Panthers Fade in Loss to Cowboys 21-7

Maybe during run plays, but I think they did a very solid job giving Jake ample time to find the open receiver.

But one thing I think everyone can agree on (if you watched the game), playcalling on both sides of the ball was VERY poor.

Sigh… I hate to say it, but a losing season is all but definite. Jaxon, all valid points about Jake, Smitty said it best, I like him as a person but not as a quarter back, and This was BY FAR his best performance this year. Personally I got him slated for 1 more year. Here are my obvious observations, He will have a losing season due to injuries and Jake, the schedule is too hard and there are too many key players down. Jake WILL have a NFL record number of turnovers this year because he will be forced play near perfect games and that is beyond his god given abilities. You have to realize, even at our healthiest, we always BARELY pulled out wins, this is the John Fox way. Our TEs looked good though, ever since game 1 last year, i’ve liked Rosario when he caught that Farve like pass in the back of the endzone for the win. 7-9 or 6-10 at best. The Redskins game looks to be the ugliest game of the season. We’ll getem’ next year.

I think this is definitely John Fox’s last year in Carolina. Our guys are playing like they don’t believe in him anymore. Regardless of how well he can coach, if the players aren’t in the mood to execute, we’re going to lose. I think the ownership will want to move in another direction and has proven to be a very supportive ownership family. So it shouldn’t be too hard to bring in a Shanahan, Gruden, Cowher, Holmgren or Dungy. Most coaches would give anything to coach a team with this much talent. Fox is still a good coach, but if he’s lost the team, then he has to go.

This is Jake’s last year. In the playoff game and the Iggles game, he had 11 turnovers in 22 possessions. In the last two games, he’s had 4 more turnovers. In all four games, he’s had 3 TDs and 15 turnovers.

It’s time to trade Pep for a young QB and a draft pick or two. Jason Campbell and a 1st rd pick sounds good, but Zorn might be fired before Fox. What about Brian Brohm? He’s a free agent and I heard bad things about him in Green Bay, but it’s worth a workout.

We don’t have a first round pick…. remember, we traded it away for Everette Brown. And the way the Panthers keep playing, there’s a good chance it’ll be a top 5 draft pick that was traded away.

Peppers isn’t playing like he wants to be on the team at all. Signs of his 2007 season are all over the field. The two good things on defense? Beason and Davis. The rest? Who cares.

How long before Fox and Hurney are fired? Who’s going to replace them? Cowher, Schottenheimer, Shanahan, Gruden, Dungy?

What happens if Parcells comes in?

That Peppers is a lot smarter than we think? I mean think about it, he’s getting a million dollars per game. If he gets franchised next year, he’s looking at $20 million guaranteed. That’s $32 million in two years. I say he’s a genius.

If you want to read more of why I think this, check out my blog.

drawonthirddown.blogspot.com

I’m neither optimistic nor pessimistic about our team, rather, realistic. After our 0-4 preseason, followed by the Deja Vu of the Eagles opener, I resigned myself to watching the 1st three games with ZERO expectations, and I have not been disappointed. I was able to accept that we might go 0-3 into the bye, and I’m okay with that, AS LONG AS adjustments are made during the bye week. What adjustments? That would be determined by the performance of the 1st three games. Last night was no exception. Here’s where I’m at now…..

Last Night’s Game:
Solid 1st half performance. Chaotic 2nd half. Not sure why the Jekyll\Hyde appearance, but it was painfully onvious. Inconsistency HAS become our hallmark. Only this time time, it didn’t wait a week to appear. It became a tale of 2 halves.

1st Half:
Loved the opening play call to Smith. Sadly, I understand why we didn’t try the deep ball on 2 and 1, opting for the run and the 1st down.
I saw Blitzes. AWESOME!!! When Beason ran over Romo I almost choked on my beverage. I was shocked.
They held Dallas to 0 pts, (granted, a missed field goal), in the 1st half.

2nd Half:
Truly a “WTF?!” moment that lasted for 30 mins of gameplay.
We had it all – Penalties, turnovers, bad playcalling, poor tackling, inaccurate passing, horrible clock management, porous defense, and plenty of 3-and-outs…. Yep. We had it all. On the Monday night stage, our team imploded.
Why did we get away from the run with a 7-0 lead?

