The Anti-tankers…. Never forget!!!!

[Mother Grabber]

when we are mathematically eliminated, i can understand sitting players to reduce risk of injury to key players. if you’re going to do that, put it in that context, and expect whoever does play to put 100% effort into it. telling players to half-ass it is actually increasing their risk of injury, and hurts their development 

[Icege]

I don't believe there's any good faith conversation to be had about tanking in the NFL.

A lot of folks are going to make demands based off what they think might have happened rather than looking at what happened and the real reasons why.

You're not going to get a guy coaching for his future tell a bunch of guys playing for their future to chill so that the organization they might not be with in the future has a draft spot or two higher. It just doesn't happen and it's silly, dare I say stupid, for anybody to get their underoos in a bunch over it.

Edited May 7, 2023 by Icege

[Day1PanthersFan]

10 hours ago, Varking said:

49ers 3-3 without CMC. 10-1 with him in the regular season. With losses to Denver, Atlanta and Chicago during that 3-3 stretch. 
 

Piss poor coaching in Carolina wasted CMC. 

His injury problems magically disappeared in San Fran also, I wonder if he exaggerated some of his injuries here because he didn't want to take part in the Rhule Circus 

Oh what a safety valve he would have been for Bryce if we didn't trade him 

[WhoKnows]

12 hours ago, rayzor said:

 and purposely sucking even more would have cured it all....

Eh, he’s not wrong about the fact that beating Tampa means that we wouldn’t have Young. At that point if the season I was on the playoff wagon because I figured our shot at the top QB was already gone. If Houston didn’t screw themselves out of the top spot, we also would have had no shot at Young.

If Young truly becomes our hero, losing to Tampa was a good thing for the franchise. We certainly tried to win that game so ranking has nothing to do with this discussion as we didn’t tank, we just plain lost. Had we won, we don’t get Young and we would have lost to the Cowboys. I know it’s hard for folks to understand this, but losing to Tampa did help this franchise assuming Young becomes what we hope he will. If Young flails, well, losing to Tampa hurts even more.

[WhoKnows]

1 hour ago, Day1PanthersFan said:

His injury problems magically disappeared in San Fran also, I wonder if he exaggerated some of his injuries here because he didn't want to take part in the Rhule Circus 

Oh what a safety valve he would have been for Bryce if we didn't trade him 

Sorry man, let’s not disparage CMC. He’s a damn hard worker. Do you truly believe he would exaggerate his injuries or do you think Rhule and co put him on IR when they realized we were done for the season? RBs have a limited shelf life compared to other positions, so is it worth bringing him back if he could play or having him carry the ball 20+ times when we are eliminated? He didn’t have a Barkley ACL or anything remotely severe that he missed any offseason time.

I remember his second injury in 2021 saying to myself that he didn’t appear to be hurt let alone hurt bad when they pulled him. We were 4 games out of first with 5 to play. Even in 2020, he got sat after we just lost a close game to KC in which he had 28 touches. We were 3-6 and playing a 6-3 Tampa team the next week that throttled us week 2. NO was also 6-2 at that time. The powers that be shelved CMC. No chance he exaggerated his injuries.

[Castavar]

OP is 100% right in the fact that if we win that Bucs game, we set ourselves back 4 years. This offseason would have been GRIM!

As for tanking, I think most of us have different definitions of "tanking". I was ALL FOR tanking, which for me meant resting key starters and letting more young guys play to see what we have (which also meant losing more). Take that last Saints game for example, we lost TWO IMPORTANT players on our o-line to major injuries and now probably won't even be ready for the season. That game was meaningless, you absolutely tank and play your young players and rest key starters to PREVENT that, while also attaining a better draft pick in the process.
 

Edited May 7, 2023 by Castavar

[top dawg]

24 minutes ago, WhoKnows said:

Eh, he’s not wrong about the fact that beating Tampa means that we wouldn’t have Young. At that point if the season I was on the playoff wagon because I figured our shot at the top QB was already gone. If Houston didn’t screw themselves out of the top spot, we also would have had no shot at Young.

If Young truly becomes our hero, losing to Tampa was a good thing for the franchise. We certainly tried to win that game so ranking has nothing to do with this discussion as we didn’t tank, we just plain lost. Had we won, we don’t get Young and we would have lost to the Cowboys. I know it’s hard for folks to understand this, but losing to Tampa did help this franchise assuming Young becomes what we hope he will. If Young flails, well, losing to Tampa hurts even more.

Maybe if we had beat Tampa, then we may have gone on to get into the playoffs and won a championship, because everyone knows that "anything can happen in the playoffs." Any given Sunday...and all that jazz. One never knows...

 

[DaveThePanther2008]

6 hours ago, MHS831 said:

Here is what I do not understand--when the season is over, after the 16th game of the season vs. Tampa Bay, why not empty your PS and bench for the final game of the season?  Use it like a 2023 extra preseason game for evaluating talent and giving players an opportunity to gain experience.

Instead, we won a meaningless game (that did not cost us draft position) for Steve Wilks' resume.  Our starting RG tore his ACL.  Our starting LG broke his foot. That impacted free agency, the draft, etc.  Why not allow Deonte Brown an opportunity to play?  Any player who was banged up for week 18 should have been placed on IR and a PS player should have been activated.  WR Saunders, OG Brown, and maybe a LB are a few players I wanted to see.

