FanPost

No The Panthers Should Not Sit Cam Newton

Cam Newton is hurt! Shock! Gasp! Panic!

This means ... Cam Newton cannot run the ball anymore! Shock! Gasp! Panic!

And without his running ability, Cam cannot be effective! Shock! Gasp! Panic!

Which means ... we must sit Cam Newton until he is healthy enough to run again! Entirely logical right? Ummm ... not really. Why not?

1. It is not like Newton will be 100% again in a week or 3. It honestly might not be well into November or December until his ribs and ankle are fully healed. This is not the most important point, but just something to get out of the way immediately.

2. What actually is the most important part: Cam Newton is not Michael Vick, Kordell Stewart, Tim Tebow, Vince Young or the other dual threat QBs in the past who were average at best passers. With those guys, take away their running ability and they are marginal NFL players. Not so with Cam Newton, who was still the #1 pick in the draft despite the abject - and in some cases recent - failures of such QBs, and even the recent inability of guys who were actually good passers in their own right to win a Super Bowl (Donovan McNabb, Randall Cunningham, Steve McNair). Cam Newton was the #1 pick in the draft because he had above average passing ability in addition to his running ability. If he were more runner than passer like Vince Young or Tim Tebow, he goes in the 4th round. If it were 50/50, he goes in the 2nd round. Even if he was a good passer in some respects but real doubts, he gets taken behind guys like Jake Locker, Blaine Gabbert and Christian Ponder at QB plus excellent prospects at other positions like Marcel Dareus, Von Miller, Patrick Peterson, A.J. Green, J.J. Watt, Mike Pouncey, etc. Instead, Newton was the #1 pick in the draft because the Panthers knew that he had franchise QB ability as a passer even without the ability to run the football. That's why the Panthers took Newton in the first round rather than A.J. Green in the first and, say, Andy Dalton or Colin Kaepernick or Ryan Mallett in the 2nd. (Or more likely why they didn't just stick with Jimmy Clausen, whom they traded up to get in the 2nd round just the year before.)

3. So, having superior ability in the NFL as a passer makes Newton the best option, the guy who gives the Panthers the best chance to win, even without the ability to run. Now make no mistake, I am a big fan of Derek Anderson. Have been since he was at Oregon State. I think that more than a few teams could do a lot worse than Anderson as a starting QB. But the fact is that if Anderson had Newton's ability as a passer, Anderson would not be Newton's backup.

Let me give you an example of what I am talking about. Cam Newton went 24-35 for 250 yards, 1 TD, 0 INTs, a QB rating of 98.7, against the Steelers despite no protection due to the UDFAs and castoffs making up 3 of the 5 players on his OL (including both OT spots), 42 rushing yards (15 of which came on one carry and 5 of which came from Newton) and the Panthers' #2 and #3 WRs being injured (and the #2 WR missed the game entirely), leaving 3 rookies, two of whom were undrafted, as the top performers in receiving yardage. Now granted this Steelers defense is long in the tooth and not the dominant unit of years past, but any offense that sees Philly Brown having 9 passes thrown his way - almost 1/4 of the entire passes attempted and nearly 1/6 of the total plays on offense - is going to have trouble no matter who the QB is. But the point is that the offense will have even more trouble if the QB is Derek Anderson - or any other backup QB and most of the starting QBs for that matter - than they would if the QB is Cam Newton.

That's the amazing thing, a real double standard. Were this Matt Ryan or Drew Brees or Andrew Luck, no one would say "sit him." Everyone would say "the problem is all those UDFAs and minimum salary veterans and chronically injured players having major roles on offense ... the lack of offensive talent ... that is holding the Panthers back." But because Newton is a dual threat QB, everyone says "Cam Newton's inability to run is holding the Panthers back." That presumes that your average NFL passer would be so much better with Byron Bell, Nate Chandler, Fernando Velasco, Jerricho Cotchery, Jason Avant, oft-injured Stewart and Williams etc. starting on this offense (let alone a bunch of backups who aren't even as good as they are, such as Ed Dickson, whose next regular season catch as a Panther will be his first).

Now it is bad enough that normal dual threat QBs deal with frequently getting blamed for the lack of a surrounding cast on offense. But normal dual threat QBs did not break the rookie record for passing yardage! Normal dual threat QBs don't throw for nearly 12000 yards and 65 TDs their first 3 seasons! And normal QBs - dual threat or not - do not put up those passing numbers with Brandon LaFell (4 catches for 46 yards in 3 games this season) as their #2 WR (with a bunch of guys no longer in the NFL behind him) and for most of his career with Greg Olsen as the only TE capable of catching a pass (meaning that Newton has put up those numbers with only 2 guys who are actual consistent threats to catch the ball in Steve Smith and Greg Olsen for nearly all of his 50 career starts). In other words, Panthers who have seen their QB throw the ball to the guys on their team should know that Newton is a better passer than any backup QB in the league. Even one who should be a starting QB in Oakland, Tampa, New York, Buffalo, Minnesota, Cleveland, Houston, Tennessee, Jacksonville or Saint Louis in Derek Anderson.

The only legitimate reason for benching Newton is fear that his lack of mobility increases his risk of serious, long term injury while playing behind that offensive line and with those WRs. If that was the argument most commonly being stated, then fine, let's debate that. But that is not the usual argument. The usual argument generally takes the "Newton is hurting the team because he can't run" fallacy. Even Joe Person, who covers the Panthers locally - and has not always been exactly a Cam Newton cheerleader by the way - admits that Newton is a superior passer and acknowledges the poor talent on offense and asserts that the Panthers can't protect Newton because of it, but in a schizophrenic, internally inconsistent and self-contradictory article states that Newton should sit anyway because he is a dual threat QB and not a dropback QB! Seriously, the article does not open with "two UDFAs starting at OT." The article started with: " Cam Newton – drop-back quarterback. That’s what he was Sunday night against Pittsburgh" (you know, when the Panthers LOST) "and that looks like what he’s going to be for the foreseeable future." And that Person claims that one week of rest will allow Newton to heal only makes his column worse, not better, as again it will take weeks before his ankle and ribs are better.

Newton should only be benched in response to a continued stretch of bad play. Which is the same way that a dropback QB would be treated, even if he did have a gimpy ankle and sore ribs.

The content of these posts are those of the user/fan making the post only