d-dave

I'm rocking a Pixel 8 Pro. Generally, I'm pretty happy with it. I still get those Pixel photos, the video is much better (especially with the blackmagic camera app), battery life has been great for me. I haven't had many real issues. It just works, doesn't get too hot (unless left in the sun). The screen is beautiful, HDR does pop. Speaker sucks, but that's how it goes. It's been rock solid. My wife on the other hand has not had a good phone since her iPhone4s years ago. Everything she gets (S8, Pixel 3, S21, iPhone, Pixel 8 pro) has had some kind of issues. From wifi to bluetooth, to battery life issues, quality issues, etc. She's the ultimate lemon getter. Guess that explains our marriage! For reference, I owned a S21 for a little while before I got an iphone 13pro. So I think I've played with the big boys here. My son is still rocking my S21, though he keeps running the phone to 0% so I'm not sure how much longer it will work. Performance wise, it's still great. Photos are fine. He's had zero problems (except him being a dumb dumb with the battery). The least impressive phone was the iPhone. I'm just not an iPhone person. I guess the better question is, who do you feel more comfortable listening to you? They all listen to sell ads, who are you more comfortable with =P I like google assistant. Samsung does win for hardware. It's really bleeding edge mobile in the android space. The tensor chip in the pixels is good, not great. If you end up using something hardcore on your phone, then that's an important consideration. I have a few games that I play and they work well on my Pixel 8 Pro. The AI features have actually been handy to translate stuff, asking Gemini for stuff, etc. I get that most AI is a total gimmick. It's not really AI, more machine learning fill in the blank stuff. I'd also go to a place like Best Buy and touch'em all. The hand feel is important, and one of the things I'm not super thrilled by the race to a thinner device. I've got big ole meaty hands with sausage fingers. I don't need a dainty phone, lol. Like I said, I'm happy with my current Pixel 8 Pro, and don't feel a real need to upgrade right now. My wife...maybe her next phone won't be a lemon...whatever it is!

I'm still full of hope(honestly, for a lot of things, even non-Panther things). Later in life, I've become more of an optimist. But to each their own. I will say my hope with Bryce has gone from a 75 down to a 25 in a week...so not much more to lose LOL =P

I would say we're over the 24 hour over reaction period, but this is the Huddle....bup bup bup? Now that we have 17 official games from Bryce, this is not good. I'm a Bryce "hoper" in that I want him to be the guy so we can move forward as a franchise. I caught a PFF video about the results from their analytics perspective: What really stood out is that Bryce has more games of sub 40 PFF play than he does over 70 (which is slightly above average for QB play). Now we all have opinions about PFF grading, which isn't perfect. But we've also been subjected to the incredibly bad play calling and execution of offense under Reich and this week of Canales. So what does this mean for the next 2-4 weeks? Not much. I think we're going to have to ride with Bryce to see if he's able to actually play better... If we're 0-5 and he's playing like garbage do you wrap it up and see how Andy can ruin our draft position? If he plays average but the D looks like swiss cheese and we're 0-5? Look, I don't know what the answer is. It's not my job thankfully. Canales needs to get the football right with this team (his words). If not, we're going to see a repeat against the Chargers. We need to ride Bryce though. He's going to have to figure it out. Man up as the old farts like me say. Canales needs to toughen this team up, especially with the loss of Brown. All things considered, I won't mind us losing so long as we're playing hard and playing with some sense. That was missing Sunday.

Well... Thurman and Ray are both holdovers from last year. Sheriff was claimed off waivers. Cherelus is a ST lb. Wallace is a 3rd round rookie we drafted in the spring.

I see your avatar shares the opinion. So far, Tepper has proven to be a pretty incompetent owner. Being good at gambling with other people's money does not prepare you for owning a NFL team.

I'm not sure. Sadly I'm not involved in the hiring of coaches for an NFL franchise, even as poorly run as the Panthers. But if I were a betting man (which I'm not), I'd wager that Tepper didn't want to give Harbaugh the same control he gave Matt Rhule.

