I Fully Expect Today To......

ChapelHeel80 · September 10, 2023

I fully expect today to be exactly what we've had since 2018. Total poo. I was excited about new ownership and in particular an owner like Tepper with a known media footprint and a resume that suggested success at every corner. Today marks the beginning of the sixth season completely circling the NFL drain under his so-called leadership. He inherited a team that had been to the playoffs 4 of the previous 5 seasons. Grant it, a team that was aging out and a quarterback that couldn't throw the football anymore. Nonetheless, in 5 seasons he can't put an 8+ win team on the field.

He was super successful in winning his spite against Jerry Richardson and finding a reason to get that admittedly dumb statue removed. One that he was supposedly contractually bound to retain. I just wish he'd pour that same amount of energy into football as he has in his disdain for Richardson, love for soccer, creating a woke social presence, and pissing off the one-half of the "two states one-team" mantra with his shenanigans in Rock Hill.

Today will be more of the same. You have to be a message board-level fan to even know anyone on our roster outside of the draft's number-one overall pick, Brian Burns, and maybe Thielen. Though I suspect a ton of fantasy football drafts had people saying in late rounds, "Thielen is on the Panthers now?" We've gone from having some of the best in the NFL at a number of positions to having a roster full of "I hope he works out" players having never reloaded once those tops in the NFL guys aged out.

The Carolina Panthers have an identity crisis and I fear today is not going to be the beginning of creating a new narrative. I have owned PSL's visa vie my dad, now mine after he passed ironically in 2018, since the very beginning. I have seen miracles, this very year, receiving an organ transplant just 17 days after getting approved on the donor list and just days before I would have died. I know what optimism looks and feels like and for some reason, this team just doesn't feel like there's anything to be optimistic about.

I hope I am terribly mistaken and we destroy the dirty birds today but I just can't deny I have this feeling that something is missing, that something is off and I can't quite put my finger on what it is. Again, I hope I am wrong, but I needed to lay down my marker.

Edited September 10, 2023 by ChapelHeel80