Something we all know

[panthers55]

Aw poo, well let's pack it in then guys. We suck and there's no hope. Who's going to be the first to drink the poisoned punch?

Nice try with the whole discredit him by going to the absurd. Why can't you accept the fact we ar not a good team this year and for much of the year were pretty bad. We are trending up and the last few weeks have been great. If we had played like that all year we would be in the playoffs.

You seem to vacillate all across the board with your main goal to be a contrarian and argue rather than propose reasonable well thought out positions.

[Fox007]

I'd rather be a "crappy" 9-5 colts team headed to the playoffs than a "good" 7-9(at best) team headed straight to the couch after the season.

Kids these days must have a different definition of good.

[TheRed]

Nice try with the whole discredit him by going to the absurd. Why can't you accept the fact we ar not a good team this year and for much of the year were pretty bad. We are trending up and the last few weeks have been great. If we had played like that all year we would be in the playoffs.

You seem to vacillate all across the board with your main goal to be a contrarian and argue rather than propose reasonable well thought out positions.

Oh I accepted that fact long ago. Isn't that a prerequisite for being a Panthers fan?

Well absurdity was the point. I was not serious, just ribbing you a bit.

[The_Mango55]

Honestly that doesn't mean anything. Those rankings are subjective and show nothing.

But the only statistic that matters is win-loss record. You can lead the league in scoring points but if you give up more than you score you end up with a poor record. You can have more yards than another team but if you have fewer points then it doesn matter.

So win- loss record at the end of the day is all that matters.

Win loss record is what matters at the end of the current day, but at the beginning of the next day the other stuff matters more.

So to say it doesn't matter is incorrect.

[Salvo]

There are far more variables to a win-loss record than the two numbers that define it. And it's more than a strength of schedule issue. Each game is defined individually. This is the era of modern NFL where the difference between a 2-14 team and a 14-2 is not as substantial as it was in the old days. I am a firm believer of the saying "any given Sunday" because the record only has meaning during the week leading up to the game. But when the game comes, that record becomes irrelevant.

How the hell did we lose to the Chiefs? Our record would indicate that we were somewhat of a better team than they were but that certainly was not the case that Sunday. We didn't play badly, but emotion can give one team an advantage.

We smacked the Falcons around two weeks ago and should have beaten them at their place early in the year. Yet, they have twice as many wins? Are they twice the better team than we are?

We aren't debating how successful we are compared to other teams in this thread. Success determines each team's record because it defines finality...and in that case, we haven't been very successful this season. But skill and talent are the underlying factors beneath that record and that's what this thread is about.

[The_Mango55]

What do all your fancy stats do for you? Make you feel better?

Actual players and coaches only care about 1 stat(2 if you count salary), and it doesn't take a genius to figure out what that is.

Let me guess, the stat they care about is wins? I guess Rivera or whoever is coaching next year will hire all the texans and falcons castoffs since they all have more wins than Anyone on our team.

[panthers55]

Let me guess, the stat they care about is wins? I guess Rivera or whoever is coaching next year will hire all the texans and falcons castoffs since they all have more wins than Anyone on our team.

First of all you want their starters not castoffs. Secondly Philly has demonstrated that some great individual players don't guarantee that you will play well as a team or win. But if Rivera is still here, how well he can mold the players in a cohesive unit that has good chemistry and plays well together will determine how long he stays here. If isn't who has the best individual players but who plays best as a team. A great team is when the overall success of the team is better than would be predicted based on the sum of the individual parts.

[Mother Grabber]

I've lost a lot of poker hand where I had a better than 77% chance of winning...

[CRA]

Honestly that doesn't mean anything. Those rankings are subjective and show nothing.

But the only statistic that matters is win-loss record. You can lead the league in scoring points but if you give up more than you score you end up with a poor record. You can have more yards than another team but if you have fewer points then it doesn matter.

So win- loss record at the end of the day is all that matters.

Depends on what you are looking at.....wins and losses are the end all be all to some questions. They aren't for others.

You can take 2 teams that are 1-15 and have them play. One will be favored.....one will be favored bc you don't actually judge a team on just record alone in terms of who has better odds to win a game

[panthers55]

Depends on what you are looking at.....wins and losses are the end all be all to some questions. They aren't for others.

You can take 2 teams that are 1-15 and have them play. One will be favored.....one will be favored bc you don't actually judge a team on just record alone in terms of who has better odds to win a game

If they are both 1-15, how could they play each other because the season would be over unless they also made the playoffs.

Just sayin.................

[KendrickPanther]

No we are our record. We legitimately lost all those games. The only one I felt even a little robbed was against the Cowboys when we converted the 4th down and they gave the Cowboys a timeout. Then on the following play there was contact on Louis Murphy but no flag. Still we played and coached terrible for most of the season. You can't watch a blow out against an even worse team in week 15 and decide we were good all along.

[SgtJoo]

Honestly that doesn't mean anything. Those rankings are subjective and show nothing.

But the only statistic that matters is win-loss record. You can lead the league in scoring points but if you give up more than you score you end up with a poor record. You can have more yards than another team but if you have fewer points then it doesn matter.

So win- loss record at the end of the day is all that matters.

Did you not see the Objective vs Subjective rankings?

The Colts have the highest differential, they're overrated.

We have the most negative differential, we're being slept on.

[Thorrez]

Actually we are not better than our record indicates. John Madden frequently says that you are what your record says you are. Now if you want to say that we have the potential to be better than our record, then that might be the case. Our offense has yet to show that they can come back and win a close game. Our defense has yet to show that we can create turnovers and shut down other teams in the 4th quarter like we did in the past. We are fine if we get a big lead but how are playing from behind???

The reasons above are why we are 5-9. Until we can show that we can finish games, we are a 5-9 team trying to improve to 7-9 which is still a losing record.

As you refuse the consider the arguments people put here let me give it to you in a simple way:

Denver is 11-3, now Manning and Von Miller get hurt in practice and placed on IR. With your, and Maddens, logic they are still just as good as they are still a 11-3 team.

The world is never black and white, regardless of what John Madden says.

[Urrymonster]

A teams record indicates how good a season a team has had, not how good that team is. There is a plethora of things that might cause a good team to lose to a lesser team.

If you only care about wins as a measure then you need to think about multiple season records to prevent the anomalies from having a major impact. Case example - who is the better team, the Detroit lions or the panthers? One was playoff bound last year but that season was essentially an anomaly compared to the surrounding years, the other had a worse record last year but currently has a better record this year.

Looking at Detroit, were they really one of the teams in the nfl last year? Or did they benefit from reasons outside of the teams ability? This season suggests last year was a fluke. Considering that bow can you reliably use a single seasons record as the measuring stick on how good a team actually is???