We'll see. We tried the hot college coach in Rhule. We went for a steady handed vet. Now we try the hot shot coordinator. Either you can coach or you can't. Tepper also needs to be patient here. He gave Rhule a lot of time. He canned Reich before the end of his first season. If he goes off and fires another coach after a few games, no one will want to work for him except to get the bag. That's not going to help you build a better team when you have to overpay (which we did for Canales) for coaches and fire them one after another. It sucks for fans, but that's where we are right now. We'll keep finding that rock bottom (week to week would be hilarious and sad) until we don't.

I've said it in another couple of threads, but we have to give Canales time. When he was hired, it was said he was the right hire a year too early. Dave will have to learn on the job. He and Morgan need at least 2+ years like Rhule got. We'll have a good idea in the first part of year three if there's any hope for the future.

This was not an ideal start (understatement much?) for Young, Canales and the rest of the Panthers. If I'm the Panthers, I am going to ride Bryce Young all the way through the season. This is his big chance to determine if he's the guy, a guy, or an XFL QB... While hindsight is 20/20, Bryce was supposed to be a savant of play whose brain allowed him to maximize his limited frame. Supposed to hasn't been very useful to him or us. I don't think Tepper can really afford to fire yet another coach. When we hired Canales, I think it was @Verge (pleases correct me if I'm misquoting you) who said that Canales was a good hire, just a year too early. Canales needs to learn how to be an effective NFL coach. If we go back to the GM/Coach rotation again, are we going to get stuck with a retread HC again? I don't care about Teppers money, but the perception of him being meddlesome will chase off the good coaching candidates. We're going to have to give Morgan and Canales at least Matt Rhule's time (2+ seasons) to show some patience. We also need to rebuild the talent level. That's going to take time. I know we all want to be the failure to hero turn around story, but we're not set up there. We traded away (can't change the past) a really good WR, CMC, Brian Burns (he is talented!), and a pick that ended up being Caleb Williams (who didn't look particularly great in his debut FWIW). We are not as talented as we need to be. When was the last UDFA that made a splash for us? Feels like Andrew Norwell... Winning will cure a lot of ills, but I don't see that happening if we continue to play this way. Hopefully Canales is able to find a lot of good teachable moments. Right now, it feels like the same old crap. That sucks as fans. As far as Bryce - he's either going to turn into the DUDE, or he's going to lead us to a high enough record to get another chance at QB darts.

Because the chances are low of the actual vehicle, less than that of a regular car. Most fires are occurring when guys like me, enough knowledge to be dangerous, attempt to set up a 240v/80Amp circuit in their garage. But unlike those guys, I know when to call a pro, lol. You'll hear more about it because EVs are new, and everyone wants to make a point. Counter to that, in my nearly 15 years of driving 485 outer to and from work, I've only seen regular cars (ICE) burning or burned out on the highway. I've never seen an EV burning on the side of the road... Of the house fires where I've lived, the number of EVs to cause it is zero. The ones I have seen (in the NE Charlotte/Concord area): car fire (was in poor repair), bad electrical (in the house), pouring hot ashes into a trash can over night, and a multitude of other things. So the myth of EVs causing house fires is more related to FUD or bad electrical work.

I will say we were not the only team that looked ineffective and out of it. Honestly, as hard as it's going to be for the fans, we need to give Dave time to learn to be an NFL Head Coach. That's just how I'm looking at things right now.

So who else is looking forward to the post game Canales? How much positivity can he find here? We learned a lot? Can only go up? We got taken out behind the woodshed and whooped... What do you have Dave. If Bryce continues to have games this bad, he's going to lock up his replacement for sure.

Welp, so much for the off season hope... Glad that's out of my system! On to other interests! Not going to ruin my life for a season.

Thank you @lumbeecheraw75! It's great to get some first hand knowledge instead of a bunch of us arm chair critics As far as owning a Tesla, I do like the tech, hate Musk, but the killer for me is the lack of manual controls. Having to use the screen for drive mode, no stalks for turn signals (I use them, a rarity in NC I know), etc. Glad to hear yours is still going strong at nearly 100k miles! I do love the idea of one for sure, but for me, it's not a financial option. I've got just under $12k left on my accord, and it's stills a beast on gas mileage, relatively engaging to drive (6MT). Hopefully we will continue to see more charging stations out there, and more investment in EVs.

Nope, stupid people, distracted drives and bad people drive all manner of vehicles. I mean, there are a ton of great sensors on cars out there right now. I think it's great they can help people drive safer, so long as they are left on and not turned off. Until we get to full autonomous driving like in the Will Smith classic, iRobot, people are going to be the most dangerous thing on the roads.