So what now?

The Onus is on the Coaching staff and key players to make adjustments and corrections. We have 3 games of film to highlight all our areas in need of improvement. Fix them. Fix them NOW. Forget the lipservice and platitudes. Forget the protectionist attitudes and simple minded explanations. Forget the loyalties. Fix the Coaching staff first. This begins with a harsh admonishment and stern warning from Mr. Richardson to “Get this Fixed Now”.

It’s clear we do not make adjustments. We do not make adjustments at half time to address our opponent’s strengths. We do not make adjustments during the game. We do not make adjustments during the play, prior to the snap. There were obvious blitz’s coming at us last night and instead of changing the play, we ran it anyway and got knocked for a loss. This is a coaching thing. I hope this changes during the bye week. If we do NOT make adjustments to address our myriad shortcomings, we’re in for a ho-hum season, as the fans are forced to lower their expectations and excitement level.

Accuracy – whether tackling, passing, or playcalling. The 1st 3 games looked like Mr. Magoo without his glasses. Someone please find them, clean them up, and put them back on.

More later… but last night was pathetic.

We make the playoffs. I know few will agree but … I have a feeling. IF they have not lost heart. I’m only mad w/Jake about the fumble. (he has to be the easiest QB in the league for a FF) About a third of this team seems to have given up or just play poorly. I used to love Charles Godfrey, now, he gets pushed around like a rag doll. I like Captain but he has to learn to be consistent. Gamble has not impressed in the least and Marshall is hardly better. (Gets beat but at least will hit). I love the LB’s and I feel sorry for them. All 3 played w/fire and did their best. I also love the D-Line. Unfortunately they just don’t have the talent to match the fire. Brayton is slow but plays every down 100%. I hate to say it but JP has bee dissipointing.

I think Moose has lost faith in Jake. I’ve noticed that since game 1. Yeah the throw was a lil short but he could have fought for it and at least defensed the play. The pick 6 hurt but I would normally chalk that up to sometimes mistakes happen. It happened at the worst time possible last night. Rosario (who I like) played well and hungry first half, second half he played like a prima donna. He lacked that hunger to catch the difficult balls as though he’d already done enough in the 1st half.

Once again, Fox got too conservative, too early. D-Will didn’t get the ball enough again. We should live and die by the run. We gotta get fired up! More later.

We suck suck suck against TEs. Just thought I’d throw that out there… it hurts watching us try to cover them. Remember Kris Jenkins running his mouth before he left, all he talked about is our lack of fire. To me that’s been the issue, we are lethargic… its painful to watch Smitty or Beason get fired up and no one respond. That is John Fox’s style and I personally believe it trickles down. It has worked well in allowing him to be good and that’s it just good. Don’t get me wrong though i like Fox and wish he’d correct some things and escalate to greatness instead of just being swapped out but I’m not entirely sure he thinks there is anything wrong to correct.

P.S. Congrats Peppers on biting inside on every play

Let’s face it, this was always gonna be a tough game to win. The Cowboys were at home, a solid 9 point favorite. I’m not excusing anything, just putting it in perspective. I see us winning the next three handily, vs the Skins and Bucs, who are horrible, then the Bills at home after we’re on a 2 game win streak, and have some momentum going our way for a change. From then on, it’s still possible to go 9-7, with a few breaks our way for a change.

OK, enough of that, let me dissect the game as I saw it.

Those calling for Jake to be replaced by Matt Moore (like Scott Fowler this morning) are not placing the blame where it belongs. The 3 sacks he took were on missed blocks by the OL, the last 2 lazy misses by Jeff Otah, the 2nd causing a FF — not Jake’s fault; he can’t block for himself. A 4th he narrowly averted by a quick release when Rosario weakly tried to chip Ware. Rosario is a good receiving TE, but he hurts us with a missed block every game he plays.

