tukafan21

Yes, because he's going to go to a place that is a good fit for him. We're not a good fit for him, which is why he'd never come here. If he goes to the NFL, except it to be to the Bears when they get Williams or Maye and can pair them with Harrison and also having Moore on the team. That's a skill position set that Harbaugh can win with Bryce, Thielen, Mingo isn't

Yes, if we were to replace Reich this year with an outside hire (as in not promoting Deuce or one of the coordinators) you'd have to imagine they get a 1 year grace period. The problem is still that even with that, there are far too many great HC openings that will be there this offseason, we'd still be so far down the list that we won't get a top candidate. And do you really want to hire a HC banking on sucking next year and just hope that we end up with the #1 pick and whoever the top QB prospect is, fits with that HC's style? If you think fans are unhappy now, another new HC ending up with the worst record in the league is going to set this town on fire.

No, a million times no Harbaugh can be a great coach in the right situation, this isn't one of them. He's more of a Deion Sanders or Urban Meyer type of coach, needs to be in the right situation to succeed and it's one of two things, college kids or a fully built out NFL roster with an elite QB. We're neither His schtick just doesn't work well with grown men who make 10's of millions of dollars, he's a motivator more than a coach. And there is nothing wrong with that, it's a style of coaching that can be very successful with the right team around them, but it's not meant for a rebuilding NFL franchise.

Sunk cost Just because you're frustrated at the last 5 years doesn't mean it can be fixed overnight. The hard cold truth is that right now, this franchise is in a total rebuild at the moment, nothing we've done in the last 5 years has contributed to our future at the moment, it's only dug us a deeper hole to get out of. If that means you're not willing to keep spending money on the franchise, I can't blame you, but wanting them to make changes for the sake of making changes is just cutting off your nose to spite your face when those changes don't help move the franchise forward. It sucks, I get it, I don't like it, but it's the reality of the Panthers current situation, no way around it.

The problem with that is Deuce has been a very hot up and coming name in recent years. If I'm him, I wouldn't do that. None of this stink falls back on him because he's not the OC and it's Reich's offense anyways. But if he were to do that and then we suck next year, it would ruin everything he's tried to build up the last few years and may never get another HC opportunity after that. If we fire Reich, we're looking at either another re-tread HC, or a second tier level candidate who wasn't expecting to be in line for any HC job this offseason and just wanted to jump the line.

The bottom line is that nobody the fan base will be happy with as our HC will want to put their HC future on the line with 2nd year Bryce with how he's looked this year. That's an unavoidable fact. Because we don't have our 1st round pick this year, we also can't move on from Bryce after just 1 season no matter how bad the rest of the season goes. That's an unavoidable fact. We're basically the 2021 Texans right now, but worse because we don't have our draft picks or Watson to dangle out there in a trade for a haul of first round picks. And they ended up having to settle for Lovie freaking Smith because no quality candidate would touch that job with a 10 foot pole. Bringing back Reich is the lesser of two evils as much as people don't like or want to admit it.

Because we're going to be at best, the 7th most attractive HC opening this offseason if we were to fire Reich. Short of just getting lucky, we're not finding an elite HC in that situation. And while I agree on the GM front, Tepper is an analytics guy and all the analytics out there say you should be hiring a GM and HC in tandem, not in separate seasons. If we move on from Fitterer this offseason, I think Morgan gets the job and unless he hits grand slams with his picks and FA moves, he'll only get one season and then do the GM/HC at the same time after the 2024 season.

I'm not advocating for a 7 year plan, that was just a stupid statement from the start. But this franchise is bare bones at the moment, we don't have a single long term franchise building block at the moment. We're in year 0 of a complete re-build at the moment and we don't even have our 1st round pick coming up. People don't like the truth, but it's the unfortunate reality we are current in with this franchise.

I could see it happening, but with Morgan and Deuce, not Evero. I wouldn't be okay with Evero as HC, or any defensive minded coach for that matter, not in today's NFL. Perfect reason why is to look at the Bills right now. Defensive minded coaches who end up with great offenses because of an OC, lose that OC to another HC job and then can't replace the magic, look how much worse Allen has been since they lost Daboll. You can't need to depend on needing to replace your OC every few years and expect long term success, not with today's game and how it's moving. You need to get the HC who keeps the offensive philosophy flowing, it's how teams like the 49ers are able to keep cycling in new OC's without a problem, but teams like the Bills or Patriots can't get it done because of their DC based HC's.

