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Game Comments - Preseason vs Steelers

Mr. Scot

By Mr. Scot,
in Carolina Panthers

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Mr. Scot Grand Master

Mr. Scot

Posted
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That wasn’t exactly the way you want to start a game. Yeesh :(

While admittedly the coverage was bad and the tackling was laughable, I’d have to put a lot of the blame for that first score on Jason Baker. He kicked a very returnable line drive straight to Stefan Logan on his first effort. Give him credit though as his next one was a highball that gave the coverage time to get there before Logan could take off. The rest of his night was pretty good.

Lot more passing emphasis in the number one offense early on than I’d normally expect in the regular season. As the game wore on though, Davidson’s playcalling showed a good balance. Solid effort on his part I believe.

Keydrick Vincent was absolutely used on a couple straight plays. Ouch. Hopefully it’s not lingering effects from last year’s injury. I’ve got no plans to begin a “Start Robinson” effort (he’s not ready) but Vincent needs to get his stuff under control once the live bullets start flying.

Mike Goodson continues to show why he was worth the draft pick. Runs hard from start to whistle, good speed and field vision, and tonight even worked in the patented Panther stiffarm. If Stewart can get healthy, we’ve got quite a corps there. And I liked what Mike Morgan called him early on: “The Electric Rookie”. If he keeps it up, I may refer to him that way for the rest of this season.

On the flipside, a couple of flashy plays by Nick Hayden, but in-between those flashes he’s still getting steamrolled way more often than I’m comfortable watching. If it came down to it, I could live with keeping him, but I think we can probably do better.

We got totally hosed on the fumble call. McCown’s arm was clearly going forward. I don’t know that the NFL installs a full replay system in the preseason. That’s the only possible excuse I can think of for not seeing that.

Thomas Davis sighting was nice.

Note to Chris Harris, Julius Peppers, Richard Marshall, Na’il Diggs and Quinton Teal: For the record guys, that’s Isaac Redman you were getting run over by for that TD. Isaac…Redman! If you can’t effectively tackle Isaac…Redman, how are you going to do against guys like Brian Westbrook, Michael Turner and Adrian Peterson?

McCown looked good. The football is coming out of his hands really fast. Makes me wonder if Rip Scherer has been working on that with him. For what it’s worth, I actually think it would have been better to run him on that fourth and one as opposed to the play they chose.

Contrast in effort: Watch the way Mike Goodson runs and the effort he gives right up until the last second, and then watch Dwayne Jarrett. Every time I see him run, it feels to me like he’s half-assing it. Sadly, I’ve begun to think that’s the only way he knows how to play.

Speaking of effort, how about Kenny Moore? A bungle or two on punts, but he made up for it. Runs crisp routes, looks the ball into his hands and holds onto it even when hit hard. Not sure how the heck he caught that one bullet pf a pass from McCown with a guy on his back. Had a Smittyesque run on that smoke route and even had a nice block to spring Goodson for a big run. Wow.

Might be wishful thinking, but I find myself remembering that the last time our third receiver wore #81, we did okay :D

This game has sealed it for me. Kenny Moore is the third receiver. If he isn’t I’ll have to seriously wonder what Dwayne Jarrett has on John Fox. Jarrett will still have that occasional really nice looking highlight like he did in the third, but I’d trade a dozen of those highlights for some consistency in effort and technique.

Like what I’m seeing so far from Louis Leonard. On one play he split the guard and center clean and inserted his mug directly into the backfield. It might have helped that the Steeler QB paused for a minute to wonder when Will Smith gained all that weight and started playing football.

Ditto for Corvey Irvin. He’s hustling and getting in the gaps the way you want a DT to do it. The play where he and Nick Hayden pushed the pocket while Everette Brown and Charles Johnson brought pressure from the edges was absolutely textbook defensive line technique.

Speaking of which, Charles Johnson has developed a nice spin move, especially for a guy his size. Kudos to DL coach Brian Baker for that. You can see he’s having an influence.

Also like what I’m seeing from Tony Fiammetta. Still raw for sure, but I fully believe he has the tools to contribute this season and be the successor to Brad Hoover that a lot of us have been waiting on for a while.

Niiiiice one-hander from Dante Rosario…nullified :(

Jamall Lee in rather than Decori Birmingham tonight. Coaches might be trying to decide which of the two of them they want to keep on the practice squad (or could just be trying to help him catch on elsewhere). Had good effort trying to get to the end zone on that one play. The leap he did to get in on the next play was a little unnecessary I thought. Tony Fiammetta plowed a pretty clear path for him.

I had just finished elaborating on how well Mike Goodson was doing when he lost the ball. I really hate when stuff like that happens. Nice that someone was there for him when he looked bummed on the sidelines.

Pete Yannity just referred to the new team president as Danny Morris (oops). The TV network has had a few yips this preseason, most notably with sound. I’d add that on the previous broadcast when they were crediting sponsors, they might have been wise to position the camera somewhere other than directly behind the statue of the late Sam Mills. As much respect as I have for Mills, it didn’t do anything for me and the future Mrs to see company logos looking like they were flying out of his butt.

