff Davidson) throughout the last two seasons and the drama we have endured. However, I can not stand by and say that this is a good decision for our team.

Let's face it. We are not going to be making a Super Bowl run this season. Starting out at 0-5 has pretty much decided our destiny. So why pull the quarterback that was drafted to be the future of our team?

Because he is not winning?

Because he is making some bad decisions?

Because he is making turnovers?

These are all things that happen when you have a rookie quarterback. It happened with other rookie quarterbacks through the history of the NFL. John Elway completed less than 48% of his passes and he had twice as many INT's than touchdowns in his first season. Two seasons later, he led the league in yards and completions. Thankfully for Elway though, he didn't have a coaching staff that pulled him at each small sign of trouble. They let him play it out, learn from his mistakes, and get the experience needed that you will not find by the sideline.

So far this year, we have had two people start, Matt Moore and Jimmy Clausen, neither have shown great progress. However we can not continue to play them base on how well they have played for half of a game. If we continue to pull each quarter back at halftime, the fourth quarter, each week, we will continue to not improve because neither quarterback is getting the time needed to improve, not to mention the mental issues. How will either quarterback improve if they only play half a game at a time?

Here are some stats for the year.

JIMMY CLAUSEN:

43/91
454 yards
47.3 % Completion
1 TD

3 INT
52.2 Rating

MATT MOORE:

25/59

342 yards
42.4 % Completion
2 TD
6 INT
33.3 Rating

I understand we are looking for a win, but think about it. There is no logic to this move. They need to pick a quarterback and stick with him (unless injured, god forbid that we endure more complications), by this yo-yo affect being used, neither one will improve to become the quarterback that we need to lead this team. And by the stats above, my pick would be Jimmy Clausen.

With each week, it is getting harder to say, but here it goes, GO PANTHERS!

Week 5: Chicago Bears @ Carolina Panthers

My first rule of thumb when watching the Carolina Panthers on TV is to not make it personal. So many times I get extremely angry, frustrated, sad, mad, happy, depressed, excited, joyful, aggravated, or annoyed, usually all within a matter of minutes. This can not be good on my physical or mental health. So I start each game with a small pep talk to myself. This is a game, just a game, life will go on, and the outcome will not determine my mood for the rest of the day or week.

This week however was more difficult than others; I was unable to shrug this one off. You see I was born and raised in central Illinois, so the majority of my childhood friends, college buddies, and family are Chicago Bear faithful. So this week, out of all weeks, the game was personal. Sadly, I must report, it did not go as well as I would have hoped.

There were a few factors that were playing in the minds of the media, fans, and players prior to game. Chicago would be playing without their franchise QB, Jay Cutler and in his place starting Todd Collins. Todd Collins a veteran in the league had not started a game in three seasons. Good news for Carolina. Chicago was coming off a despicable loss on the road in New York against the Giants, the morale was down. Yet another piece of good news for Carolina. Lastly, Carolina was coming off a very strong performance against a very good offensive Saints team. It is beginning to look like a perfect storm for the Panthers and like we could get a win just before our bye week.

So what went wrong? Lets take a look at the stats below:

CHICAGO BEARS:

- 219 yards rushed

- alright Chicago didn't really do anything else that impressive, we were just that bad

CAROLINA PANTHERS:

- J.Clausen was 9/22 for 61 yards 0 TD/1 INT

- M.Moore was 5/10 for 35 yards 0 TD/2 INT

- 4 Fumbles

- 3/18 Third Down Efficiency

- 7 penalties

- 0 points converted from turnovers

- 0% Red Zone Efficiency

So if you go back one post, you can see how great our team had improved from weeks 1 & 2 to week 3. And from the stats above you can see how quickly we fell to THE worst performance of the season.

The game started off with Carolina winning the coin toss, we elected to defend first. Chicago opened up with a great punt return putting them in great field position. They scored on the drive and were up by a touchdown with less than two minutes run off the clock. Carolina received the ball and started out on our own 39 yard line. We had an impressive drive down the field with two breakout runs by DeAngelo Williams and Jonathan Stewart. We were able to drive down to the Chicago 6 yard line, but were unable to put the ball in the enzone. We kicked a field goal and were down by four. At this point in the game, it seems as if the game will be a back and forth battle and a good defensive stop will determine the game. But this is all about to change.

