No Such Luck

2011 has not started with much luck for Carolina and today the realization of getting Andrew Luck the projected Number 1 pick out of the upcoming draft crushed the Carolina Organization and fans by announcing that he will not be entering the draft this year. He will be returning to Stanford to finish out his architectual design degree. Which leaves the Carolina Panthers with a big "?", what do we do with the first pick of the 2011 draft?

So before we get to deep into the subject, lets really look at Andrew Luck versus our current rookie quarterback, Jimmy Clausen.

Andrew Luck 2009 Stats:

- 162/288 CMP/ATT (56.3% CMP %)

- 2575 YDS

- 8.94 YPA

- 13 TD - 4 INT - 6 SACK

- 143.47 Rating

Andrew Luck 2010 Stats:

- 263/372 CMP/ATT (70.7% CMP %)

- 3338 YDS

- 8.97 YPA

-32 TD - 8 INT - 6 SACK

-170.16 Rating

Now obvious improvements from 09 to 10, but what lets take a look at the stats for our own Jimmy Clausen. We will look at the two years of stats prior to Jimmy Clausen getting drafted, as Carolina would have only had two years of stats to look at for Andrew Luck if they would have selected him.

Jimmy Clausen 2008 Stats:

- 268/440 CMP/ATT (60.9 % CMP %)

- 3172 YDS

- 7.21 YPA

- 25 TD - 17 INT - 21 SACK

- 132.49 Rating

Jimmy Clausen 2009 Stats:

- 289/425 CMP/ATT (68.0 % CMP %)

-3722 YDS

- 8.76 YPA

- 28 TD - 4 INT - 24 SACK

- 161.43 Rating

In comparison side by side the last years of their college careers (as of yet) Jimmy Clausen had approximately the same CMP % and YPA. He also had less INT, more total yards, and was obvioulsy rushed a lot more as Jimmy Clausen was sacked 24 times compared to Luck's 6.

There is more to this than just the numbers, but before Carolina fans really get down in regards to not getting Andrew Luck this year, if we build a good enough Offensive Line to protect the rookie quarterback that we have. I think we have the potential to return Jimmy Clausen to his college level stats.

So who do we take? Where are our areas of weakness?

I believe our number one area of weakness is our offensive line. Now I think Ryan Kalil is a great player, but how many times did we have a fumble exchange between Center and Quarterback this season. This is something that is practiced approximately 80 times a day, there should not be an issue with this. The other big issue is the protection of the quarterback. The Carolina Panthers as of week 13 of this season had allowed 36 sacks and 78 hits to the quarterback, that is third and second highest totals in the league.

These stats and the performance of our quarterback(s) leave me to believe that if we do not fix our offensive line quickly, we will continue to have problems with our quarterback, which leads to problems with our passing game, which ultimately leads to problems with our running game. (which was only averaging 4.0 yards per carry, ranked 20th in the league, with two RB's that broke NFL records just a season ago)

Looking forward to hearing what happens in the next few days, weeks, and months, but mainly looking forward to the upcoming Fall in hopes that Carolina will have turned this around like we did in 2003.

As always, GO PANTHERS!