Steve Smith Interview

[DecrypticShadow]

I'm sure many of you are not in the mood to watch this after the embarrassment that can hardly be called a game today. However, I could not help but laugh at the brutal honesty that comes from Smitty in this interview. Enjoy!

[SgtJoo]

Wow. Lol.

[Gazi]

He's wearing the LA hat. outrage.

[realtriumph]

Thank you man. I love this dude.

Does anybody else notice that the players are more brutally honest and direct while Rivera sounds so optimistic and has a completely different viewpoint in his post-game interviews?

Rivera's attitude is not shared by the team when he spoke earlier today.

Cam's on the podium with little idea of what to say anymore.

I just don't like how much more vocal the players are compared to the coach. It just doesn't say good team chemistry. I know they wanted to establish Cam as a leader from the get go. But I think it was a mistake for Rivera not to get up there especially with us losing most games and keeping the players out of the light. Especially Cam.

I'll say this much if Cam figures out how to deal with all of this and Rivera ends up taking charge and this team gets back together as a group, it will mean something.

[Catalyst]

It's Rivera's job to stay optimistic and level-headed in public.

[realtriumph]

I know but so is being realistic.

Here's what the Titans said they did to stop us:

http://www.rotoworld.com/content/playerpages/playerbreakingnews.asp?sport=NFL&id=2386&line=219925&spln=1

Titans defensive coordinator Jerry Gray confirmed after Sunday's win that taking Steve Smith out of the Panthers' offense was Tennessee's primary goal entering Week 10.

The Titans used Cortland Finnegan against Smith for much of the game. The key was tackling well to minimize Smith's run-after-catch ability. "We just did a good job of trying to keep him bottled up," LCB Jason McCourty said. "He was able to get down the field a lot in previous games, so we tried to keep him in front of us and make tackles." In Week 11, Smith will square off with the Lions, whose aggressive defense doesn't typically double team or "key up to stop" opposing No. 1 receivers.

It's the same story. Smith makes this team. Without Smith we would look like we did today every day.

So why doesn't Cam know what happened today? He was asked in the presser if he knew what they did, and he said "he didn't know but they did something".

He looked really genuinely surprised as if he didn't understand why his passes no longer went for 70 and when his longest was 18 yards. Yet people will continue to ignore Smitty's effect. Titans didn't give a damn about Cam. They knew if they stop Smith, they stop Cam.

Why is it that even our opponents know who the main weapon is and the fans don't?

[Guest Irv]

he's right about one thing we were consistently awful the entire game.

[bleys]

our TE's are a big reason for this offenses success.. they obviously did something to take them out of the game which caused a downward spiral..

Smith has been successful due to them more than anything..

[The NFL Shield At Midfield]

http://www.panthers.com/media-vault/videos/Locker-Room-Talk/1f43d6e0-4ce9-4cb8-abcc-918e1d4c4f9f

Here's a link that's not someone holding a camera up to their iPad.

[RoadRunner]

Smitty knows the "truth" hurts...everyone

[CatMan72]

I was listening to Rivera's post game interview on WBT and he said "...you can get mad and pissed-off all you want, but we have to do something about it" so believe me, Rivera gives a damn and is biting his tongue. As the HC of the team, you have to keep yourself together, ranting and raving may feel good but it doesn't accomplish anything.

When you start ranting and raving in the media as a HC, it means you've lost control. Think about the top 10 press conference rants in the history of the NFL, where are those coaches now and how many rings do they have?

[realtriumph]

our TE's are a big reason for this offenses success.. they obviously did something to take them out of the game which caused a downward spiral..

Smith has been successful due to them more than anything..

Our TEs were not taken out though. Olsen got 45 and 4 receptions. Shockey got 1 for 19. Cam targeted Olsen 11 times though. Only hit him 4.

But they went mainly for Smith. That's how important his yac are. He doubles whatever all those other guys get. They were tackling Smith like a running back at point of catch today. It worked. They know if you u stand up and go one on one he'll stiff arm you and beat you.

But this offense is nothing without Smith.

[Guest Setfree1012]

What I noticed was, well it atleast seems to me that we did not run enough crossing patterns. From the POV I had (watched on tv), it seemed they were concerned about our passing attack vertically and the short/intermediate area of the field had room to be exploited.

I felt like we ran a lot of routes for the TE's to "sit", vs horizontally stretching the field to spread the Titans coverage in the middle of the field. We also had a few drops on easy passes which didn't help, but I was really disappointed watching us play like this, especially after a bye; and the penalties...smdh.

[Chaos]

The Titans defense played great yesterday. Add on top of that, there seemed to be a serious loss of morale when they took that punt back for the TD when the score was 0-0.