Entering the weekend at 3-2, the Carolina Panthers had an excellent opportunity to not only go two games above .500, but to finally put down the ailing division opponent Buccaneers, establishing that the NFC South is Carolina’s from here on out.
Naturally, everything that could’ve gone wrong did go wrong, and the Panthers crumbled at home, 43-13. In what happened to be a sick twist, Carolina was unable to stop the run in a game that honored franchise legend Luke Kuechly at halftime.
No, the 7/11 in the title isn’t for the Slurpee I wanted after having to endure that “game.” It isn’t shouting out my cousin’s birthday, either.
7/11 was Baker Mayfield’s passing line for the day.
The Good
On National Tight End’s Day, Darren Waller hauled in a 50-yard touchdown reception, cutting into the Buccaneer’s seventeen (17) point lead in the second quarter.
Reserve running back Tre Tyus scored his first NFL touchdown late in garbage time, once the starters were pulled from the game. Tyus has been on the practice squad and was elevated to mainly play special teams, but got his first NFL score on Sunday.
That’s it, there isn’t anything else worth noting on the positive side of the ball.
The Bad
There was so much bad in this game that it’s hard to narrow it down. For the sake of having points for the next sections, let’s highlight the running game here on offense.
Entering this week, Tampa Bay had the 2nd best rushing defense in the NFL. Of course, star nose tackle Vita Vea has a big hand in this, so trying to run off-tackle, away from Vea was a key point in this contest.
In fact, it was one of the keys to victory in our preview of this match.
Naturally, Carolina failed to do so. Whether there was a lack of assistance from tight ends, or the OL failing to ensure firm edges, the Panthers backs could not get to the outside successfully.
Being in a negative game script also hampers this - Carolina allowed a 7+ minute opening touchdown drive to Tampa - but nevertheless, the team failed to adequately access the run.
Bryce Young certainly had his worst day of the season. In the previous five contests, Young’s worst yardage total was 281, and he had only turned the ball over twice.
Against Tampa, Young threw two interceptions, had a sack-fumble returned for a touchdown, and threw for a season-low 163 yards.
Sure, the fumble wasn’t on him, we’ll get to Rob Hunt in a minute. You could even argue the first interception wasn’t 100% his fault, as Jalen Coker slipped at the top of his route.
Regardless, Young wasn’t the sharp, decisive quarterback we’d seen through the start of the season. The downfield attempts in this game dropped dramatically, which had been the strength of Young’s game.
Situational awareness was a massive issue for Carolina as well. Everyone will likely jump to David Moore’s muffed punt in the first quarter, but a play late in the third quarter was equally as bad.
On a 4th and 1 from the Tampa Bay 5 yard line, this is what the Panthers were able to muster.
On another 4th and short pass attempt, Bryce Young takes the snap, faces instant pressure from David Walker (51) (Young’s time to pressure on the day was 2.42 according to NGS), and hits Brycen Tremayne for the conversion!
Except, Tremayne bobbles the pass, drops it, and turns Carolina over on downs mere feet away from the endzone.
Maybe McMillan or Coker don’t drop this pass, but this is still an easy pitch and catch. Well, not an easy pitch, considering the magic Young had to work to instantly get the pass off, but an easy catch nonetheless.
A perfect microcosm of the entire game in one play.
The Ugly
Take your pick here.
We could go with the offensive line, who once again allowed a >50% pressure rate to Young. As stated above, the time to pressure in this game was 2.42 seconds. A quick pressure is defined as one in less than 2.5 seconds.
Bryce Young’s average pressure faced on the day was a quick pressure.
This just doesn’t happen in the NFL.
Unsurprisingly, left tackle Rasheed Walker was responsible for seven pressures. Bryce Young threw the football 27 times. This means Walker alone allowed a pressure on more than one quarter of Young’s pass attempts in this game.
One of the pressures (and sacks) he allowed also partially-contributed to the fibula injury that stalwart right tackle Taylor Moton sustained. In just his second game back after dealing with blood clots in the summer, Moton will miss the rest of the season.
Egregiously-uncalled tripping penalty aside, Walker has Yaya Diaby (0) absolutely bulldoze him.
Walker wasn’t the only lineman that struggled, every single one of the starters allowed at least one pressure. Probably the other most notable blunder by the line occurred in the second quarter, where Young was strip-sacked and Tampa returned the fumble for the score.
Here, we see Rob Hunt almost-instantly lose his rep against Al-Quadin Muhammad (97), who hits Young as he cocked his arm back to throw, resulting in the fumble and subsequent score.
Hunt has had a bad season, to say the least. From penalties to poor pass pro, there isn’t much outside of his paycheck that can rationalize him being the starter at right guard going forward.
Other ugly points in this game include:
David Moore being the “safe returner” and fumbling a punt, giving TB a short field early in the game
Being unable to stop the run when facing a QB with a mangled throwing hand
Akayleb Evans being forced to cover on an island again
Ryan Fitzgerald having another missed extra point, and on that miss TB returned it for a rare defensive two point score
The Coaching
Yes, there is a tier lower than “The Ugly” points of this game.
At this point, what else is there to say about how this team is coached? I think it’s better to let some stats do the talking.
Since the inception of the Carolina Panthers until 2022, a span of twenty-eight (28!) seasons, the team allowed 200+ rushing yards in a game eight times. That’s about one game every three and a half seasons having allowed 200+ rushing yards.
