Carolina Panters: An In-Depth Review By 2nd And Wrong

CAROLINA PANTHERS

By: Frank White

Consistent and competent, Carolina is always an enigma of a team. In fact, they've never been worse than 7-9 since 2001 with Mr. Weinke. Even so, they fall short of expectations a lot and everyone seems to think the cause of their problems is Jake Delhomme; he's hot and he's cold and all that.

When he plays well they can beat anybody, when he doesn't it gets really ugly. It isn't a quarterback centric team unless it has to be; John Fox's bread and butter is his defense and an excellent running game, so for Jake to have a chance to screw up it probably means their big guns aren't working.

They were a very good team last year, losing in a collapse to the Giants late in the season but otherwise getting the wins you expect with a first round bye as a bonus. A year earlier most of their losses had come from late collapses which had mostly been remedied.

Oddly enough, the team had fewer first downs than its opponents during the regular season but had a lot more yards. This speaks to the big play ability of its running back duo and the dominance of Steve Smith and his new old teammate Muhsin Muhammad with 18.2 and 14.2 yards per catch averages respectively.

Generally speaking a great running game, big play ability and solid defense is going to give you a good chance against anybody. That'll do.

So, the playoffs huh. You take an explosive team that has everything going for it in its first playoff game where the opponent's run defense continues to deliver from beyond the grave and five interceptions later the Panthers are run off the field. Having placed money on a certain favourite winning this game, I don't know what to tell you.

I could tell you Jake Delhomme and it's always a gamble, but it doesn't make it sting any less. They were a great running team going up against a Cinderella with apparently bad run defense and sublimated because of their suddenly atrocious passing.

The result was ridiculous, and as much as you have to hate someone asserting your win was not the result of your own effort, when you throw five interceptions early in a playoff game, you gave it to them.

It is possible the Cardinals' defense was just that good, but considering how the Panthers went toe to toe with better opponents during the year, five interceptions is just not in the gameplan.

For the defense, the stats were mostly middle of the pack but among them Julius Peppers got back to being Julius Peppers as the experts would say. We all know defense in football is a one man show. If they do well, it means Mr. Peppers absorbed 10 blockers and jumped 15 feet in the air for the pick.

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