I would have benched Corbett and maybe Moton.  I would have have played Christensen at T and brought Brown up from the PS to get some reps at RG.  I would have played Mays at LG.

Instead, we hoist the 7-10 trophy and sent our Guards to offseason surgery and rehab.

I am very strongly opposed to tanking and have bounced back and forth with several huddlers that seem to want to tank at midseason.   It sends a terrible message to your players and players that may eventually consider coming to Carolina. 

That said, once we were eliminated from contention, I don't think doing this is tanking.  You are evaluating players that could be on the squad 2023.  You are still trying to win but giving players who might have a future in this league a chance to play. 

Unfortunately for us.  Wilks was fighting for his interim position and sent our best out there.  It truly was one of the worst games I have ever seen.  Seemed both teams couldn't get out of their own way. Thankfully, as you pointed out.  It didn't cost us draft positon. 

Carolina mustered up enough to get close enough to kick the game winning FG. 

[OneBadCat]

Meh. I think best case scenario we would have beat Dallas. Wilks proves himself to be a decent HC.  A better Ron Rivera. Sam Darnold gets resigned. He ends up being a more talented Delhomme. But never a top 5 QB.

We would have had a good to great team without a super star QB.

We haven't seen what this new team is capable of. Who knows. We might end up being trash. But if Bryce is the real deal then we are going to be dictating games through our offense. Which isn't something we've had since prime Cam.

[Gerry Green]

I love Tanks. I just don't believe they have a place on a football field.

[WhoKnows]

3 hours ago, Mother Grabber said:

when we are mathematically eliminated, i can understand sitting players to reduce risk of injury to key players. if you’re going to do that, put it in that context, and expect whoever does play to put 100% effort into it. telling players to half-ass it is actually increasing their risk of injury, and hurts their development 

You do understand that even tanking doesn’t mean you tell players to half ass, right? Tanking is done with personnel, like not signing a medium level FA QB (like Teddy) and letting Clausen or Weinke or Painter get you a top draft pick or it’s done by resting players in week 17/18 to start rookies and as posted above, not get your two starting guards seriously hurt. As has been said many times, tanking is NOT asking players to play poorly.

[WhoKnows]

1 hour ago, top dawg said:

Maybe if we had beat Tampa, then we may have gone on to get into the playoffs and won a championship, because everyone knows that "anything can happen in the playoffs." Any given Sunday...and all that jazz. One never knows...

 

Lol, seriously? Fantasy land is elsewhere. Sam Darnold is not winning us a Super Bowl. Let’s get a grasp on reality again.

The supposition that if we make the playoffs, we lose out on Young is realistic. You saw what it took to get to 1st from 9th, imagine the 2025 1st and multiple other picks to get from 19 to 9. Plus you’d need Chicago to be willing to drop that far which is highly unlikely based on their desire for a top tackle.

I’ve been wanting a top rookie QB since we let Cam go. I’m excited we have one but damn I’d be upset if I knew we let that go just to get beat by Dallas. Young or bust. 
 

[rayzor]

1 hour ago, WhoKnows said:

Eh, he’s not wrong about the fact that beating Tampa means that we wouldn’t have Young. At that point if the season I was on the playoff wagon because I figured our shot at the top QB was already gone. If Houston didn’t screw themselves out of the top spot, we also would have had no shot at Young.

If Young truly becomes our hero, losing to Tampa was a good thing for the franchise. We certainly tried to win that game so ranking has nothing to do with this discussion as we didn’t tank, we just plain lost. Had we won, we don’t get Young and we would have lost to the Cowboys. I know it’s hard for folks to understand this, but losing to Tampa did help this franchise assuming Young becomes what we hope he will. If Young flails, well, losing to Tampa hurts even more.

Yes he is, because he is saying we should have purposely tanked to get a better pick.

The real question is, does or should the team TRY to lose do they can get a better pick? Because that's what tanking is, right? Trying to lose? You might say that it's just not trying to win, but that's the same thing.

Trying not to win is trying to lose and there are implications that go WAY beyond trying to lose so we get a better pick. And it's those implications that makes that myopic choice to tank a really bad and foolish idea.

He said those who didn't want to tank weren't looking at the big picture, but it's him and everyone else saying by that we should tank who isn't looking at the bigger picture. It's a very narrow-minded view that ONLY looks at the draft.

 

[poundaway]

7 hours ago, MHS831 said:

Here is what I do not understand--when the season is over, after the 16th game of the season vs. Tampa Bay, why not empty your PS and bench for the final game of the season?  Use it like a 2023 extra preseason game for evaluating talent and giving players an opportunity to gain experience.

Instead, we won a meaningless game (that did not cost us draft position) for Steve Wilks' resume.  Our starting RG tore his ACL.  Our starting LG broke his foot. That impacted free agency, the draft, etc.  Why not allow Deonte Brown an opportunity to play?  Any player who was banged up for week 18 should have been placed on IR and a PS player should have been activated.  WR Saunders, OG Brown, and maybe a LB are a few players I wanted to see.

I would have benched Corbett and maybe Moton.  I would have have played Christensen at T and brought Brown up from the PS to get some reps at RG.  I would have played Mays at LG.

Instead, we hoist the 7-10 trophy and sent our Guards to offseason surgery and rehab.

I agree, I would have been fine benching starters for the last game.  Saints were clearly desperately trying to lose that game.