kungfoodude

No, you are literally inventing something that isn't real. His TD:INT ratio and his INT% both were worse than 2019. So to say "....his INT rate went down each year..." is literally NOT accurate. Did his interception go down? Yes. Take a guess why? It was the lowest passing attempts of his career. That's what I am saying. Don't invent a stat that isn't real for the purposes of cherry picking. That is classic poor use of statistics.

So you don't like them because they didn't like BC?

Discussion is fine but cherry picking stats is fruitless in this scenario because the overwhelming bulk of his stats are so clearly negative. It isn't even a case where you can pull small bits of data out to support a good statistical argument. He has been pretty bad to date. That's why I don't get this specific urge to paint a scenario that isn't reality.

Frankly, the stats horse has been beaten to death. There is no purpose to cherry pick stats for him. The only thing that will change minds is games played in a Panthers uni. Until that happens, he is who he has been.

I actually look at the statistics. It does help quite a bit. I understand the need to cherry pick for a player with some pretty bad career statistics. It is what it is.

Yeah bit likely none that can play at above a below average NFL level. That is really the concerning part. But, perhaps there is more cream there than it appears.

That write up on Erving sort of illustrates my overall point about he and Elflein. They are good quality backup players. The issues becomes when you try to have extended periods of them starting. Neither has had much success so far in those situations.

Talent and maybe even more so, experience. We are leaning heavily on VERY young players.

His INT% was basically the same the past two years. 2018: 3.6% 2019: 2.9% 2020: 3.0% It was actually his TD% that tanked last season. 2018: 4.1% 2019: 4.3% 2020: 2.5%

Yeah, it doesn't seem very likely at all. What a strange article.

That is about as pie in the sky as I could imagine. Which, logically that doesn't make much sense. Let's say he is all of a sudden a stud....well why isn't he the #1 or #2? Why trade him? Grier all of a sudden being some kind of trade bait is a scenario in which we have 2-3 really good QB's. Not many teams in the NFL can boast that.

I mean.......okay.

To an extent that is true. We do have quite the collection of guys with pretty extensive injury histories. That's one thing that really can hurt, having little continuity in the OL.

Yep and regardless of how much sand our fans like to place between their ears and these facts, they are going to exist until they prove these doubts wrong. Make no mistake, there are plenty of reasons to doubt the direction we are headed, the personnel we have to achieve it and the methods for achieving it. We just have to hope these are the guys that prove all those doubts wrong. That's about all we can do.

Sure. There is no reason for us to get as personal as we sometimes do. Darnold is doing the best he can. Not everyone is capable of being an elite NFL player. Darnold didn't draft himself.

The issue is that a fair amount of the available older veteran former starters still want at least a shot at starting. I don't think we would even remotely offer that here, although I definitely wouldn't have been against signing someone like Andy Dalton as an insurance for Darnold. That doesn't really seem to fit with what the staff really wants to do. Furthermore, it's harder to find a cheap option for a good journeyman backup QB in the current market. Some of those top tier #2 QB's are getting a hefty chunk of change.

You know, the 4 Man Rush(best Panthers related podcast, IMO) did an episode recently covering some of the issues that players deal with that fans generally gloss over. Highly suggest listening to it. I mention it because although a lot of a us have very legit concerns or questions about a LOT of the players on this roster, as fans we also lean way too heavily into personally attacking or just plain being vicious towards our own players. Hence why I think all the trashing of PJ should get dialed back a little. There is no sense in ripping into him or trashing him(or even Greg Little) in some of the ways that happen here. PJ is just doing what he can to be prepared. We can argue all day about whether he will be successful but there is no reason to just summarily trash a player that isn't being a knucklehead. He is just doing his best.

I guess the question is how much more "legit" do they have to be for them to be an improvement over our current backups. The chances of a high caliber backup being available are slim. More likely it will be a couple of old veterans moving towards being over the hill(doesn't seem to fit the general philosophy of our organization currently) or some young, raw QB's that just didn't stick. In the latter case, how much of an improvement would they be over two guys that have WAY more time in the same playbook and system. Those are some other reasons I don't really think we will be going QB dumpster diving unless one of our current two backups gets injured.

I'm stealing this quote from someone(cannot recall who), "Availability is an ability." If you cannot stay healthy, it doesn't matter how good you are. We have a LOT of guys on the roster that fit that description currently. Unfortunately, a lot of them are in that OL unit.

IMO, it's that they believe in their ability to turn these guys into something they likely aren't. Let's be honest, rare are the stories of journeyman backup OL and busts that go from team to team in the NFL and then suddenly become above average players. Hence my general dislike for the Erving and Elflein signings. Had we signed them as backup OL, I'd have completely different feelings but IMO they were signed to start(or at least compete to start). I feel similarly about Christensen. He's a guy that looks great when you see his RAS but his film isn't exactly outstanding. To that point, our hopes of him becoming our future LT appear to have dimmed a little. Which, in fairness, the "news" coming from the organization leads us to believe they thought more highly of him as an OG anyway. I think they appear to place a very high value on athletic ability and raw potential. I believe that makes a lot of sense if you are a college coach but in the NFL everyone is a great athlete and has potential. That's my general theory on why we make some of the moves that we do(and did). But, perhaps they just have the special sauce like Pete Carroll did and can motivate these guys into being champions. We will see in the next few years.

I kind of disagree. I believe they appear to be all in on Darnold. I really hope they do sign a better quality backup.

I will point out that the likelihood of PJ starting games is probably high. Sam Darnold has never played a full season in his three year career.

I like PJ but if he is better than Darnold in 2021, I would wager that is us on the path to a top 5 pick in the 2022 NFL Draft rather than PJ being our franchise QB.

Your sample starting five includes two backup OL brought in for their supposed versatility. Frankly, Miller is a backup OL, as well. That was generally most of my issue with our offseason. We piled up backup OL when we actually needed at least 3 starters.