Who are your top 5 Panthers players of all time based on talent?

[CRA]

28 minutes ago, Brooklyn 3.0 said:

So how exactly do we define talent in this scenario? Brady, for example, could throw it very far and thread a needle with a pass. But he was slow. Cam was fast and powerful but not as accurate as Brady. Speed is nice and all, but Barry Sanders was about the juke not the speed. A WR who can jump high but can't catch is worthless, but I bet there are dozens and dozens of guys who could catch anything thrown their way but were slow and didn't start. So how do we judge "talent"? Stats? Freakish size? Lord of high school and college ball? Natural god given ability? Maybe it's ... checking off every single box in every possible category for your position? But even then, "Cam wasn't accurate", etc. And come on ... Armanti Edwards did nothing in the NFL. His talent vanished.

So what exactly is "talent"?

 

In no particular order, I think:

1. CMC (could run, catch, pass lol, made people miss, and played smart)

2. Luke (was all over the damn field, intelligence off the charts)

3. Cam (could run, pass, very physical, tons of responsibility on his shoulders)

4. Smitty (could catch, jump, was quick, fast, route god, and could make people miss)

5. Peppers (fast, quick, powerful, no quit in him, blew through Olinemen)

All subjective. I view it as a talent freakshow.  Take them out of football and throw them somewhere else. Who is going to stand out as a freak athlete and not just someone that plays one position in football well. 

so I probably would put the Hardys and Edwards in a pure talent list ahead of significantly better football players.  

or a Micheal Bates.  He was bringing a talent that was almost unmatched.  Didn’t make him a better WR than guys without Olympic Bronze medal speed 

[JawnyBlaze]

Cam, Smitty, Kuechly, Peppers, and Reggie White

[JawnyBlaze]

5 hours ago, Pejorative Miscreant said:

Are we excluding Kevin Green and Reggie White?. Neither were home grown guys but it’s hard to not at least put them in with an asterisk. 

I posted my answer before looking at any posts, thought I might be the only person to say Reggie White heh. He was a Panther and he was one of the most talented players of all time period. Counts to me. Doesn’t matter to me that by the time he played for us he had declined.  I wanted to include Kevin Greene, but I couldn’t take off any of the other three. I debated swapping out Peppers for him, Greene’s numbers say a lot but in the end I saw Greene more on the effort side whereas Peppers was more on the talent side. 

[OneBadCat]

2 hours ago, CamWhoaaCam said:

Stephen Davis never gets any love on this sub. He was pretty damn good as well.

Stephen Davis was awesome. But his gift was his vision. I don’t think his all around talent level was on that elite level like Stewart and Williams were. 
 

Deshaun Foster had buckets of talent also. But I think that acl tear he had his rookie year capped was his potential could have been. He was my favorite player after Biakabatuka. 

[CamWhoaaCam]

10 minutes ago, OneBadCat said:

Stephen Davis was awesome. But his gift was his vision. I don’t think his all around talent level was on that elite level like Stewart and Williams were. 
 

Deshaun Foster had buckets of talent also. But I think that acl tear he had his rookie year capped was his potential could have been. He was my favorite player after Biakabatuka. 

I wasn't talking about his talent. I was just talking about him as a rb. I was saying he was another great rb that rarely gets talked about.

 

He doesn't belong on this list though. As you said he was more about vision and a patience as a runner.

[jfra78]

2 hours ago, CRA said:

All subjective. I view it as a talent freakshow.  Take them out of football and throw them somewhere else. Who is going to stand out as a freak athlete and not just someone that plays one position in football well. 

so I probably would put the Hardys and Edwards in a pure talent list ahead of significantly better football players.  

or a Micheal Bates.  He was bringing a talent that was almost unmatched.  Didn’t make him a better WR than guys without Olympic Bronze medal speed 

Hell of a kick returner tho

[Donald LaFell]

Dwayne Jarret stuck around a long time on talent and potential. He apparently showed out in practice sometimes but just couldn’t cut it real games. Also I heard Smitty berated him a lot. 

[CPcavedweller]

1. Armanti Edward's

2. Camerun "Can Run" Peoples

3. That's it

[shaq]

18 hours ago, Verge said:

Talent? 

1. Cam Newton 

2. Julius Peppers 

3. Kelvin Benjamin 

4. Kris Jenkins 

5. Thomas Davis 

Probably 

Hell no to Kelvin Benjamin, one season over 1000 yards. From a talent perspective he was slow as fug, he was a glorified TE. He was inefficient only reason he even got 1000 yards his first season is because he had 145 targets!

[shaqattaq]

5 minutes ago, shaq said:

18 hours ago, Verge said:

Talent? 

1. Cam Newton 

2. Julius Peppers 

3. Kelvin Benjamin 

4. Kris Jenkins 

5. Thomas Davis 

Probably 

Hell no to Kelvin Benjamin, one season over 1000 yards. From a talent perspective he was slow as fug, he was a glorified TE. He was inefficient only reason he even got 1000 yards his first season is because he had 145 targets!

I know that you know a lot more about football than I do @Verge, but I gotta agree with @shaq here. I can't get behind any list that has KB on it and not Smitty.

[thefuzz]

Talent...tough thing to describe exactly.  

Pep

Cam

CMC

Luke

Then it gets murky for me...Reggie for sure, but he time here was short.  TD, Smitty, etc...

[AggieLean]

Peppers

Cam

Smith

Luke

TD

[bababoey]

Based on talent a guy like Lamar Latham, or Peppers should be at the top and Luke should not even be on the list.

Mark Fields was more physically talented than Luke ever was but Fields wasn't half the player Luke was.  It's hard to make a list like that.

[thefuzz]

26 minutes ago, bababoey said:

Based on talent a guy like Lamar Latham, or Peppers should be at the top and Luke should not even be on the list.

Mark Fields was more physically talented than Luke ever was but Fields wasn't half the player Luke was.  It's hard to make a list like that.

I cannot disagree more on the Luke thing.  You need to go back and look at his athletic profile coming out.

He was a complete freak show.