We kick off to the Chicago -5 yard line (middle of enzone) and they run it out, Manning made it to the Chicago 32 yard line before getting brought down. The first play of the drive was a run for Matt Forte who took off for a 68 yard touchdown. Carolina is now down 14-3 with half of the first quarter still to go. I am still not sure how we did not prepare for such plays. Given that their starting quarterback was going to be out, we knew they would be relying on the run heavily throughout the game.

Carolina receives the ball back and on our first play, Jimmy Clausen fumbles the ball, we recover, but lose one yard on the play. On the third play of the drive, Jimmy Clausen throws an interception, to give Chicago the ball on the Carolina 27 yard line. (now in all fairness to Jimmy Clausen on this particular turnover, it was a fluke accident, it was tipped up and it happens to fall right into the hands of none other than Julius Peppers, however in the NFL a turnover is a turnover). But as you can tell by the drive above, just where this game is headed.

At this point, the game has taken a turn for the worse. Thankfully our defense had shown up to play and was able to hold them to only a field goal. This finally brings us to the end of the first quarter. Yes, you read right, the first quarter. The remainder of the game was a very un-thrilling match of Carolina's defense making big plays, to give the ball back to our offense, who in turn handed the ball back over to the Bears on a silver platter.

There are a couple of key points I wanted to discuss about this game more in particular. A couple of play calls on offense and the decision to pull Jimmy Clausen with less than four minutes to play are a couple of areas I am still scratching my head over.

We are at 4:23 left in the 2nd quarter, down 17-3. We have started with the ball on the Chicago 42 yard line. We need to only move the ball down the field 10-15 yards (at the very least) to give John Kasay a chance for a field goal. This is worse case scenario. Best case, we move the ball down the field and get a TD. This is the best field position we have had all day (by at least 20 yards). The first play called on the drive is a wild cat formation with Armanit Edwards, he throws to Gettis (rookie WR) and we lose six yards on the play. We are now at the Chicago 48. The next play called? Another wildcat formation to Armanti Edwards, because it worked so well the play before. This time instead of throwing he ran up the middle for seven yards. We are still out of field goal range and we are now at third down. Needless to say, the best field position we had, the chance to score some points before the half, and we blew it because we were trying to get tricky.

Jeff Davidson, our team is made up of a number of rookie players who are still adjusting to the systems in place. Our team has not been able to do well executing the every down plays, why would you call a these plays when we had great field position? Especially when we have D.Williams and J.Stewart who are obviously ready to go, given they had rushed for almost a fifty yards on a previous drive. There is no reason for this. We could have easily gone into halftime 17-6, if not 17-10.

The last point I wanted to discuss in this game was the decision to pull Jimmy Clausen in the fourth quarter with less than four minutes to play (3:36 to be exact). Clausen was having a rough day, not performing to the caliber he had in New Orleans the week prior. However, he will not learn to continue to fight if each time we yank him to put in Matt Moore. We must stay consistent and give him all the time in order to learn, develop, and gain the experience needed to be our future. A great article was put on the Carolina website, titled "Growing Pains", (I plan on posting in regards to this topic and article at a future date) but it states this point perfectly. Each rookie quarterback is going to lose a number of games before they win, it is inevitable. So why is the coaching staff not reading this and following this philosophy, we must learn not to handle him as if he is a porcelain doll, let him play and get the experience, win or lose.

It was a very painful loss to deal with, but I have two weeks to recover (thankfully), but as always GO PANTHERS!

Week 4: Carolina Panthers visiting New Orleans

After falling to a quick 0-3 record, the Carolina Panthers traveled to the Super Dome of Louisiana to visit the defending world champions, the New Orleans Saints. Going into the game it was believed that it would be a pretty one sided game; however there are a few factors that gave the Panthers and their fans some hope on the road. The Carolina Panthers have only lost twice to the Saints in the Super Dome since 2001 (minus the 2005 season when we played the Saints in Baton Rouge due to Hurricane Katrina, although we did win this game as well). We were competing against a depleted team that had just lost to a divisional opponent the Atlanta Falcons and the home team was down two of their top running backs, Reggie Bush and Pierre Thomas. So even though the landslide victory seemed immanent on this day for the home team. The Carolina Panthers and their fans knew that it would be a much closer game.

The Panthers did not disappoint this Sunday; yes, we ended up losing the game. But for the first time on this site, we will be focusing on all the improvements that we accomplished in this game.

