Time to pull for the Bucs for the next few weeks. They could do us a few favors.


Also, Fortners will lose to AZ.

[Edited on December 9, 2013 at 8:46 AM. Reason : .]

12/9/2013 8:45:18 AM

you lose one game in 2 months and the trolls come out of hiding

12/9/2013 8:46:59 AM

well that sucked. can't say I didn't see it coming though

NFC South (3-1) Games remaining (2): NO, @ATL
NFC West (2-2) Games remaining: None
NFC 2nd place 2012 (2-0) Games remaining: None
AFC East (2-1) Games remaining (1): NYJ

most playoff projections get Carolina in at 10-6 assuming Arizona doesn't do anything silly like win out. a win over the NYJ puts us in really good shape. a win @ ATL in the last week likely solidifies our 5 seed. IF we can win out, and NO loses to STL, we still can pull off the #2 seed, but I think that is the only way. the only other potential problem is the NFC East 2nd place team, but that will take a few weeks to clear up.

12/9/2013 8:51:30 AM

man this season is bittersweet for me, we'll make the playoffs but seeing steve smith finally over the hill is tough to get used to, some of those articles saying we were overrated went kind of overboard but our vertical passing game is certainly a major cause for concern, we should draft three wide receivers in the next draft

[Edited on December 9, 2013 at 9:54 AM. Reason : k]

12/9/2013 9:51:42 AM

I've got a crush on Benjamin from FSU. I hope he comes out this year.

12/9/2013 9:59:58 AM

Quote :

"we should draft three wide receivers in the next draft"

that's the last thing i want.

12/9/2013 10:40:46 AM

Jonathan Stewart with a serious knee injury

12/9/2013 10:56:28 AM

Absolutely got their asses kicked last night. Still a playoff team but this definitely curbs a little of the enthusiasm. This team has some major holes on offense, and when the pass rush isn't working the defense is gettable.

12/9/2013 12:28:22 PM

The pass rush isn't as effective if the opposing QB is making a bunch of quick passes, west coast offense style. Brees can obviously do that, he's pretty baller. I figured Brady would do that in the Pats game, and he kind of did, but they always wanted to take their deep shots and that's when we could get pressure on him and get some sacks and hurries. This is just a bump in the road though. The game in 2 weeks should play out much differently than last night's game.

Still, barring a meltdown, we will have to play New Orleans and/or Seattle at their place in the playoffs, and we need to make some big adjustments. Although even last night's game could've gone a lot differently if we had been up 14-0 after 1 instead of 6-0.

12/9/2013 12:50:51 PM

yesterday was a bad day for knees in the NFL

12/9/2013 12:51:08 PM

if Gano would have made that damned field goal!!!

12/9/2013 12:53:05 PM

12/9/2013 1:01:46 PM

The tke troll has posted more in this thread in 2 weeks than he has 2 years in his team's thread

it's a bit pathetic

[Edited on December 9, 2013 at 1:10 PM. Reason : guys i couldnt think of anything good so im just gonna use my school and my frat letters]

12/9/2013 1:07:09 PM

what I meant by that was if Gano would have made his FG, then the Panthers would have been down by only 2 scores. Then Cam could have led a comeback instead of running the clock out



(BTW, it's no fun posting in the Bears thread if nobody else will post with me.)

12/9/2013 1:09:01 PM

I haven't read anything to confirm it, but I'd be willing to bet that Brees averaged less than 3 seconds per completion for the entire game

pretty impossible to get in his face when he's getting rid of it that quick

it's the exact same thing Manning did to the Chiefs in Denver a few weeks back

12/9/2013 1:27:46 PM

He was getting the ball out quick, but come on, he dropped back 42 times. The front four failed to generate any pressure last night, we only started getting to him with blitzes in the second half. That's a massive fail.

12/9/2013 2:03:25 PM

Rivera said Stew had a torn MCL in his press conference yesterday. Out a minimum of 2-3 weeks.

I hate to say it, but I don't see him being on the team next year. We've got to get rid of one of these guys anyway and he just can not stay healthy.

12/10/2013 9:01:59 AM

Not sure if it's been mentioned, but Kuechly got exposed quite a bit in coverage. Graham, Colston, and others were killing him in the middle of the field.

It's not all his fault -- the pass rush sucked, and the Tampa 2 defense asks him to cover an insane amount of ground -- but Brees had him guessing all night. They'd usually put two guys in his zone, forcing him to play in between or sell out and cover one guy. Almost every time, he guessed wrong.

That was the most concerning thing for me. Everyone knew our secondary would get exposed, but I didn't think Kuechly (our best defender) would be getting picked on all night. Hope they get that sorted out by next week.

12/10/2013 12:34:15 PM

Would love to see Barner get a few touches, especially after seeing what Sproles did to us. He could be a weapon catching the ball out of the backfield, and give the offense a little spark down the stretch. The lack of explosive playmaking outside of Cam's scrambling is hurting us.

12/10/2013 12:34:28 PM

^^ He didn't have a good night, but I think McDermott got the gameplan wrong going in.

You can't play those big zones with Brees and ask Kuechly to cover that long, especially if the rush isn't getting there. He's going to kill that.

Disclaimer: I am as armchair quarterback as the come but they need to blitz the hell out of him and try to man up some on the outside and get bumps off the line to attempt to disrupt the timing of their finesse offense.

