Sgt Schultz

My only debate with this is that we had the QB situation figured out. I don't know that we did, we just got lucky and had a guy that could play the position well. Given what we did when we had him and what we have done with the position since, it is more like the blind squirrel finding an acorn. The last few years we had no sense of smell, either. That, I am hoping Reich and company can put an end to.

Matt Rhule is a BS artist. Unfortunately, I’ve dealt with enough BS artists in my lifetime to not suffer them well. That probably explains my ill feelings toward politicians. I don’t wish any personal locusts or plagues on The Process. I’m content if he just gets universally exposed for what he is. It is sad if his kids get hit with some of the mud/dung slung his way. The focus should never stray beyond the actual target. But he created that situation. It was not reaching beyond his ability that exposed them to the mental midgets of the world, but his constant tap-dancing to deflect any accountability or sidestep any responsibility. As @HPPantherzfan said earlier, if he doesn’t work out in Nebraska, his star dims. He will be on the Bobby Petrino trajectory, hopefully without the scandal. That means he bounces around between medium-level D1 programs and smaller schools. Hell, if he follows the Petrino trajectory, he will spend some time back at Baylor or Temple before he is done. I lived in the Washington, DC area for nine years, and he would fit right in there.

We know next to nothing about Corral right now. Yes, he looked awful last preseason, but caveat that with "under the stewardship of The Process." That moron treated him as a red-shirt freshman......and he may not have been OOU.......and, if he had worked out we may have had to part company with PJ Walker, who is OOU. Corral's chances of finding his footing in the NFL and becoming a viable starter are not great. But, they are exponentially better under Reich than they were The Process. None of that means we should not be drafting somebody early (and maybe often) and looking at a cheap journeyman to fill out the QB room.

Toomers and I have had this discussion before to no avail, and I am not criticizing him. Do I think some NFL games have been greatly influenced by the league? Yes. Do I think the NFL scripts the outcome of every game (ala professional wrestling) or even a game a week or month? No. What generally grabs my attention that something may be "unusual" (any sport) is when the officials suddenly start making calls during a game that have not been made during the season or playoffs prior to that moment. Not one call, a series. Anybody can miss one call, and then try to make up for it the other way at the next opportunity. When it happens at the start of a game, the league probably issued an "interpretation" or "point of emphasis" after the previous game. The teams get those same notices, so they know (or should know) it is coming. But it does not happen during a game. And it is highly unlikely that two, three, or more officials suddenly decide that at the 8:00 mark of the third quarter (for example) we are going to start calling all contact in the secondary. I was a college baseball umpire for several years. We would get interpretations or points of emphasis every now and then. It was somewhat rare, but not unheard of and usually in reference to some dust up or series of escalating dust ups the conference wanted to put an end to. Without exception, when we would ask the coaches prior to the game whether they received the same notice, the answer was yes. I know for a fact MLB issues them on a regular basis. I would suspect the NFL does, too (and under Goodell, who is the most reactionary commissioner the NFL has had in my lifetime, I suspect they send them out far too often). If you are watching any sport and wondering why "the officials never call that," it is very likely because they have received direction not to. The few instances that come to mind over the years fall outside of that, when all of a sudden the calls changed mid-stream, and some were over the top. People that are quick to yell "the whole thing is fixed" have never learned life's lesson to not search for a conspiracy when incompetence can answer the question. As for the general decline in quality in officiating over the years, the last time the NFL addressed the number of onfield officials was 1978. Back then, teams would send out three receivers, and three back-line officials could handle that. We still have three back-line officials and now four downfield receivers are relatively normal, and we took the umpire out of a position where he could help. "What did we think was going to happen?" Add to that, the players are faster than they were in 1978, the schemes more sophisticated, and then we added instant replay and instructed the officials to make borderline calls in a way that could be corrected if needed, not make the correct call as they saw it and let the chips fall where they may. All that earns another "what did we think was going to happen." To those wanting to fix all this with technology, it works until it doesn't, and when it doesn't the results leave everybody baffled. I work in aviation, and the industry is in a constant battle over how much automation is too much.

So, nothing has changed since about November, then. They make the Panthers look like a well-oiled machine these days.

No, no, no. You don't understand how this works. Once you scratch a new name off the list, the previous name scratched off the list comes back. So when we scratch off Stroud, Levis comes back. Next, we will talk about trading up for Young, so he gets scratched off and Stroud comes back. The loop gets closed the Tuesday before the draft starts when we talk about wanting Jaek Haener of Fresno State. Then whoever we talked about wanting before that comes back, leaving us with Young, Stroud, Levis, Richardson, McKee, Hooker, and having thrown everyone of the scent.....including ourselves.

