Answering all of your burning football and off topic questions this week!
Hello CSR! Welcome to Brian Answers, part two of your weekly Panthers fan mailbag for everyone! We’re chugging right along into July as we get closer an closer to training camp. You all brought questions, let’s answer some!
Bruce Guild: What improvements have been made this past year at BOA to improve the facility for camp? Do you feel the size and quality of the current training fields are a disadvantage to the team getting the most out of this 2025 camp?
I know last year massive renovations were approved and are in progress on the stadium, however those all appear to be focused on upgrading the fan experience more than anything. As far as the practice and training fields go, I’ve actually never been to the practices. Anyone who has gone recently should sound off below with their observations!
panthers2112: Do you think Canales has learned from start of last season and will let Bryce play in the preseason?
I’m not sure as of yet if Canales will change his method as far as the preseason goes. I do think he SHOULD, as it became pretty obvious the offense specifically wasn’t quite as ready to go as they possibly could have been with a few quarters of preseason action. However, this time around they aren’t installing an entirely new playbook, and the large majority of the starting offense will be the same personnel, so there’s definitely a strong chance Canales follows suit with last season. I hope he doesn’t, but I don’t know for sure as of yet.
dayneB12: Are the Panthers obligated to give a 53-man roster spot to Shy Tuttle given he took a pay cut?
Per OverTheCap, the Panthers and Tuttle agreed to a revised one year deal worth $3 million with an additional $3.5 mil available through incentives. As it stands, they could release him and save around $2 mil against the cap, so his spot is by no means guaranteed. However, with 3 down linemen in base and many nickel formations, and at least two down linemen in most heavier pass sets, there’s room for Tuttle as a rotational piece. The team usually hangs onto 5 or 6 interior defensive linemen, and I count 5 (Derrick Brown, Tershawn Wharton, Bobby Brown III, A’Shawn Robinson, and most likely rookie Cam Jackson) as locks to make the roster barring an injury. Tuttle could very well sneak in as a part of the pass rush rotation on the interior.
Bull123: Saw on Panthers website, a writer had Moore making the team over Renfro?
Also had several non-performing holdovers on defense (scott, johnson to begin with) also making the team?…surely we can do better?
what is you take on Renfro?…I say he not only makes the team, but gets considerable playing time & ends up being an impact player for us
I’ve been saying for awhile now in these mailbags that I would not be shocked at all if David Moore makes the final roster over someone like Hunter Renfrow or a rookie. I know many fans will roll their eyes at this since Moore isn’t the flashy new pieces with an unknown ceiling, but he definitely was a solid target for Bryce Young last season, albeit one they can definitely improve upon. I wouldn’t put money on Moore making the roster, but I definitely reserve the right to tell you all “I told you so!” if he does. I like Renfrow, I like his story, both before and after his battle with disease, but until he shows he’s back to his old self, he’s just another veteran fighting for a spot.
As of now, while the Panthers spent heavily on the defense, there’s not a ton of depth, especially in the secondary. So there’s going to be some holdovers that are replacement level on this defense for depth, you don’t build a top to bottom deep defense without significant investment spanning multiple seasons via the draft. So in those instances, they are going to opt to keep people that are familiar with the scheme until they can find better replacements.
schrodingersblackcat: I’m indulging myself in some hard-earned optimism. How will the first winning season in almost a decade impact CSR?
I think a winning season will do wonders for the community traffic. We will always have the die hard faithful (and we really appreciate you!!) here at CSR, that’s what makes this community unique to other fan sites. But, I do recall many new faces in the comments during those great 2013 and 2015 seasons, but many have since fallen off for a variety of reasons. I think a winning season will breathe life into fan interest again, and we’ll be welcoming back many names we haven’t seen in awhile.
Snarky_Comet: With it being so damn hot this week, did you ever see the classic Twilight Zone episode The Midnight Sun? (If not, watch it. It’s on both Paramount+ and PlutoTV.)
Great episode. It deals with the last two occupants of an apartment complex struggling to survive as the Earth gets closer and closer to the sun. Temperatures soar to unbearable levels, water is scarce, and society has collapsed into chaos.
Would you steal water from defenseless people to survive in a similar scenario?
Also would Matt Rhule be the ideal person to daily inform everyone how near we are to the sun?
“We’re close.”
I have not watched that, it has been added to my list! I actually thank you for the reminder, as a major fan of shows like Black Mirror I’ve been meaning to go back and watch the Twilight Zone classics.
I would probably try to work together with people as I’ve always been a member of friend groups that becomes very community like. However, I don’t know what Twilight Zone Brian would be like and I hope to never find out.
I think Matt Rhule would do a wonderful job, especially since his idea of “close” is a lot further away than most people think, so ideally that would buy us more time than we originally expected.
@WTMealey: woulda coulda shoulda
XL doesn’t drop the pass and Chuba doesn’t fumble and we maybe have 7 wins so getting to 9 this year seems more believeable
But what is the other side of the coin? Which or how many of our 5 wins are the other fanbase saying if…. we beat the Panthers and have one more win.
So big picture were we a 5 win team if we replay all those games again(especially with new improved BY) more or less?
Is 10 wins an unrealistic prediction for this year?
The Giants, Cardinals, and (2nd) Falcons games all went to overtime, so those games very easily could have been losses. The Panthers also only defeated the Saints the second time around by one point. So yeah, I don’t like playing this game!
I don’t think 10 wins is unrealistic, but I’m not going to put my stamp on there. We need to see this Panthers team beat a team like the Jaguars pretty handily in their first outing before I’d start thinking they have a chance at 10 wins or more. But starting the season against the Jaguars tends to be a good omen!
Good_Ol_Boy: What are your favorite console/PC video games? Do you have a favorite gaming system?
The game I’ve probably played the most since I was a kid and up to my adulthood is the Super Smash Bros franchise. Just a solid way to make you hate all your friends! I was also a huge Gears of War fan back during the Xbox 360 days, so I recently fired up the Gears of War Reloaded beta and that was a bit of nostalgia, very excited to try that out in August. I was always a big Madden guy but for many years it was just not good enough to fork out full price to play it. College Football 25 was a refreshing experience, and I have played a little bit of the most recent Madden as a result.
Favorite gaming system of all time is between the Nintendo GameCube and the Xbox 360. I made the change to Playstation 4 due to my preference for many of the Sony exclusives, and am a proud PS5 owner now. The Spiderman franchise on Playstation has been one of my favorite games.
That’s all for this week, Panthers fans! Join us next week for another edition of the mailbag!!