Even more so on 3rd down. Get everybody up and make him throw hot there. There's no reason he should be given a chance to throw the ball 15 yards down the field on 3rd and 9. I love the way Rex Ryan plays 3rd down defense for this very reason. Sure, he's going to beat you every now and then, but at least we would be getting a lot more negative plays too on top of getting off the field when you take care of business on 1st and 2nd down.

One other little thing I noticed that didn't happen Sunday. We are pretty good about showing that double A gap blitz on 3rd down and keeping the quarterback and line guessing on who to block. We didnt show that to Brees and he knew automatically whether he had it blocked up or not presnap and could release the back at that point.

It felt like they were in a two minute drill and we were in prevent the first half of the game.

12/10/2013 12:49:35 PM

Saints-Panthers not flexed into SNF next week, but will be the Fox Game of the Week, meaning we finally get Buck/Aikman

12/10/2013 1:18:51 PM

We just need to worry about beating the Jets and Falcons at this point and securing the five seed. Go into the New Orleans game more concerned about the experience rather than winning as that would be our second round opponent assuming we get one playoff win.

12/10/2013 1:21:43 PM

we need to worry about going into that game and whooping their bitch asses. also, if they lose to the Rams, we can still get the #2 seed (not sure if them losing to TB would help or not)

12/10/2013 1:27:32 PM

any loss helps if we win out

12/10/2013 1:34:00 PM

Quote :

"Saints-Panthers not flexed into SNF next week, but will be the Fox Game of the Week, meaning we finally get Buck/Aikman"

oh joy.

12/10/2013 1:45:22 PM

would you rather listen to Myers/Ryan again?

12/10/2013 1:57:30 PM

I want Billick back. He's our good luck charm.

12/10/2013 5:29:45 PM

^

also fuck joe buck, worse than ian eagle

EDIT: finally some playoff scenarios

http://espn.go.com/blog/nflnation/post/_/id/106203/2013-nfl-week-15-playoff-scenarios

Quote :

"CAROLINA PANTHERS Carolina clinches a playoff spot with: 1) CAR win + ARI loss + SF loss + DAL loss or tie OR 2) CAR win + ARI loss + SF loss + PHI loss or tie "

[Edited on December 10, 2013 at 5:55 PM. Reason : add another note]

12/10/2013 5:38:47 PM

^^ this team is good enough to not need a good luck charm

I'm not too high on Billick, anyways

12/10/2013 5:56:30 PM

I've always like Tim Ryan since i first heard him doing his daily show on NFL Radio. When we were 1-2 this year and Rivera was on the hot seat, he said Richardson should extend his contract. I was like wtf? But it looks like he was probably right.

12/10/2013 10:54:28 PM

I'm fairly certain that you are his only fan who isn't related to him

12/10/2013 11:15:12 PM

does Game of the Week = 4pm time slot?

12/11/2013 8:55:52 AM

Quote :

"would you rather listen to Myers/Ryan again?"

I'd rather not listen to any of Fox's broadcast teams, because they are all terrible. But Aikman is the worst.

12/11/2013 9:09:48 AM

Gus and Charles Davis is a good crew

12/11/2013 9:26:05 AM

12/11/2013 11:01:31 AM

Quote :

"I think we are in trouble @NO. I just dont like the matchup. We are really strong against the run but NO doesn't rely on the run. They will just spread us out to negate our pass rush and pick on our weak secondary. Jimmy graham is such a tough matchup for us. On the other side the saints are stingy against the pass this year so we will have trouble throwing. They are really bad against the run but we haven't been able to run very effectively this year except with cam Could see thid being like a 27 - 16 type loss."

Wow. Can't nail it much harder than this.

12/11/2013 4:54:20 PM

The disappointing part is we were running the ball well and could have continued to do so had they not run away with the game in the 2nd quarter. Not scoring TDs on those two opening red zone possessions killed the entire gameplan.

12/11/2013 6:18:34 PM

It's funny how face seeks public validation for anything he says that is remotely right. I've never seen anyone else do that.

Don't hurt yourself patting your own back, big guy.

12/11/2013 7:26:42 PM

Because this messageboard has an obsession anytime I get something wriong

12/11/2013 11:51:11 PM

which is like 98% of the time.

12/12/2013 7:30:44 AM

Controversial statements like "Jimmy graham is such a tough matchup for us" are things only face sees when he analyzes the matchups. Only the most advanced metrics can find hidden gems like that.

12/12/2013 10:08:02 AM

Black jerseys and black pants Sunday.

12/12/2013 10:37:09 AM

All black unis sunday

[Edited on December 12, 2013 at 10:38 AM. Reason : same time lol]

12/12/2013 10:37:33 AM

The last time they said that they did a last minute switch to silver pants for the Pats game.

12/12/2013 11:26:42 AM

well you don't break out the greatest uniforms in nfl history for just any old game.

12/12/2013 11:27:45 AM

http://www.grantland.com/blog/the-triangle/post/_/id/85597/how-the-panthers-were-remade

Nice postmortem on how Hurney ruined the team.

12/12/2013 12:49:21 PM

All black for the jets?! But not the big game versus NOLA?

12/13/2013 2:30:19 AM

We have conceded the division at this point so the jets and falcons are our biggest games because we need to win both of those to ensure we make the playoffs.

12/13/2013 9:19:10 AM

I'm not conceding the division until NO beats STL Sunday

12/13/2013 9:20:07 AM

Tampa isn't gonna lie down for them in week 17 either

12/13/2013 9:52:07 AM