Panthers Breakdown

The Panthers seem to be going in the direction that most people expected: downhill. They are 0-3 after three somewhat poor efforts. With the change made in quarterback, it is obvious that things are not going as planned or as hoped. Truth be told, Matt Moore never seemed to be the guy who was going to lead this team to bigger and greater things. With Clausen now at starter, Moore has probably seen his last snap as the starting quarterback in the National Football League.

The offense for the Panthers was never expected to be amazing, but I don’t believe that they were supposed to play this poorly. The running game has had only mere glimpses of last year’s glories. Although the offensive line has been missing at least one key player per game, this can no way explain all of the problems they have had. If this offense is to go anywhere this season under a rookie quarterback, the men up front are going to have to step up their game. Jimmy Clausen did not look fantastic in his NFL debut, but this was expected. I look to see him only get better with time and experience. Towards the end of Sunday’s game, he seemed to be more comfortable and we were able to see why he was such a good quarterback coming into the draft.

The deffense for Carolina has been somewhat better than expected, but in no way have been good enough to get this team into the playoffs. Up front, the deffense has looked very good, but in the secondary, they have struggled. This is the opposite of what was expected. With the departure of Julius Peppers, the defensive line was expected to struggle immensly, but this has not always been the case. Of course they are not as good without him, they have impressed spectators. The secondary is probably one of the biggest let downs thus far in the season. They have been pushed around all season, even though they have quite the amount of interceptions. Hopefully they can fix whatever seems to be holding them back and potentially be able to help turn around this team.

Although the Panthers have looked poor, not all hope has been lost. The season is only three weaks in, thus leaving plenty of time for improvement. As said earlier, Jimmy Clausen will only get better as he becomes more familiar with the offense and gets more in game experience. If things don’t turn around soon, look to either see Fox make big moves or just give up as this is the last year in his contract. In all honesty, the change in coaching may be needed now more than ever, and Bill Cowher is waiting to get the phone call to come and take over. The Panthers are a very young team and although they look very poor now, they will get better and will at some point be able to make an effort to the playoffs.