The 2 INT’s count vs Jake, but in reality, neither should have occurred. The first may have been underthrown, or into double coverage, but Moose should have easily been able to fight for it (which he didn’t) enough to knock it down. The second — which cost us the game (we were only down by 6, and had just picked up a running FD) was solely Smitty’s fault, and to his credit, he owned up to it. Jake gallantly shared the responsibility, rather than blame his go-to guy, but if Smith makes the timing break he’s supposed to, the worst that happens is an incompletion, and it’s 2nd and 10. Up until that time, this is a game we were going to win, as the Cowboys played a lackluster game, and were waiting for us to take it. (They miss a chip shot FG, and false start at the 1, scoring only 3 when they should have had 7.)

Jake gets blame, yet he had an identical pass record to Romo, both going 22 for 33. If Moose doesn’t make that tiny pushoff, he gets a 76 yd TD — can’t say Jake can’t lead his receiver - that pass was money. Plus the two 28-yarders, back-to-back, to Rosario, were beautifully thrown balls. Jake’s line could well have been 23/34, with 2 TD’s, -0 INT’s. Then Romo’s on the hot seat, along with Wade Philips, and we get out of there with a W.

Once again, we took a 7-0 lead, then couldn’t build on it.

I mentioned the poor blocking by Otah and Rosario — but the ever-present poor tackling kills us every game, surrendering poor field position and giving up YAC and 3rd down conversions that keep our offense off the field. I’m talking about Godfrey, who had an abysmal night, and every other guy in the secondary. It looks to me as if the problem lies in technique, not in position. Time and again, our secondary is in position to make a tackle, yet instead of aggressively going for the ball carrier, we stop in front of him, bracing for the hit HE’S gonna deliver — should be the other way around, shouldn’t it? This means any juke on the runner’s part freezes us in our tarcks. We sure miss Chris Harris, and the hits he used to deliver. Ankle tackles just don’t do the job. Makes you want to yell, OLE!

And speaking of missing somebody, our run game needs Brad Hoover in there — Fiammetta may develop in time, but he can’t cut it right now — any holes that were there for D-Will were solely created by the OL, but Fiammetta was never there, taking out somebody at the second level, which Hoov could always be counted on for.

I won’t beat on Peppers any more — it’s painfully obvious he doesn’t have it. He’s average at best, just taking up space (more ways than one!)

Horrible start to the season, guys, but we’ve got a couple cupcakes coming up, and the ship will be righted after those. The Skins and Bucs will give us a momentum shift.

Man, it’s starting to remind me of the season when Kerry Collins led the NFL in interceptions… all we need is for Jake to start drinking and it’s right back to the 1990’s again.

Y’all are saying there are some cupcake opponents coming up… I disagree. This team is so bipolar now I don’t think they could pull it off… can they hang a win on the Bucs? Probably… then again, we thought the Iggles were toast… and the Falcons… and the Cowboys too… and look where we are. 0-3. Why?

Fundamentals. Tackling. Wasn’t it worked on in training camp? Apparently not.
Didn’t we get a new QB coach? Apparently he’s not working.
Jake needs a shrink to get out of his head and just play the stupid game and quit overthinking everything.

He was spreading the ball around the first half… tried Moose… Jarrett, Rosario… Williams and Stewart and it was WORKING! And then Jeff Davidson changed the game plan? Why? Is he stupid? Conservative? Following Fox?

Peppers is on autopilot waiting for his “big payday” next season and no team will pay what he’s looking for because he’s not playing like he’s worth the league minimum let alone his franchise tag.

If the deep pass isn’t available, use the short pass… run the ball for 6 yards, pass for 5 and it’s first down… rinse, repeat to the goal line then let Williams stuff it in! It’s that easy!

From now on we run the ball all 3 downs, once we get to our 45 we stop punting. Why it works, RBs only need 3.4yrds/carry over 3 plays or 2.5 over 4, so we never stop the drive. Our ST sucks so badly that punting usually ends up badly anyway, Jake can’t be trusted to do his job, so make King the new “blocking” QB and wallah a winning team again. And to insure that we never face another 3rd or 4th and long again any offensive linemen who gives up a false start gets a field goal in his uprights by Kasey.

If you can’t taste the dripping sarcasm you need a serious chill pill.

I love it.

That plan could work. And our time-consuming drives would eat up so much clock, why, we wouldn’t even need all those defensive subs, as the starters would never get tired.

Wallah.

.. run ’em all from varied wildcat formations (aka Shotgun formation)…..