And replacing Reich with someone who isn't going to be an elite HC is the right move? It will literally only put us in a worse place moving forward. It's not about intentionally tanking the season, it's about being realistic about the attractiveness of your franchise and it's ability to bring in a high quality HC candidate. Unless Bryce has some miracle turnaround in the second half, no good HC candidate is going to tie their career to that wagon, they just won't. Most HC's get one chance at the job, not many get a second. They're not going to tie themselves to Bryce and an owner that has proven to have a short leash if not successful. That's all it's about, and sure, I feel bad for people who spend their money on the product, but if you're a PSL owner who wants to keep your tickets forever, do you really want to make yet another move that will set us back even more?

Jacksonville spent years of re-building and drafting well before they had their sudden change. Outside of Thielen who isn't a long term player for us anyways, we don't have anyone on our team as good as Lawrence, Etienne, Ridley, Kirk, Engram, and that's just on offense, they also have a lot of great defensive pieces as well. Yes, the change from a bad team to a playoff team can happen suddenly in one offseason, but only if you already have the key building blocks in place and then find those final puzzle pieces. We don't have those key building blocks. Honestly... who are our building block pieces right now? Bryce looks like a bust, Ickey is playing worse every week, we can't re-sign Burns, Luvu is a FA, Brown has only 1 year left, Horn can't stay healthy, Chinn is going to walk in FA. I'm not sure we have one foundational franchise player on this roster right now that we are sure will be here for more than another season or two at the moment, we're not even in the same galaxy as the Jaguars of 2 years ago in terms of being able to have a one offseason turn around to playoff contention.

And this right here is why emotional fans are a franchise's kryptonite. This thing won't be fixed overnight, it won't be one offseason of moves to make us contenders. If you can't handle a proper rebuild and struggling for a few years while doing so, then give up your PSL's and season tickets, because what you want isn't going to happen. The best path forward for long term success is to struggle for a few seasons. And I don't say that in regards of getting the high draft picks because of it (although that does help in the rebuild). But it's that we have far too many problems to fix with not enough current foundational players or draft picks to get it done in one offseason. Trying to fix it all to be competitive in 2024 will only make things worse, look what just happened when we tried that this past offseason and it's only set us further back, so why do you think we're going to magically be able to fix it for next year?

Also remember there will be some really good jobs available this offseason. I'd bet my life savings that the Chargers job opens up (they'd need to make a run to the AFC championship game to save his job, and that aint happening). The Raiders have way more quality players than we do and are a team steeped in history and in a town a lot of players want to play in. Washington will open up, has an ambitious new owner, potentially their long term QB already on the roster and has a boatload of draft picks Giants could end up with a Top 3 pick and a HC opening, combo of NYC and one of these QB's in the draft will make them a desired spot. The Falcons can't keep Smith around after his misuse of all their top picks right? Sure they won't have the QB figured out, but someone is going to want to play with all the toys they have there on offense. The Bears, thanks to us, could very well could end up in a position to draft one of the top QB's and also get Harrison Jr, which if they end up in that position, would likely make them the most attractive job on the market with potential generational talent at QB and WR on rookie deals. I don't know about you guys, but as much as I'm frustrated with Reich, I don't want to end up with the 7th best HC candidate in an offseason, and that's if we're lucky and the top candidates left after those jobs above get filled don't decide to just wait another season.

Yes, plenty of people would be interested, but the best ones wouldn't be and they'll either take another job or just wait another season. The best candidates don't jump at any offers, it's why Ben Johnson went back to the Lions and why Dan Quinn has turned down multiple HC offers the last couple years as well. It's why they're the best candidates, they are smart and know putting themselves in a bad situation can kill their HC career before it even gets off the ground. See my post above for a full breakdown

I know a lot of people won't like it, but the best long term move for the franchise is to bring back both Fitterer and Reich next season. The statistics have long shown that teams are more successful with a GM and HC hired in the same offseason, not separately. And the unfortunate truth is that if Bryce is so bad the rest of this season that it gets Reich fired, it will also get Fitterer fired, while at the same time it would make us an extremely unattractive franchise for the top candidates out there for both jobs. GM's and HC's don't want to go into their first season without a first round pick and stuck with an undersized QB who has looked as bad as Bryce has. Sure, there are only 32 jobs of each in the world, so there will be plenty of people interested in them, but they won't be the best candidates out there. So in reality, the best path forward is to just make smart building block decisions this offseason and then let Reich takes his lumps next year while we have our first round pick again in 2025. You then fire both of them after 2024 and tell the new GM/HC that they have full control. If they want to give Bryce a 3rd season to see if they can fix him, they can and it's considered a "free season" for them and won't put their jobs at risk given the situation they're stepping into. But at the same time, if they just want to cut bait and draft someone new in 2024 or even just sign a vet to replace him, they can. By being open with them about knowing what Bryce is at that point and giving them the necessary leeway and time to fix things, it would help us become a much more attractive destination. The fortunate thing for us is that thankfully the rest of the division has also screwed themselves moving forward and short of something crazy happening, none of the other 3 teams will have found their franchise QB's before the 2025 season anyways. Carr, Baker, Ridder/Heineke aren't the futures for any of them and they also are all going to end up winning too many games this year to end up with a Top 5 pick to get one of the top QB's in the draft.