Some stats to look at:

NEW ORLEANS SAINTS:
- Drew Brees 33/48 for 275 yards 1 TD/0 INT
- 3 Fumbles 2 Lost
- Red Zone Efficiency: 20% (1-5)

CAROLINA PANTHERS:
- Jimmy Clausen 11/21 for 146 yards 1 TD/0 INT
- 1 Fumble 1 Lost
- 2 Sacks 3 FF

Now we obviously know this was another loss for the Panthers, but I can not bear to bring up any of the negative aspects from this game because we played so well. This by far was the best game that we have had and the win was so close, I could almost taste it.

As you can see, Drew Brees continued to be Drew Brees; however with that said, our fifth ranked pass defense was able to hold him to only one touchdown and forced him to fumble the ball. In comparison our own rookie Jimmy Clausen was able to finally get a taste of what it is like to play in the professionals, he threw his first touchdown pass. And to top it off, wait for it, wait for it, wait for it... not one interception was thrown, NOT ONE! Which lets face it, this is one statistic that should pop out for every Panthers fan.



At this point we know that the Carolina Panther Defense has been on top of their game since the beginning of the season. And they have seemed to improve each week, but this game also was an improvement for our offense as well. We outscored the Saints with two touchdowns (obviously we did not outscore the Saints overall, we lost, just in the TD category) in the game and we had zero turnovers on offense. (the one lost fumble was on special teams on a punt return) Our offensive line was able to limit the Saints defense to a total of two sacks. This stat also reflects on our rookie quarterback making smarter decisions of getting out of the pocket, throwing the ball away when possible, and protecting the ball when he does go down.

Carolina ended up at the end of the day with yet another tally in the loss column; however the experience from the game, the lessons learned, and the improvements the rookies were able to accomplish in this game were undeniable.

0-4, but oh so close... and with that I say, GO PANTHERS!

Week 3: Cincinnati Bengals @ Carolina Panthers

Week 3: The Cincinnati Bengals (1-1) vist the Carolina Panthers (0-2) in hopes of continuing their winning momentum as well as improving the connection between TO and Carson Palmer, which has been having some trouble over the first two weeks, while the Carolina Panthers battle for their first win of the season.

Week 3 was similar to week 1 in many ways. The weather was windy and rainy, we continued to hand the ball over on offense, and we were unable to capitalize on the turnovers our defense were able to cause. Cincinnati came into this week with a big win against a tough Baltimore Ravens team and were a clear favorite to win the game. Once again our defense was able to shine and keep us within reach throughout the entire game, but in the end we were unable to come up with the victory.

The stats I want to focus on for this game:

CINCINNATI BENGALS:

- Carson Palmer was 19/37 for 195 yards 1 TD/2 INT

- Fourth Down Conversion Efficiency: 100% 2/2

- Fumbles: 1 Lost: 0

CAROLINA PANTHERS

- Jimmy Clausen was 16/33 for 188 yards 0 TD/1 INT

- Fourth Down Conversion Efficiency: 0% 0/2

- Third Down Conversion Efficiency: 18% 2/11

- Fumbles: 4 Lost: 3

This was the first start for rookie quarterback Jimmy Clausen. Although he had playing time in each game prior, this was the first game he started and finished. In comparison to previous quarterback performances, throughout the last couple of seasons, his stats for completions, touchdowns, and interceptions were acceptable for a rookie quarterback. He had a 49% completion rate (just 2% under Carson Palmers for the day) and he had one less interception. (more details on game stats can be seen here) One might ask, how did they lose this game with looking at these stats alone? The answer, Fumbles.

Since week 1, we have continually struggled with getting a smooth snap between the center (Ryan Kalil #67) and our quarterback (regardless of who the quarterback is).** When John Fox was asked about this in his press conference after the game, (full press conference can be seen here) he said that they practice on average 80 snaps a day (obviously on practice days only). So the fact that this is an issue throws up many red flags. This should be one of the simplest things that we do come game day. This leads to the overall protection of the ball. Until we are able to protect the ball and protect our quarterback in the pocket, we will continue to see issues in this area.

**On a side note, the center/quarterback exchange seems to have become an issue this year. So although it has been an issue for both M.Moore and J.Clausen, more than likely it is not the common denominator of Ryan Kalil.

