This team is Gettleman's legacy

[TN05]

Dave Gettleman was a decent GM. He saved us from cap hell and had a few good free agent signings.

He was also extremely overconfident that he could replace great players with scrubs and have no consequences. Our problems on offense step in major part due to this.

In 2013, Dave Gettleman let Jordan Gross retire after failing to negotiate a contract. Rather than have the best offensive lineman in team history for a couple more years so he develop find a replacement in the draft, he made our line problems even worse and we've had a revolving door of tackles since. Byron Bell, Michael Oher, and now Matt Kalil - none or them really being that good. We still haven't fixed this issue in four years.

In 2014, Dave Gettleman cut Steve Smith rather than pay him. That's fine, but he did it in the least professional way possible. He also cut every other receiver on the roster, leaving us with literal scrubs that we had to fix in the draft. Cam had to throw to an extremely raw Kelvin Benjamin, Philly Brown was the deep threat and Jericho Cotchery was the clutch guy. Needless to say, this did not work out very well.

In 2016, Dave Gettleman cut Josh Norman because he didn't like his agent. He then blew three draft picks on rookie corners and expected it to work. Sanchez is a bust at this point, Worley is a mixed bag, and Bradberry is good. That void still hasn't been filled.

In 2017, Dave Gentleman, with millions of dollars in his pocket, decided to not pay Ted Ginn, our only deep threat and a receiver Cam trusts, a pretty measly $4 million. Ted Ginn is tearing it up in New Orleans while the draft pick we picked to replace him, Curtis Samuel, hasn't done anything other than give Chicago a touchdown. He also seemed ready to cut the cord with Thomas Davis and Greg Olsen, with no players ready to fill either spot.

See the pattern here? We have a good to great player, Gettleman decides we can do without him despite not having a replacement ready. He then either starts a guy off the street, a washed-up veteran, or a draft pick or three. None of the times have worked out. Gettleman thought he was Belicheck and the scheme would solve everything, when in reality he isn't.

[UpstatePanther]

While I understand why you say this, I think the biggest piece of blame we can place on Gettleman is that he never pulled rank and fired the obviously inept Shula. An OC worth his salt would be able to game plan around the missing pieces. Shula is married to his philosophy and come hell or high water he’s sticking with it. If Gettleman had done the right thing and fired him after 2014 or 2015, then 2016 and this year wouldn’t be happening

[Peppers90 NC]

last week, last year it was the defensive player he didnt sign that cost us, now its the offensive. let's at least be consistent fans, otherwise how can we expect consistency from our team?

[uncfan888]

get pooped on, OP... since you like to poop on people

[J.Cage]

Was he done when they fired him? 

[Ricky Spanish]

The Gross move was a 2014 move, not 2013. 2013 we had a 12-4 record with Dave's bargain bin hunting. It was very much a success. We had no money to do things. 

2014 we had. no. money. Like at all. Even less than in 2013. We had to let literally everyone go, not just the great guys. That was thanks to Hurney and his dumbass contracts. Plus, Hardy decided to be a dipshit and screwed us over with his dumbassery. 

I like how you neglected to mention 2015 where we went to the super bowl and he signed a very solid LT in Oher, found a serviceable RT in Remmers, Kurt Coleman, the UDFA Norwell we found the year before became a long term starter, and Trai Turner became an All Pro, signed peanut tillman as a stop gap corner, etc. but let's ignore this year because it doesn't perpetuate the narrative you're trying to drive here.  

2016, he let Norman walk with no replacement. Can't argue with that. But the money saved by letting him go was used to extend Turner, Short, Davis, and gave Olsen some contract escalators. So While it was a hard pill to swallow in the short term, long term we have MORE good guys on the roster because of it. We also lost 6 games by a TD or less while our entire line minus Norwell was injured at one point or another where we had to use a 4th stringer at RT at one point as well as roll with a 3rd string center, and a RT at LT. Let's not also forget that we lost all of our rookie corners at one point or another due to injury, our reigning MVP was concussed and tore his shoulder up, and Luke went out with a concussion for the year. Not having Norman hurt, but it was injuries that broke us last year. 

2017, He went out and gave Shula new offensive weapons in CMC and Samuel, provided depth at both tackle positions, signed two vets in adams and Captain in the secondary to help the young corners out, restacked the D line by re-signing Addison and bringing back peppers. Funchess is actually stepping up this year, when shula isn't being a dumbass and calling decent plays. His only misstep I see was giving Kalil a giant fuging contract, and I went on record saying that I was not a fan of it to begin with. Even his shortcoming could be mitigated a bit if the O-Coordinator didn't call plays in which it is required to block for 5 seconds to allow our long developing routes ran by our big slower than average receivers to get open while not even having our speed guy see the field. 

So yes, Gettleman wasn't perfect but I'll be damned if he didn't set this team up for success this offseason. He gave Rivera all the ingredients to make a great dinner, and Rivera is letting his sous chef Shula add his special ingredient of literal shit to fuck up the entire meal.  

[hepcat]

Gettleman did more good in Carolina than bad. He fuged up letting Steve Smith go and the Josh Norman situation, but he kept the team afloat and held people accountable. 

[Peppers90 NC]

1 minute ago, hepcat said:

Gettleman did more good in Carolina than bad. He fuged up letting Steve Smith go and the Josh Norman situation, but he kept the team afloat and held people accountable. 

He fuged up how he let Smith go, not that he did, we were committed to Cam and it was obvious the two could not coexist. Norman was the right move long term for a multitude of reasons though it was a setback to some extent.

[hepcat]

Few could argue letting Norman go made the team better in the short or long term. He’s still a dominant corner and has some good years left. It did save money though? 

I agreed with letting Smith go, but it was handled very callously. Gettleman’s downfall.

[Peppers90 NC]

It just depends if you believe that letting Norman go allowed us to keep KK and Turner and if they together are more valuable than Norman, which I do personally. 

[PanthersBigD]

Imagine if we gave an offensive minded HC/actual talented OC our current roster. I don't think we'd be seeing the same clusterf@ck that we're currently fielding. We have a ton of talented players and a number of decent role players. Our run blocking schemes are terrible, our pass plays take too long to develop and we are sloppy in every aspect of game management. That's coaching. 

 

[Khyber53]

I think JR and his advisors could see this season happening this way and that's what got Gettleman canned. Last season's terrible performance was bad and maybe he could just tell that the slide was going to continue.

Losing Gettleman didn't make this season any worse. I don't believe that the shot fired startled Rivera and staff into doing more with the tools they have on hand.

[Snake]

1 hour ago, UpstatePanther said:

While I understand why you say this, I think the biggest piece of blame we can place on Gettleman is that he never pulled rank and fired the obviously inept Shula. An OC worth his salt would be able to game plan around the missing pieces. Shula is married to his philosophy and come hell or high water he’s sticking with it. If Gettleman has done the right thing and fired him after 2014 or 2015, 2016 and this year wouldn’t be happening

Dave wasn't allowed to touch coaching staff. That was clear from the beginning and also why you saw weird personnel moves to force Rivera to play younger talent. His biggest mismanagement was losing Josh Norman. 

[Fox007]

JR....can't even say Gettleman was anything since JR controls the team. We have no clue the moves he would have really made and knowing him he wanted to get rid of Shula and they wouldn't let him. I'd love to find out what he truly wanted to do but we'll probably never know that.

He'd instantly be the best GM in history if he said he was trying to fire Shula and or Rivera.