I’d say that Mike Rucker is a decent announcer and commentator though. He might have a future there.

On the topic of Danny Morrison, he just seems to ooze likeability and intelligence. Just based on first impression – which realistically isn’t worth much – we might just have something in this guy.

They had a close up of Steelers number three QB Mike Reilly’s face. He looks like Mark Richardson, minus the glasses and in a Steeler helmet.

Beautiful open field tackle by Munnerlyn. We need more of that. Need less of the ball handling issues though.

Reilly’s face might look a little different now after Everette Brown smacked him in it.

I’d have to admit that I kept Hilee Taylor on my final roster based more on what I saw from him in the last regular season than what I have in this preseason. If he stays, it might be because Coach Fox has some similar thinking. Taylor is legitimately on the bubble, and with that in mind a highlight play or two tonight might have been a good thing.

I find myself wondering if Geico is going to start selling knick knacks modeled on those googly-eyed money stacks.

Anyone else see the kid in the 87 jersey making Moose antlers with his hands? :lol:

Returned the favor on the fumble. Thanks to Jeremy Leman…again. Leman’s field vision and instincts are arguably as good as anyone’s. If he had the athleticism of a Jon Beason or a Dan Morgan, he might be something special. As it is, he’s an overachiever (which isn’t such a bad thing).

Here’s a concern: The defense tonight at times looked very vulnerable to the cutback runs. The style of “fly to the ball” defense that Ron Meeks likes can be susceptible to that. I’ll grant that it was evident more from the third stringers than anyone else, but I saw enough to worry me overall.

Been praising him, but put that pick six from Matt Moore on Tony Fiammetta. He let the rusher get hold of Moore and alter his throwing motion. That one hurt. To his credit, Moore showed the “short memory” that QBs have to have. Add in that in fairness, as a rookie Fiammetta is bound to have a moment or two like that.

The "other Moore" (Matt) had a decent night overall despite the pick six. He looked worlds better on that one than he did last preseason and did a good Delhomme impression on the quick screen to Goodson. Like McCown, he’s getting the ball out pretty quick overall (Rip Scherer anyone?)

Have to say overall that although I didn’t fault Matt Moore completely for the pick, and even taking into account that he led the drives that produced the first Panther points of the night, I still think that Josh McCown has probably won the battle for the backup spot.

I’m sure if you asked the average fan which team had better depth between the Panthers and Steelers, the knee-jerk reaction would be to say the Steelers. Me? I’m not so certain that's true. Better at the starter level? Hard to argue that when they’re the league champs. Overall though, outside of a spot or two I thought our backups handled theirs pretty well.

Captain Munnerlyn isn’t big enough to be victim of a horse collar tackle. “Pony” maybe…

Regarding some guys on the fringes: I put Mortty Ivy on the practice squad for my final roster. Truthfully though, the most active linebacker on the field this preseason not named Jeremy Leman was probably Kelvin Smith. He was around the ball a lot. Don’t think he’s practice squad eligible though. He might catch on as a reserve somewhere. Another guy I saw a time or two was Joe Fields, who is eligible. On the other side of the ball, I feel fairly certain that if we keep one of our own WRs on the PS rather than picking up a guy cut elsewhere, it will be Kevin McMahan. For the hype, Larry Beavers never produced much. Maybe he should try for the UFL.

Well, game over, and no doubt as I’m typing this there are probably already people proclaiming doom and gloom over being 0-4 in the preseason. Truthfully, those kind of numeric “it’s never been done before” things aren’t the locks people make them out to be. Those sorts of roadblocks fall from time to time, and could again.

Let's get ready for the season :)

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Mr. Scot Grand Master

Mr. Scot

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what about 91... he has a sack in every preseason game so far no?

wish he got some more work with the 1's but he looks like he was worth the pick.

Could swear I had a paragraph on Brown. Must have deleted it :confused:

For the record, I was very encouraged by what I saw from him. At the very least, I think he gives us another Al Wallace type backup. Give him a year or two to acclimate to the league, and who knows?

At least based on what I see so far, I have no argument with using next year's first rounder on him.

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outlaw4 Mentor

outlaw4

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Great analysis, as usual! :)

Too bad it's going to be overshadowed by...

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Not to say I'm not worried about our tackling, pass protection, run defense, etc. It would had been felt better had we put together a good game in preseason but this time, we didn't face teams that are traditionally crappy in preseason like the Colts and Skins. :lol:

Shame to hear your comments about Jarrett. Sorry to say that I was VERY unhappy when we chose Jarrett on draft day and I was hoping that somehow, this time, a USC receiver was going to live up to their billing.

On a semi-related note, it's absolutely ridiculous that I have wait until SUNDAY to watch this game. Granted, none of our games have been worth watching anyway but I get to see the Saints, Falcons, and Bucs live but I have to wait for the Panthers? I shouldn't be surprised, but still, for the love of all that is good, I got to see the LIONS live! :frown2:

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