Our Defense once again shined throughout this game and kept us in the game until the very end. They were able to get 2 interceptions and a sack on Carson Palmer. However, we continued with our issues from week 2 with allowing third and fourth down conversions to be completed. Cincinnati was able to convert twice on fourth down continuing their drive time and ultimately leading to points on the board. We must do better at putting pressure on the quarterback in situations like this and not allowing them to convert these downs.

Sadly another week has come and gone and another game was within our grasp has slipped away. Cincinnati has the potential of being an offensive nightmare with Terrell Owens and Chad Ochocinco; and although we were able to keep them in check, unlike our turnover rate, we were still unable to walk away with the "W". We have fallen to 0-3 with a tough two games ahead before our bye week. (New Orleans at New Orleans and Chicago at Bank of America Stadium)

Patiently waiting for win number 1, but as always, cheering GO PANTHERS!

Week 2: Tampa Bay Buccaneers @ Carolina Panthers

Week 2: An early divisional opponent game, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (1-0) visit Bank of America Stadium to take on the Carolina Panthers (0-1).

After an extremely sloppy game in a rainy New York City, the Carolina Panthers return home to take on a division rivalry. Tampa Bay got a week one win by a margin of a field goal over the Cleveland Browns led by none other than our own Jake Delhomme. Now overall, this game was favored to be the first win for Carolina. Although we were not established in the quarterback position yet, Tampa Bay was a 3-13 team last year (this is throwing out the fact that each team that finishes last in the division wins the division in the following season), they had barely escaped with a win over the Cleveland Browns, and they too had not proven that their quarterback Josh Freeman was a legitimate threat. Sadly, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers came into town and showed Carolina that these areas were of no concern and pointed out the areas that we still needed to improve on. They stole the first home game making them 2-0 for the first time since 2005 and made Carolina 0-2 for the second season in a row.

A few stats to look at from game 2.

TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS:
- J.Freeman was 12/24 for 178 yards 2 TD/0 INT
- TB Defense had 4 sacks
- Return Yards on Punts: 47 yards

CAROLINA PANTHERS:
- M.Moore was 6/16 for 125 yards 1 TD/1 INT
- J.Clausen was 7/13 for 59 yards 0 TD/1 INT
- CAR Defense had 0 sacks
- Return Yards on Punts: 8 yards


Once again, our quarterback situation has impacted the outcome of our game. As you can see from the stats listed above and the more detailed stats here, this is an area we continue to struggle with. However, this was once again a minor issue in comparison. As you can see Josh Freeman did not outperform our own QB's by much. I am not going to go into much detail on this particular aspect as many of you already know the details of this issue and I will post more in depth posts at a later date on this subject.


When it comes to Defense, I would rank Carolina as being in the top tier, they have areas they need to improve on, but as a whole they keep us in the game. If it was not for our defense, we would have lost the games by a larger margin than we have. Even with Charles Godfrey leading the league in interceptions. Our Defense still needs work. We are currently ranked 5th when it comes to pass defense, we only allow 182.4 yards passing per game in comparison to our rush defense allowing 134.4 (ranked 27th). Now I could be crazy, but usually teams that are very good in the run game have a great rush defense because they practice against some of the best running backs in the league. This seems to be the opposite for the Carolina Panthers. We have one of the best running back duos in the league yet we are unable to stop the run. We have one of the worst passing games in the league (ranked 31st). Two areas that we need to focus on is the rush defense as well as pressuring the quarterback. Sadly Tampa Bay was able to convert on a number of 3rd down conversions by allowing Josh Freeman to rush the ball for a first down. (4 rushes for 43 yards, the longest being 17 yards) We can not allow this to happen, especially on third down.

One of the large factors to our un-success is our bad field position. We are allowing the opposing team 47 yards on punt returns in comparison to our 8 yards. When you are continually starting behind the 20 yard line, you are allowing 4 sacks, and have one of the worst passing games in the league; it leads to the team starting 0-2.

Tampa Bay is not a bad team, but they are not amazing either. This was a very winnable game and thanks to Defense, we were able to stay in this game for the majority of the game. There are a number of areas that this team needs to work on; however we as fans must remember that this is a very youthful (rookie oriented) team and it will not change overnight. We are in a rebuilding phase (this means it could be a couple losing seasons) and sadly, the road of losing will continue before we are able to exit onto the road of success.

Be patient and as always, GO PANTHERS!

Week 1: Carolina @ New York Giants

Week 1 of the 2010 NFL Season for the Carolina Panthers was against the New York Football Giants in East Rutherford, New Jersey.