Yeah, they'd be calling in the homicide squad by week 6. Their OL was awful, especially up the middle. It would be a very Bears thing to do, though. Ignore a glaring weakness and trot out a smaller, slighter-built QB to deal with it.

The moral of the story here is to not watch any ESPN show that is not a sporting event, and even half of those you want to do with the sound muted and music turned on instead. If not for that, I gave up ESPN about a decade ago and for good reason. I like Wilks. There is a role for him in the NFL as a HC as what I call a stabilizer. Like Rivera and Fox, if your team is a clusterf*#k, you hire a stabilizer to come in and restore some semblance of order and purpose. He probably will not get you to the juggernaut level, but you screwed yourself by hiring some moron who left ashes behind. Fox was hired in Denver a decade ago for that very reason, and he restored them to prominence. He got them to an Owl, but to win one, they had to replace him. It sort of says something about the Panthers that we had stabilizers for 18 consecutive years, and then 12 games this year, with a moron shoved in between.

Being a Panther fan is a little like living in Wichita Falls, TX and a thunderstorm is rolling in. The good news is it will deliver badly needed rain. The bad news is that it is Wichita Falls, and you know there is a tornado up there somewhere.

Reich was not my first choice, but as I have tried to make clear, I did not sit in on the interviews. Just for grins, when I saw that he was hired I pulled up a highlight reel from the 1992 Bills-Oilers playoff game. I have learned a lot from reading this thread, though. Reich is too old for the job. Because of his age, the most he will last here is 5-10 years, as opposed to the league norm of 15-20 years He also had a losing record at Indy of 40-33-1 His worst year was his last year, where he went 4-12 in his nine games Rivera was the second coming on Bill Walsh, despite the disparity in success Bill Belichick sucks as a HC, despite his .708 winning percentage with the Pats Reich is already a failure since we have no QB yet. What is he waiting for? My theory that the human species has always had the same amount of aggregate intelligence, we are now just splitting it up among 8 billion people probably has some merit. My favorite post, however, is this one from @ncfan That, folks, is a picture.

Wilks was able to sweep up the ashes left behind by the Process in a matter of weeks. He turned what I thought would be a 3 or 4 win season that was impossible to watch into a respectable season with some bright spots and hope along the way. If nothing else, he left the team in a far better situation than it was when he got his hands on it. He probably deserves the nickname Dirty Steve. Just like Dirty Harry, he gets dirty job that comes along. First Arizona, then following Rhule here. If he is patient, he may be in Indy following Saturday after about week 11 next year.

In there somewhere may be the very reason coaches from Belichick's tree never seem to work out. McDaniels said the reason he failed so badly in Denver was his inability to deal with personalities. I don't think that was the only reason, but most of the issues could conceivably be traced back to that. He said he worked on that, but thus far it looks pretty similar in Vegas. Judge? What exactly is his claim to fame other than he coached under Belichick? At least McDaniels has an aptitude for calling offensive plays to go with his ability to alienate people. It is probably not a coincidence that when McDaniels was going to accept the Indy job Judge was going to go with him. Imagine the locker room atmosphere that would create. You could not even cut that tension with a knife, you'd need a chain saw.

Thanks for sharing. For whatever reason, I have paid a lot of attention to Hooker. Not in the first round (even if we traded down or somehow wound up with multiple first round picks), but with SF's 2nd or 3rd.....why not? He may be a product of the system he played in, or he may not recover well from the ACL. But, there are a lot of "yeah, buts" associated with QBs and the number and risk are weighed in to where they are selected in the draft. His age does not worry me, either. I see maturity, too, and unless his ACL is a chronic problem or we get him killed (our OL is better, but we have a recent history of having to give QBs hazardous duty pay), he could realistically play 10 years. I don't know squat about Tune. But, given our QB room is one person right now (who we have no real observations on because of the way he was mishandled last preseason), I could see us drafting a pair. I'm not as sour on Stroud as many, but I also don't know that he will be available. OSU does not have a reputation for supplying great NFL QBs, but that is true of pretty much any college program. It is pretty much a crap shoot, but like you (I think), I like seeing good completion percentages and relatively few interceptions. I think we still need a vet while we evaluate/develop this group. I'm not looking for gold (and probably winding up with pyrite), but we need somebody to start in September. Unless we can get Stroud (or similar) and we are convinced we can start them without ensuring their failure, we need somebody. But, those are my views. The new staff should be the driving force in all those decisions, not some clown ignoring a Zoom meeting in New Mexico (me).

They probably asked Steichen how he would build his offense around Darnold and Walker, since they plan to sign Darnold to a 5-year deal and Walker to 3. Steichen forgot to mute his mic when he said "you've got to be effing kidding me. No wonder that snake oil saleman got this job based on a plate of meatballs."