Under no circumstances other than Bryce retiring before the draft would we ever consider a QB in the 2nd, and I'm one of the biggest anti-Bryce people on here. And even if he did retire, we probably would just punt on next season with a re-tread and shoot for a 1st round QB in 2025. We can't move on from him until after Year 2 at a minimum unfortunately, and even then, we only can do it if we're able to draft a replacement in the Top 5 in the 2025 draft. Most realistic situation is we're stuck with Bryce for 3 years as the starter no matter how bad it gets. As he'll have his ups at times and it will keep him from losing the job like with Wilson last year, he won't be that bad consistently. Again, that was also always the problem with Bryce, he was never going to be an elite franchise QB but he also was going to be too good to just cut bait without a top draft pick to replace him.

Not the worst draft pick, but I think the worst trade in NFL history all things considered (Bryce is bad, but he's not Leaf/Russell bad). It's also totally different than the 49ers Lance trade because they had a fully built out team, they took a shot on what a lot of people felt could be an elite QB, it at least made sense to go for that move. This one never made sense to me, I never saw it with Bryce, his physical limitations were a huge red flag from day 1, I just tried to trust the "football people" that he had this super brain that would allow him to overcome those issues, spoiler alert, it won't. We traded away a stupid haul only to take the most physically limited QB ever taken in the first round of the draft, let alone #1 overall.

Leeway Frank and staff built up expectations, especially after trading for the #1 pick and saying we were a QB away from competing. This squad has been exposed for being as bad as they are, the next GM/HC will be coming into a bad situation that they know they'll get a few years to sort out in their own way and not be expected to win in year 1, unlike Reich and co. Same reason I thought the Texans were an attractive job this past offseason. They fired their HC's in back to back seasons after only allowing them 1 season. They couldn't do it for a 3rd time, they'd get crushed by the media and fans for doing it, that next HC knew going in they had at least 3 years of job security and could build things up their own way and not have the pressure of needing to win immediately in year 1.

I mean, I obviously don't think he will, which is why it's really "you don't trade any firsts until we replace him" but I still have to say it that way.

The first and most important thing is that under no circumstances, do we trade ANY of our own future 1st round picks until Bryce either proofs himself an Elite QB or we replace him. I don't care if the Vikings offer us Jefferson for a single first, he's worthless to us without a QB (okay, that's obviously hyperbole, you take that offer, but you know what I mean). There is a very real possibility that we're picking in the Top 5 of the 2025 draft, if that's the case and there is a QB worth taking, you cut bait and do it.

Everything else aside, he just doesn't even have an NFL arm. It's alarming that the #1 overall pick can't throw a quick 10 yard out with enough on it for the ball to beat the DB to the WR. The rest is also bad, but if you don't have even a minimally adequate arm strength, none of it matters.

Put Burns on the Browns or Cowboys defense and he's going to put up video game numbers A pass rusher can only be so good when their team is constantly playing from behind, doesn't have other pass rushers, and struggles in the secondary. Teams can focus their blocking gameplan on Burns, they have no fear of anyone else on the defense. And when our DB's can't cover well enough to force the QB to hold the ball for that extra second, it makes it hard for any pass rusher to get home before the ball is away. I'm not saying Burns is on Parsons or Garrett's level, but the defense Burns plays on absolutely hurts his ability to get sacks on numerous levels.

And letting Burns walk for free after turning down trades at both deadlines would be maybe the most absurd story in FA history. Fitterer would get DESTROYED in the media for it, it would cost him his job and nobody in the NFL would touch him for any front office job, let alone a GM again. That's why he'll be 100% tagged if they can't come to a deal before then (honestly not sure he can be traded until tagged, doubt it).

I think it's his agent knowing the Panthers screwed themselves in negotiations when the Rams offer was leaked I'd bet that information leaking out raised the cost for the Panthers to re-sign him by $5 million a year. Once they did that, we lost all leverage in any negotiations with him, they know they either will get us to WAY overpay, or they'll be able to force a trade to a team that will only slightly overpay for him, but likely go to more of a contending team. Win-Win for Burns whichever way it plays out

Because we can't agree to a contract with him It's not about wanting to trade him, it's about finding the best possible ending to a bad situation. WAY overpaying him and letting him walk for free are both unacceptable situations, so if he won't sign a fair market value contract, then the only legitimate option we have left is trade him. And at this point, I'm not sure he's taking a fair market contract offer from us, if he was, a deal would be done by now, no?