That’s pretty good. If there’s one positive thing the Panthers have been known for throughout the team’s history, it’s strong linebacker play, which includes stopping the run.
In the games since (2023-now), the Carolina Panthers have allowed 200+ rushing yards TWELVE times. If you aren’t catching on, that is the time frame in which Ejiro Evero has been the defensive coordinator.
Twelve times in 58 games, compared to eight times in nearly 500.
If you’d like the percentages, that’s 20.69% in the Evero tenure vs. around 1.79% in the rest of the games.
The whole point of the scheme Evero deploys is to limit the run, limit explosives, and get off the field on third downs; bend-don’t-break defense at it’s finest.
In seasons past, you could explain away this issue with lack of premium talent, or maybe injuries, especially in 2024.
That can’t be an excuse anymore. This defense has had heavy investment in the draft and free agency, AND Derrick Brown is healthy.
Naturally, the worst of these 200+ yard games should have been early in Evero’s time here, right? The team has spent and improved in this department, after all.
Well…the two worst rushing performances by the Evero defense have actually occurred this season - 291 yards against Chicago in Week 1, and 258 yards against Tampa Bay on Sunday.
How is it getting worse? Are the players forgetting their assignments, run fits, and just how to tackle in general? Detractors will often point to the players needing to execute, which in their defense, is true. There isn’t an excuse for missed tackles.
But if players continue to miss their fits, get moved off of the ball, and have poor tackling attempts year over year, at what point is the blame shifted to the coaches who are responsible for installing those fits?
NFL coaches shouldn’t have to teach their players how to tackle, but this has been an issue going on four seasons now.
There is clearly a defensive issue that isn’t getting much better. However, it’s hard to paint Ejiro Evero as the bogeyman when we know what the issues are, yet they are allowed to continue year after year.
It’s like trying to blame Akayleb Evans for giving up bad play after bad play. It’s not his fault that he, a gunner on special teams, is out there covering on an island - the onus rises to the top to give him help, or better yet, find an actual, experienced corner, and make them play coverage snaps instead.
What I’m getting at is simple: the problem with the Panthers coaching starts at the top.
And no, this isn’t another assault on David Tepper’s leadership. He got the brunt of the blame during the Matt Rhule/Frank Reich era, but I believe Tepper has done a good job in not meddling and giving the team the resources they need in order to succeed.
I’m pointing the finger at Head Coach Dave Canales. Ultimately, a lot of the team’s decisions stop with him.
He’s the guy that lobbied for, kept, and subsequently helped extend Evero, even after posting the worst defense in NFL history. He’s the guy that has kept someone like David Moore around and promoted him to the active roster to return punts over an experienced returner like Ihmir Smith-Marsette, who is rotting away on the practice squad.
Sure, Canales gave up his conservative play-calling to allow a more aggressive person in Brad Idzik to take over, but Canales’ ideology still bleeds into gameday. Just last week against Philadelphia, his indecision cost the team a possession before halftime.
One major consistency in the Canales era seems to be a lack of preparation in games that aren’t in primetime. The Carolina Panthers getting blitzed by opponents is not a new phenomenon, despite what Canales said in his post-game presser.
“I mean it’s a shock, you know…for me to be able to move on from it because literally I’ve never been a part of a half of football like that.”
- Canales on dealing with all the struggles in the game against TB
Perhaps in terms of all three phases failing at a high degree, sure. But the Panthers should be used to having bad first halves considering the past three seasons worth of them.
Preparation has clearly been an issue. This was also a contest where the team faced a quarterback who hadn’t played football in a month, and that had a special glove commissioned to protect his thumb on his throwing hand. Carolina should’ve known what was going to happen on defense.
Still, Mayfield only had to throw eleven times. Of those eleven attempts, only two were passes beyond ten yards of the line of scrimmage - one a 3rd down conversion, the other Mayfield’s lone passing touchdown.
All of this ties in with another problem the Panthers have under Canales - how to handle success. The Panthers haven’t been the favorite in a lot of games over the past few years, but it’s seldom that the team wins as a favorite outside of games against Atlanta.
Carolina has had six games since 2023 in which they have entered the day above .500. The record in those games? 0-6. For whatever reason, the preparation seems to get worse when the team has won games in the previous weeks.
Whatever the reason, the Panthers need to find out how to handle success and be prepared for games soon - both in a philosophical and literal sense - as the team will head to Lambeau for a Thursday Night Football bout this week. By the time you’re reading this, it might already be gameday.
In the Week 1 post-game newsletter, I said I’m not sure Evero needs to be replaced after one game.
Now, I lean in the direction of making some level of coaching change. Whether it be at the position coaches, the defensive coordinator, or even head coach, I do not believe that this team will not win anything of note with the current staff in place.
There’s some cruel irony in the idea that both of the significant defensive failures the Panthers have suffered this season have ties to the team’s greatest-ever defender. From a 59-point bludgeoning to a blowout during his HOF Ring of Excellence ceremony, Luke Kuechly deserves better football.
I’ll leave the review with this: I wanted to continue my little uniform/jersey gimmick from last week, as the combo Carolina trotted out against Tampa Bay is much more appealing on the eyes than the Philly combo.
However, the Panthers played so bad that I think it’s poor taste to do any analysis other than rating the look.
Black helmet, process blue jersey, and black pants?
I’ll give it a 7 out of 11 - the team can’t handle anything more, after all.