KSpan

I don't know that this staff and/or FO were ever going to draft a QB this year with how the picks fell. Agreed that that may have been the deviation, but disagree that cutting Teddy was deviating. The fundamental issue here is that they were only out a few million by moving Teddy (bit retained/gained credibility in the process) but then appear to have flopped by trading for Sam (and then signing the 5th year) and giving up draft capital. Booting Teddy exhibits a commitment to winning (even if more of a facade), and bringing in any of those guys I mentioned earlier on a 1 yr deal retains that and the bridge. Rhule would have killed any credibility he had at the time by trotting out a player again that no one had any kind of confidence in whatsoever. After that 2020 performance, keeping Teddy as a starter would have been an automatic white flag on the season, and there's still no guarantee the staff drafts a QB. They're 2 different things.

It doesn't, but Teddy was a sunk cost and keeping him would have been choosing to destroy any chance of on-field success. It was a lesser-of-two-evils gamble and while the staff unfortunately did not appear to choose wisely with Darnold vs. the other options out there, that still doesn't make getting rid of Teddy the wrong decision.

8 yr. old me playing Tecmo Super Bowl knew that it was an advantage to have all my plays running out of the Run & Shoot formation because my friends didn't know what play was coming. I'd like to assume this would be standard knowledge among NFL-level coordinators as well.

Fitzpatrick, Tyrod, Dalton, Trubisky, and Jameis were all signed to 1 year deals this offseason. None of those guys are any kind of long term plan and likely wouldn't do much better, if at all, but at least someone like Trubisky has actually won some games (if they were bent on a reclamation). Any of those guys though do replace Teddy, prevent the Darnold situation, and still send the signal that wilting/failing like that 2020 offense did in crunch time isn't acceptable. Again though, this whole thing should have been precluded in the first place by not dumping Cam as they did.

Teddy's a loser, or at the very least not a winner, and proved it last year. The team simply couldn't keep him because of how painfully obvious it became (and continues to be now in Denver); keeping him would have been a huge alarm to the team and indicator that they weren't truly looking to compete. That's ignoring that, rightly or wrongly, he came across as uncoachable and not a team player. Maybe Teddy was on to something regarding the staff but you can't have a guy like that at QB. Where the big gaffe came in was compounding the mistake with Darnold. As has been said a million times the proper play was to keep Cam in the first place.

I'd say it was less that he was set up to fail and more that he was stepping into a high-risk unknown situation and ended up being unable to overcome the challenges. Can't blame him for betting on himself but set up to fail implies the situation was intentionally constructed for no chance at success, and I don't see that being the case.

Tough to draw a conclusive judgment on this specific situation outside of clear observations such as Cam's arm, similar to those pushing that last year was hard to use for judgment due to COVID, new staff, etc. Longer term observations such as Rhule's impact and overall time performance and preparation, however, are still pretty fair game IMO since there is continuity in Rhule and he made the decision believing it to be the better alternative even given the circumstances.

They got lucky with Kingsbury but he did bring more NFL experience than Rhule and was smart enough to hire a staff with NFL coordinator and HC experience as well.

They weren't giving up Minshew until they had a good look at Lawrence, so he was never an option for Carolina due to timing. Wouldn't have hated it though.

It's Teddy Time.

Teddy sucks, and his suckage does not mean that Brady, Rhule, and others (such as players they hitched their wagons to like Teddy, Sam, Whitehead, etc) don't suck as well. If the offense continues to be crap then it will make it more clear just how far the suckage extends and can hopefully be fixed.

I suspect they did it much earlier in the week and are just now announcing, or at the very least were planning contingencies/the path forward throughout the week.

I think the difference here though is that the picks being discussed were at a glaring position of need that continues to be an Achilles heel. DT (assuming Brown isn't completely flaming out) and CB were definitely improved with these picks, but OT and the OL is by far the crappiest unit on the field. There was clear logic and reason to take those tackles over who they did and yet they didn't.

$4MM or more of that is dependent on Carolina winning the Super Bowl and Cam being named MVP, so it's realistically about $6MM.

And tens of millions to Rhule players such as Teddy, Sam, Eli Apple, Tahir Whitehead, Cameron Erving, Pat Elflein...

If he's legitimately considering going back to a college job IMO that's a big indicator that he needs to be in college and not the NFL, even if only in the near term. Dude should just jet on out if that's the case.

Hakeem Nicks drove down the street that one time though.

And Steve Wilks, Eric Washington, Mike Shula that were of his own choosing. A push at best, but arguably more damaging at the end of his tenure and done to himself.

Guy had 8.5 years with some of the most talented Panthers to ever wear the jersey and couldn't string together 2 winning seasons. If he does it in Washington then good for him, but there were as many troughs as peaks. Ultimately need better than that, even if it's a bit tough to find.

Yup. Good guy, sometimes good coach, was time to make a change. Looking like the team came up on the losing end of the bet this time so we'll see what the future holds.

I assume they would, particularly the bigger names like Snow. They likely wouldn't be retained in Carolina and I'm not sure anything has been put on film that would compel folks to add them to their NFL staffs at any level comparable to where they'd be with Rhule in college.

Whoa, that's one hell of a typo; I've no idea why I wrote that. Tepper/Hurney is what I meant and what it should obviously be, and the overall sentiment doesn't change.

I daresay the general pubic is not aware of this. I live in KC and most folks here aren't aware of it, so the attention he would draw as an HC would absolutely bring it to light on a broad scale. The local backlash on Britt Reid, particularly once his history came to light, was not insignificant.

Always knew that was a possibility but hoped it wouldn't be the case. Unfortunately, looking like Gettleman chose poorly. Really need to get some folks with credible NFL experience more involved with this football operation, and perhaps Fitterer and Morgan were the start of that.

How is that even possible at the NFL level? Like, that's so bad it seems like an active effort to fail.