All I can think of is the Colts are in search of a coach who is the worst interview in the NFL. They must have a theory that people who suck at interviews do so because they are on such a higher plane than everybody else when it comes to strategic thinking. I might want to be careful about posting something like that on an open forum. Next thing you know the Panthers will have somebody assembling the analytics to support that and scheduling interviews accordingly. I'm always careful at work about things like that, because the dumber the scenario the more they like it and I am not convinced the Panthers are any different in that respect.

8 x 10 glossies, maybe? I have said several times Tepper may see Wilks as a "safe pick" after looking like a buffoon with The Process. At least Wilks can claim that title. Saturday looked like 6-foot of man standing in 15-feet of water. Maybe he will "grow into" the position, but from here that looks like thinking your 6-year-old will someday grow into being a renown brain surgeon. It may happen, but how anybody could pin their hopes on it unfolding is a mystery. Meanwhile, Bieniemy may be the 6-year-old's 15-year-old brother in that scenario. He's either going to surprise everybody and become the renown brain surgeon or get a D in high school biology and become a plumber.

At this point, expending the capital to get the #1 pick and selecting Levis with that pick is like planning your entire day around dinner, going out and buying a new suit for the event, calling the restaurant to make sure you have a reservation for their best table, hiring a limo service to pick you and your spouse up and take you home at the end of the night, and then having the limo driver take you to Outback. You may both like Outback, but the effort for that night was just a touch overkill. Who knows, he Levis may rocket up the draft boards between now and day one, but right now, not worth that price.

Kelly may be the exception that proves the rule. And even that could have worked out, right up until they gave him personnel control so he could take his science experiment to the next level......and blow up the lab while he was in it.

Well, now wait a second. Chip Kelly would like to say something here.

As Al Davis used to say, "Commitment to Excellence." Then again, he kept spouting that out when the Raiders were in the same futility club as 7 winning seasons out of 28. But by that time his mind was on its way out the door. In theory, we've been coherent and sane in our run.

I may be misinterpreting your question, but the Wilks-led Panthers went 6-6 after The Process had the locks to his office changed. I'd even give the man a pass on the Rams game since the whole situation was a clusterfugg.

People are generally attracted to mediocrity because it is safe. Moving to excellence takes a lot of work, tough decisions, and risks. For football teams and fans, that step involves the potential to part with favorite players, especially if somebody offers a king's ransom for them, their usefulness is about to wane, or the contract they are going to command inhibits moving forward. The Pats over the years have been a revolving door. That's how they stayed so good for so long. People want to give Brady credit for that, but Brady always had tools around him. The names of those tools changed a lot, and fairly often. They could have allowed the early 2000's team to age out because it brought them three Owls. They didn't. It was viewed as cold much of the time, but it kept them competitive. To that end, think of all the howling that has been done by this fanbase when any long-time or popular player was let go. Granted, there was not always a replacement on the roster, but that was rarely the point of the howling. "How could we let them go/trade them after all he has done." I thought what Wilks did with Rhule's roster and flawed assumptions was very good. Would any of us have been surprised at 3-9 in that same stretch when the change was made? The guy inherited not only the roster but the coaches, made a few changes, and the team looked like it had a purpose. That is a testimony to his ability to lead a locker room. It is also a testimony to how bad The Process was. Wilks made some lemonade out of the lemons The Process left behind. His ability to lead a locker room and focus the team is not at issue. That said, I would not jump off the roof of a five story building if Wilks gets the job, but he is not my first choice. I would need to see something convincing that he would have been more aggressive with his own roster, instead of playing not to lose. I would also need to see a sustainable plan for the offense, including how we will deal with attrition. That is a lot to ask. In other words, I would need to see that he is not striving for mediocrity. For what its worth, if we are looking heavily at offensive coaches, I want to see the answer to similar questions on the defensive side.

Steichen, Kafka, Evero, Reich, and Wilks. Wilks is a show of respect. His first interview as his performance as IHC this season. His second interview was his first official interview. If nothing else, he has earned the right to be respected with a second official interview.

Absolutely. He and Harbaugh have both played this process like fine violins. That could be just part of the concert.

Could be. Jerrah as much as said he was going to fire McCarthy when he gave him his endorsement after the game Sunday. But that aside, the rumor/speculation of Payton to Dallas has gone on since Payton stepped aside in New Orleans. It would not surprise me to learn McCarthy was either fired, stepped down, or was perhaps moved "up" in the organization, despite of Jerrah's endorsement. That same rumor/speculation has been going on with the Chargers, but as @Mr. Scot said, that seems to be unlikely given what they have done since their playoff exit. Still, one never knows.