A lot of fans see a lot of our players at JAGs/replacement level players given how bad things have been. It's hard to blame them. We've been bad for a while, and it's often hard to appreciate the talent we do have. I'm of the opinion that Moton is a very good/not great RT. Solid as the day is long. He suits up, he leads, and he keeps playing hard. He's earned his paycheck IMO. You're not going to find a cheaper replacement right now. If there was any move to be made, it was the offseason. In Tillis we trust!

Sadly no, my son's school doesn't have a close enough spot, plus the rest of the traffic around there (from carline and entitled parents) is quite dangerous. The amount of folks in the Concord area who are driving distracted is terrifying...

The closer we get to the game, the more iffy I am. I just don't know. Could the Panthers win? Absolutely. Could the Panthers get smoked? Definitely. We're just unknown in so many ways. That one drive in the preseason looked good. We looked good with our guys we were going to cut in Buffalo as well. The Saints are a vet heavy team. Carr is a streaky QB. Will he throw 3 TDs or 3 INTS? I think they will try to run the ball on us and protect Carr. Can we stop the run? Can we get after them on 3rd down? I don't know at all. If we don't, we're going to lose it. On offense, we're going to have to run well, but Bryce will need to make plays. That's just how it works here. NO is going to sell out on the run and they will come after Bryce, probably early and often. We need to hold up and beat the blitz a few times to loosen them up. Who knows!? All I know is that I DO NOT want to be the team that loses to the returning worst team in football... So the pressure is on the saints. I mean, if we lose, but have some really positive moments; that's not the end of the world in the larger narrative. Heck, if we're competitive, I won't be crying like a baby if we lose. Now if the Saints run us out 35-3, we look lost on offense and ineffective on D...then I might take the season off lol.

I thought of why I really want an EV: Carline. Both at my school and my son's school. Look up the problems with finding enough bus drivers in NC, ugh. It's bad. At my son's school, kids often are over an hour late to school because of the lack of buses. The afternoons are worse! There are times when I get trapped by the parents in our carline and get stuck for 20 minutes or more. I hate it. I hate burning gas as I sit there waiting for other people to move. There are a couple EVs in carline, I think I'll ask them how they like it versus an ICE. While electricity isn't free, it's still cheaper than gas in NC.

Good thing this isn't my job We'll see what happens here, my only hope is that the Panthers get better.

Yep, that's what I see on the internet. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=70mph+EV+test EVs aren't great on the highway. In my car, I can go nearly 500 miles on a tank with enough to find a gas station. It's still very much in the early days of EVs. Though they are hard to beat around town. It's best if you can charge at home at night.

I read that the other day. Goes to show you how Santa needs to get more EV infrastructure built headed towards the north pole before it melts! =P Realistically, the adoption of EVs is going to be hampered by the lack of fast charging outside of the house. People forget things all the time, like plugging in their phone, getting gas, calling to cancel an appointment, etc. If people could stop at a charger and in 5 minutes pick up 30-50 miles so they could get through their day, that would be helpful. You can with a Tesla Supercharger, but on the less powerful DCFCs it's going to take too long. Getting there!

I've been thinking about this since the end of the Buffalo game. What kind of team do we have? On one hand, we are a hungry team. New coach, new culture, let's see how the positivity pays out. By all reports, Bryce has looked great for the entire off season. I want to see that in game. On the other hand, the Saints are a vet team. An old team at the end of this current run. Is Carr cooked? Will Tysom Hill be the best offensive weapon for them? I just don't know. I think I'm 50/50 on this one. I've gone a whole off season riding the hopim high, but I've been around long enough to see the Panthers completely poo the bed in the regular season. My goal: to see a competent team. I figure there will be a good degree of figuring stuff out as they go and adversity hits them in the face. I figure we're going to run the ball a lot. After that, I have no idea. Maybe we can be disciplined, especially with the presnap penalties. Hope???

I saw it and though it was funny when I first saw it. FWIW.

Yep. It's interesting to see how different things are. I wonder how much headbutting Dan and Fitterer did over the years here? Just a different approach, and I HOPE (that terrible word!) that this signals a change in our fortunes as a team.