Bill Barnwell's strange hate of the Panthers and Cam

[amcoolio]

I don't know if anyone has been following Bill Barnwell over the past couple years, but if you have, you noticed that he posted an article today listing the contenders for the Super Bowl on the league and their main weakness.

He listed: Washington, Philly, Houston (!!), New Orleans, Minnesota, LA Rams, LA Chargers, New England, Kansas City, Pittsburgh, and JACKSONVILLE (!!!!).

Not only that, but he has yet to write about or mention the Panthers at all this season, through 7 weeks, in any of his podcasts or articles for ESPN.

Here are some facts--

-Carolina has the best record in the NFC over the last 5 years and are 4-2 this season. Sure, we don't look like a contender, but if you just swap the word "Carolina" with "New Orleans" Barnwell would be on his knees to eat out Brees' ass with articles and mentions. Strange that a perennial NFC playoff team who is off to a good start again is not a contender.

-After the Cam Newton/Jourdan Rodrigue incident last season, Barnwell and Mina Kimes had an immediate podcast shortly after bashing Cam Newton and calling him a sorry guy. Barnwell has become fairly social justice warrior over the past few years, after starting his career just covering football he often makes comments about feminism and refuses to say or write "Redskins" when talking about the Washington football team.

-In his "season preview" podcast, he barely mentions the Panthers despite talking in length about the other 31 teams. When they get to the NFC South, Barnwell and Kimes talk about the greatness of the Saints and Falcons for most of the time alloted to the NFCS. At the end, he briefly mentions that he has the Panthers at 6-10 and might be the worst in the division if Jameis wasn't suspended and still could if Jameis plays well. I mean the Panthers were an 11-5 playoff team last year and thats all you got? Even if you are down about their prospects (as we were) you still have to consider them.

Is that really the reason that Barnwell, who is ESPN's most highly touted football journalist, refuses to talk about an NFL team? It's really weird and it makes you think if Cam did something to hurt Barnwell's ego that we don't know about.

[AceBoogie]

He’s a young black quarterback that isn’t humble enough for some folks. It’s that simple. They don’t like his dancing, his first down pointing, his trash talking, etc. 

[CRA]

I don’t mind.  Historically we do better when no one respects us.  Generally flop when the national press expects something early on

[amcoolio]

1 minute ago, CRA said:

I don’t mind.  Historically we do better when no one respects us.  Generally flop when the national press expects something early on

I don't mind it either, but in this case its Barnwell going out of his way to not write about the Panthers. This guy writes/podcasts about NFL afterthoughts like Cardinals and Buccaneers

[TheRed]

6 minutes ago, AceBoogie said:

He’s a young black quarterback that isn’t humble enough for some folks. It’s that simple. They don’t like his dancing, his first down pointing, his trash talking, etc. 

Truth.  Getting down to the real knitty gritty of it. The same people don't see what the big deal is about cartoon caricatures like the one we saw yesterday of Eric Reid.

[thefuzz]

Doesn't his stuff have a fantasy lean to it?

If so, I can understand...if not, I have no clue.

Also, what's good for business?  That matters too.

[Cat]

Why does this matter?

[Dex]

I have literally never heard of him. Not worried. 

[Palmetto]

A lot of people wanted and predicted he would fail in the NFL and said he would be out of the league

So of course they don't want to see the Panthers win

[SuperBowlBound]

What is this ESPN entity you speak of? I get it, but I don't read much of their content anymore. I get enough news from The Athletic and The Riot Report. That's all I need.

[mc52beast]

Not just this guy, most of the national media are saying Philly beat themselves and don’t really say much about Cam and his 4th qtr heroics.

 

If it was Brees, Rodgers, Brady, Roth, Goff(insert anyone else) they would be slobbering on their jocks. 

[Seltzer]

Ehh... the Panthers don't currently look like they are on the same level as the Rams or Saints, but they should be up there in the conversation for 2nd tier of NFC teams with the Vikings, Packers, Eagles, etc.

It's a long season... all the Panthers goals are still on the table almost halfway through the season, which is nice.

We are going to have to beat the Saints (maybe twice), but the division is still in reach.

We went 3-1 against the NFC East which will be huge for tiebreakers at the end of the year.

We have seen glimpses, but the offense has just scratched the surface of how good they can be.

The defense has not been dominant, but they haven't been awful either.  They have made some big stops in every game when they have had to, including the losses at Atlanta and Washington.

I just want to make the playoffs for the 5th time in 6 seasons as of now.  Of course I want to win the division (and ultimately the Super Bowl), but getting into the playoffs is the goal for now.

This season is starting to remind me of 2003 in some respects, especially the close wins.  That 2003 team was not anywhere close to the playoff version we now remember until the playoffs.  We started 5-0, then dropped 3 straight to go to 5-3, then won 3 more to go to 8-3, then lost another couple to be 8-5, and then won our final three to be 11-5 and enter the playoffs as the 3rd seed...

However, their was nothing dominant about the team really in the regular season.  The team certainly had a good defense, but even the defense had several stinkers, too.  The offense was every bit as hot and cold as this team is.  It was also a different era in terms of scoring and rules tilted to the offense, and while the Panthers got some pub for their close wins, the defense, and Cardiac Cats persona, nobody took them serious as a SB team when you looked at the other teams that year like the Eagles, Rams, or Green Bay

Point is, the Panthers are 4-2, just won a game with a crazy comeback against the defending SB champs, and still can be so much better.  Who cares what anyone thinks long-term at Week 7?

I don't know where this season ends up, but it has been fun so far.  At some point as a fan, you got to enjoy the journey.  I want to eventually see this team win a Super Bowl, but only one team does every year.  It's not being defeatist to enjoy close wins along the way.

 

[jfra78]

2 minutes ago, mc52beast said:

Not just this guy, most of the national media are saying Philly beat themselves and don’t really say much about Cam and his 4th qtr heroics.

 

If it was Brees, Rodgers, Brady, Roth, Goff(insert anyone else) they would be slobbering on their jocks. 

Just not true, I am hearing nothing but praise for the Panthers today

[Captain Obvious]

if its any consolation i don't mention him ( or even know who he is) either