So what ELSE went wrong?

[Mr. Scot]

First off, it’s been a long time since I’ve watched a game that hurt as much as this one did

Going past that though, why exactly did this disaster happen?

The most obvious answer would be a complete meltdown by Jake Delhomme. I’ve got a separate thread on that. This one will be about the other reasons.

I see them as follows:

RUN BLOCKING: While the pass blocking was, for the most part, at least decent, the run blocking for this game was just plain awful.

Granted, the Cardinals clearly schemed to stop the run, and going down by so many points took us out of our preferred game plan. Still, even early on when the game was within reach, the blocking just wasn’t what it needed to be. With no push up front, Williams and Stewart were forced to run into bottlenecks in every series but the first. As a result, they were held completely in check.

I’d have to add that as much as I hate it because I’ve long been a fan, I think Jeremy Bridges might have played himself out of a job.

PLAYCALLING: To call Jeff Davidson’s first playoff outing as an offensive coordinator a failure would likely be generous. I hated the playcall on third and short backed up early in the first quarter. My fear on seeing that was that there would be a lot more plays after that which I would also hate. Sadly, that turned out to be true.

What struck me as much of anything was the lack of any kind of short or medium game. It was mostly either a run or chucking it deep. Some of that is on Jake, but you can’t let Davidson off the hook either. The defense the Cardinals ran could have been exploited with a decent short game or a little misdirection. A few attempts of this type were made, but too few. Far too few.

In fairness, this was his first playoff game. Hopefully it’ll serve as a learning experience.

DEFENSIVE SCHEME: I’ve long been a Trgovac critic, and this game made it all that much clearer that he simply needs to go. Why wasn’t Fitzgerald accounted for? Someone should have been attached to him from the very beginning. With Anquan Boldin out and the Cardinals run game not a serious threat, how in the world can you not put extra effort into stopping the one real threat that the team has? Awful.

PASS RUSH: Or rather, the lack of it. Even with our injured guys back in, Warner had all day to sit in the pocket and find Larry Fitzgerald (not that he needed all day given how poorly Fitzgerald was covered).

SECONDARY: They’ll be a scapegoat for this game, and while it isn’t entirely their fault given the poor scheming and lack of pass rush, they certainly played their role.

It’s been discussed that Ken Lucas is a bad fit for the kind of coverage the Panthers prefer, though even with that in mind he has plenty of critics. Either the scheme or Lucas will likely be “adjusted” this offseason. I’d put my bets on it being Lucas.

As to Charles Godfrey, he hit the rookie wall a long time ago. Jonathan Stewart did too, but he played through it and got back on track. Godfrey? Not so much. To be clear, I think he’ll be just fine in seasons to come, but down the stretch this season he’s been pretty rough. This game was no exception.

Gamble and Harris? They did what they usually do, but with the other half of the secondary playing poorly, it just wasn’t enough.

My overall read on the defense? Someone will likely say that the defense was better in the second half than the first. I’d agree in part, but I’d also add that the Cardinals coasted somewhat in the second half. And while that’s generally a dangerous thing to do, with our offense playing like it was, it turned out to be a luxury they could afford.

DISCIPLINE: Undisciplined doesn’t even begin to cover it. Sloppy might be the better word. On defense, blown coverages, missed assignments, poor tackling, dumb penalties…ugh! You’d have an easier time listing the mistakes the defense didn’t make. In fairness though, they were under the gun way too often because the offense was doing so badly.

And what of the offense? Some false starts (inexcusable at home) and poor blocking. Overall though, I’d have to put most of the offensive issues on Delhomme.

OVERCONFIDENCE: I’m iffy on this one. It seems like the Panthers may have believed the hype to a point, and it only got worse when the first drive looked so easy.

I’m reminded of the national championship game a few years back where Ohio State’s Ted Ginn ran back an opening kickoff. It looked like it was going to be an easy blowout at that point. It was, but for Florida, not the Buckeyes.

This game was almost a mirror of that one.

COACHING: The Panthers were outcoached, at every corner, on every level, period. Whatever it was that they saw about our offense gave them a tactical advantage. That advantage led to a point advantage that was just too much to overcome.

My final Take: Congrats to the Cardinals. I’ll cheer for them from here on out…

…but it’s gonna take a while to get over the pain from this one

[g-man430]

I'm already over it. Go Steelers. Time to move on. I knew it after that Saints game. We couldn't put them away.

[John Fox]

everything

i'm done with the NFL till next season, won't even watch the superbowl

[George Shinnsplints]

Great post, but cross-posted from Panthersfanz.com , eh?

I didn't even realize that site existed until tonight. Not a whole lot of cross-pollination from there generally, for whatever reason.

[bigdog_10_2002]

at one point in time I saw C. J. Wilson in man coverage against Fitzgerald.

That was the biggest WTF moment of my life thus far....

I knew we were doomed from that point on

[stankowalski]

What went wrong?? Jake, Jake, Jake, and did I mention Jake?

End of story, print it.

[Snake]

I think alot of whats wrong with Jon Foxes ways became very clear tonight. What sticks in my mind is that our Defense looked lost in coverage most of the game. Throwing there hands up looking at other players with a big fat ? over there heads. Then on the other side of the ball they just made Jake throw the ball quicker then the wanted to and yea guess what that did. This is not some masterful scheme hell it worked on Warner when Beason pick him off but getting in Jakes face and making him not trust his lineman were the key to winning.

[Mr. Scot]

What went wrong?? Jake, Jake, Jake, and did I mention Jake?

End of story, print it.

There's a whole other thread on Delhomme - several, in fact - but the notion that he was the only thing that went wrong with this game is silly.

Pretty sure Jake wasn't assigned to cover Larry Fitzgerald, or scheme against him for that matter.

(of the issues listed above, that's my biggest pet peeve)

[stankowalski]

There's a whole other thread on Delhomme - several, in fact - but the notion that he was the only thing that went wrong with this game is silly.

Pretty sure Jake wasn't assigned to cover Larry Fitzgerald, or scheme against him for that matter.

(of the issues listed above, that's my biggest pet peeve)

Jake's turnovers fuged up the whole gameplan...do you not understand this?

[CarolinaSock]

I really find it hard to place a ton of blame on any individual part of the defense. Lucas should have made a play on the one jump ball and just didn't adjust at all, he just over ran the play even though he was looking back at the ball. Warner was able to get rid of the ball almost instantly a lot tonight. When he didn't he always had the middle to step into because I saw no push up the gut at all tonight except the one sack (where Peppers forced Warner to step into Lewis). The gameplan was just absolutely ridiculous from the start though. Running that soft ass zone against Warner and Fitz should be a fireable offense.

From the run blocking it seemed nothing to the outside worked. They always stretched it out and shot a gap to hit the RB before he could turn up field. We seemed to have all our success up the gut or behind Otah (I remember one run in particular where the right side of the offensive line completely cleared that side of the field of Arizona D-lineman) but we kept trying those stupid tosses and stretch plays.

[g-man430]

I blame everybody. The only person who played tonight was Jones on special teams.

[goodlay]

everything

i'm done with the NFL till next season, won't even watch the superbowl

Im feeling the same way.

[beastson]

I think the Panthers was feeling themselves a little too much this game

[Mr. Scot]

Jake's turnovers f*cked up the whole gameplan...do you not understand this?

You wanna explain how turnovers lead a defensive coordinator to not double the other team's best receiver when the other receivers and the run game aren't major threats?

Delhomme was a big part of the loss tonight, but it wasn't all on his head. The notion that nobody else played (or coached) badly or thet every other issue stemmed directly from Delhomme is ridiculous to the point of being goofy.