Pat Welter and Chris Lea preview the Panthers “win and they are in” game versus the Tampa Bay Buccaneers from Tampa, Fl.
Look at this beautiful view right here. Look at this beautiful view right here. Pat Walter, Chris Lee. We’re here in Tampa, Florida as we’re getting ready for the Carolina Panthers versus the Bucks. It’s happening Saturday at 4:30. And boy, there’s a lot on the line for the Carolina Panthers in this one, man. It all comes down to this. Well, it does and it doesn’t because they don’t actually have to win because the whole Falcons could actually win on Sunday, which would be a tiebreaker, kind of like Duke in the ACC, only this way, the The Panthers come out on top, but ultimately, they don’t want to deal with all that. A lot of the players said this week they didn’t even know about all of that, at least until after Monday Night Football, and the takeaway is that they’re not focusing on all of that. They want to win. They know they can win. They beat the Bucks 2 weeks ago. Now they’re on Tampa’s turf. The way things are trending, the Bucks are reeling. They’ve lost 8 of their last 10 games. The Carolina Panthers know if they can execute, just stick to the game. Plan. They have what it takes to win this game and earn a spot in the playoffs. And if you believe in patterns, I’m a, I’m a pattern recognition guy. The Panthers are winning every other week for the last 10 weeks. This would be their week to win, right? And this is the perfect week to win because, as you said, you don’t have to wait for the Falcons on Sunday and what they’re going to do against the Saints. You could just go ahead and win and everything’s taken care of and you win the division, you’re in the playoffs, which will be huge for this team that’s been rebuilding. It seems for a while now, since the last time they went to the playoffs in 2017. And right now under head coach Dave Canales, under general manager Dan Morgan, it feels like they found something here. Now they just have to really get a few pieces right and see if they can use these great, uh, uh, experiences over this, uh, season to see what they can build for in the future. But mainly the focus is on this game. The offense has to pull their weight. The the defense. Has been doing well. Offense really has been lagging behind. Bryce Young, under 200 yards passing in 12 games this season. One of those was 2 weeks ago against the Tampa Bay Bucs. The key there, he did throw 2 touchdowns, was able to get some balls down the field. Interesting stat I saw this week, Chris, is that when Bryce Young has completions of 20 air yards or more, they’ve won 4 or 5 games when he’s done that this season, the Bucks game being one of them. He did not have. That against Seattle, only had 54 yards passing in the game. He doesn’t need to be spectacular. They have established a formula here where they can win with minimal offense, but he has to be, for lack of a better word, clutch, and he has been in a lot of times this season, they’re going to need him to do it on Saturday. I’m going to point something out to you when it comes down to Bryce Young and his game. Usually if he faces a team the second time around, he’s a little bit better than the first time. Let’s go to the very first game versus The Atlanta Falcons. Don’t have the number off the top of my head, but it wasn’t 4:48, and that’s what he threw for the second time versus the Falcons, and that one was on the road. The first one was in Carolina, so he raised his level of competition when he went against the New Orleans Saints at home, and that was a loss. He was, it was like the Seattle game. It looked very reminiscent of that. He didn’t have a lot of yards. I want to say maybe in the 130 to 140 range passing. A little bit better the second time around. The Panthers ultimately just couldn’t, you know, stop the Saints. They were just on one that particular game. But Bryce’s competition level and his passing was a little bit better. Maybe his passing is a little bit better this time around versus the Bucks, which could help. get more yards, which could help them possibly secure the division because right now, uh, this will be a huge growing moment. If you want to compare, because people are always going to compare him to Cam Newton. Cam Newton first won the division in his 3rd year. This is year number 3 for Bryce Young. So if you want to get compared to him, maybe you got to do it in your 3rd year. Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of it comes down to Tederoli McMillan, right? Like they have had not had a lot of other options in the passing game this season. Xavier Legette has not lived up to his billing as, you know, what, a late 1st, early 2nd round pick. He is not. Tedero McMillan has as an early 1st-round pick in contention for Rookie of the Year. Now, he was under the weather against Seattle, downplayed how much of an impact it had on the game. You think if it came out that he was sick, that he clearly had. Sort of impact. 5 yards receiving. So there you go. And one thing I worry about or that people are worrying about is the blueprint. Like what Seattle did completely mystified Bryce Young. They not only shut down, they gave them like short yardage runs, forced out, basically checkdowns to the outside, and didn’t really leave much downfield for Bryce to navigate with. Now, is that a blueprint? Yes, but every team is different. Right? Like the Bucks and Todd Bowles have their own scheme. They like to blitz a lot. They like to stop the run. So I don’t necessarily think, oh, the Bucks are going to come out in this game and be like, Oh, let’s just copy what Seattle did. It’s week 18. You’re going to do what you do, but there’s certainly some elements of that I think they need to be wary of. What the Seahawks did is exactly what the Saints did in that home game where the Panthers lost after their big win versus Green Bay. Here’s something cool that could happen in the game. If you guys could get some extra cash. You can leave Florida and come back to Charlotte with some. Extra money. Uh, Rico Dall has been amazing this season. If he has 11 more yards from scrimmage, just 11, he will have a $1 million bonus. If he gets a touchdown, he’ll have an extra $250,000 in his bonus and incentives in his contract. Let’s not leave out Mike Jackson. Uh, if he just, if the Panthers just get to the playoffs, well, he has an extra $500 million in his pocket. So, uh, this trip could be very fruitful and very, um, I guess, rainy. Let it rain for a lot of these Panthers players out there. I, I haven’t heard that. I, I don’t know if our contracts have anything like if we get through the postgame live shots without stumbling once. Maybe we get a bonus, something maybe we could potentially talk about. I’m just kidding. One bonus we know we won’t see Mike Evans in his 1000 yards. Like every year at the week 18 mark, it seems to be Mike Evans going absolutely off, ruining fantasy football seasons or making fantasy football seasons. He’s had a lot of injuries this year. That’s not on the cards, but he’s back healthy. He played against Carolina a couple of weeks ago, scored a touchdown, and I think one thing that Ted McMillan said was interesting. On his side was that the refs let them play in that game, very physical, which works in Tre McMillan’s favor, works in a physical receiver like Mike Evans’ favor. So we’ll see how the refs impact this game too. It’s going to be interesting to see what happens Saturday 4:30 kickoff right here in Tampa, Florida. And of course, the Panthers don’t have to win. They can wait for Sunday and hope that the Falcons get the win so they can get to the playoffs. But if not, if they want to keep it in their hands, get a win and you’re in.