This game was not only the opening game of these two football programs seasons, but it was also the opening game for the G-Men's new stadium. The New Meadowlands Stadium opening game was very similar to final game in the old stadium a year prior (the NYJ actually had the final game played in the old stadium the following week). The Carolina Panthers was the visiting team and helped retire the old stadium when they beat the New York Giants in their last home game in the old stadium 41-9.

Going into this game both teams were regarded as being questionable, but were a considered possibly playoff contenders. The New York Giants were coming off a disappointing end to their 2009 season, where they had big hopes to go further than they did. The Panthers however were suprisingly on the opposite side of things, coming off a disappointing 2009 season but with a winning momentum that had led them to beat some of the best teams of the league. Sadly that momentum came to a screeching halt during this first week.

So stats to consider for the game:

NEW YORK GIANTS:

- Manning was 20/30 for 263 yards 3 TD/3 INT

- 118 yards rushing

- Red Zone Efficency 60% (3/5)

CAROLINA PANTHERS:

- Moore was 14/33 for 182 yards 1 TD/3 INT
- 89 yards rushing
- Red Zone Efficency 20% (1/5)

Now obviously there are tons of stats to this game and you can get more details on the stats of this game here. However I wanted to focus on these key stats for a specific reason.

The first stat that you see is regarding the quarterback position. A position that has been heavily scrutinized in Carolina for sometime. Now I am not going to get into the whole Jake Delhomme situation, that is for another post. But lets look at the quarterback position for this game, as some would say that Carolina has problems winning a game due to the lack of a franchise quarterback. Although I believe this plays into the situation, I do not believe this to be THE factor.

Eli Manning in this game made a total 6 more completions for a total of 81 more yards. I know, this additional completions and yards led to two additional touchdowns. But lets look at it this way, Eli Manning going into this game had a total of 87 NFL starts in comparison to Matt Moore's 8. I think it is safe to say that there should have been more than 81 yards and 2 touchdowns standing between these two. I am not saying that Eli Manning is not a quality quarterback and that Matt Moore should be considered on par with him; however I am saying that this is just one small problematic area that contributed to our loss, not the entire reason.

The second stat that I had shown was a rushing statistic. This is Carolina's bread and butter. It was just a season ago that "Double Trouble" had broken the record of two players from the same team rushing for over 1100 yards each in a single season. Yet we were unable to rush for over a 100 yards against the New York Giants between four running backs. Another part of this decline is because of the offensive coordinator's play calling. Unfortunately, as soon as we are down by a field goal or a single Touchdown, we abandon the running game all together and go to a pass game. Which is definitely not our bread and butter, as we only have one wide out that is anything to brag about. By abandoning this part of our game, we not only take away two of our biggest offensive weapons but we also limit the potential of our passing game. Now given our quarterback issues (listed above) would you not say that the play calling surrounding our QB should be better considered. I would say this is more of a contributing factor to our loss.

Lastly, we do not capitalize on our red zone possessions. We were only able to get any points on four of our trips in the zone. Now we lost this game by a total of 13 points, if we would have got three field goals, we still would have lost, but it would have been a completely different game. This one statistic makes the loss almost unbearable.

Carolina has started the season 0-1 and handed the Giants an opening day win on a silver platter. Never the less, as always, GO PANTHERS!

Double Trouble

I realize that I probably should have started this blog about 5 weeks ago, before the NFL season had started, but after reading some of the blogs posted by the Carolina Panther faithful, I decided to go ahead and start my own. I am in no way saying that this blog will be better than any others, as I do enjoy reading a few that I have come across. However, there is some that are quick to judge.

It wasn't too long ago when the phrase "Double Trouble" was used with Carolina because of our running game duo, the offensive threat that we were coming into town. Today, this phrase has taken on a new meaning. Sadly the only thing the offense has been able to capitalize on is turnovers and giving the opposing team better field position (ie. stupid penalties, lack of qb protection, ball protection, and bad play calling). Now I know that I said above that so many people are quick to judge, and well by this paragraph it sounds as if I am too. However there are many positives to this team as well.

I will be reviewing the first five games of the season in more detail throughout the next two weeks. I will also be making a few posts regarding our problematic areas, where we are in need of improvement, and what we seem to be doing right. Stay tuned.

And as always, GO PANTHERS!