Smith's Bond With Graves Extends Beyond The Game

Fred Graves, now the wide receivers coach for the Carolina Panthers, remembers going on a recruiting trip to Santa Monica (Ca.) Junior College in 1998 to watch Chad Johnson, hoping to bring him to Utah where he was on Ron McBride's coaching staff. The more Graves watched Johnson (now Ochocinco), the more he noticed Steve Smith, a 5-foot, 9-inch bundle of fire and muscle. As a receiver, Smith was raw but he had a knack for making plays and his competitiveness drew Graves to him.

During a visit to Santa Monica, Graves asked Smith what he was doing that evening. Smith told him he had to work at Taco Bell, an after classes job that required him to ride the bus there and back. Though neither realized it at the time, it was the start of a friendship that developed during Smith's two seasons at Utah and has brought them together again with the Panthers this season.

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Panthers Take Another Step Back In 24-13 Loss To The Bengals

CINCINNATI – The biggest question surrounding the Carolina Panthers all summer has been whether or not Cam Newton will be the starting quarterback this season? But it turns out the Panthers have much bigger questions. For the second straight week Carolina’s defense looked dreadfully porous allowing the Cincinnati Bengals, who had scored just 10 points in their previous two preseason games, to roll up 269 yards and 24 points in the first half alone.

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Smith Hoping For Big Offensive Night In His Return Thursday

CHARLOTTE — Steve Smith’s timing couldn’t be any better. Smith announced Monday he’ll be back in the starting lineup this Thursday night when the Carolina Panthers travel to face the Cincinnati Bengals.
That good news comes after a lackluster performance by Carolina’s offense in a 20-10 loss to the Miami Dolphins this past Friday night and with an upcoming game in which top draft pick Cam Newton is expected to see his most extensive playing time with the Panthers.

Newton, Smith and the rest of the starters are expected to play about three quarters as coach Ron Rivera is treating the team’s third preseason game as if it were a regular season game. “It will be fun,” Smith said after Monday’s practice. “Today was probably our best practice. We were going on all cylinders.”

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Panthers Struggle Around Newton In His Second Game In 20-10 Loss To Dolphins

MIAMI GARDENS — Cam Newton isn't likely to save the tape from his second NFL pre-season game for posterity. Newton, the 2010 Heisman Trophy winner whom the Carolina Panthers made the first pick in last April's draft, showed calmness and leadership against the Dolphins Friday night at Sun Life Stadium, but was unable to get much accomplished against a Miami defense that played its starters against him most of the way. Newton was a respectable 7-of-14 passing for 66 yards while playing the first half, but guided the Panthers to just three first downs. Carolina's deepest penetration in the half was to the Miami 48 on the next-to-last play of the half.

"It went alright, but it could've gone much better," Newton said. "We couldn't find a way to (keep the offense) on track. To have all the three-and-outs we had, that's not acceptable."

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A Thought About Carolina / What 2008 And 2009 Tell Us About 2011

The Carolina Panthers fell apart last year after a decade of ranging from average to very good under John Fox, including two championship game appearances and another 12-4 season just two years earlier. Their collapse made me wonder: does it matter how a team did in the two years prior to a horrible season, in determining how they bounce back? So, I used the pro-football-reference team game finder to locate all teams that went 3-13 or worse in a season since 1990. I kicked out the first two years of the expansion Cleveland Browns, and looked at the remaining 41 teams to compare how they played (by simple rating) and how many wins they had in the two seasons prior to that 13+ loss season.

As it turns out, yes, knowing that the Carolina Panthers went 20-12 over the previous two seasons means we should shade them to be slightly better than your typical really bad team in 2011. First, though, we want to know what is typical. As it turns out, the average team that won 3 or fewer games in a season finishes 6-10 the next year (which is just another way of illustrating why Overs on teams with win projections under 6 are a good idea).

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Assessing Cam Newton

Throughout the 2011 season like I always did as a front-office executive, I will track the performance of the top 15 drafted players, analyzing their production prior to them slamming into the rookie wall, which is inevitable. This project is not to second-guess coaches, general managers or even the players, but it has always been an interesting study. Someone has to go No. 1, but is it really the best player in the draft? Were they taken for need, or was it just a flat-out bad pick?

Cam Newton is a tall, handsome young man with striking features, a broad, chiseled chin and a big, bright smile that lights up a room like several hundred halogen lamps. As one woman told me, he could be a male model during the offseason. In short, Newton has charisma, confidence and is very poised for a young man. While his youthfulness still shines through, along with moments of immaturity, he has grown up quickly in the last several months.

Let's take a quick walk down memory lane.

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Preseason Game One Final - Panthers 20 Giants 10

Jimmy Clausen started his second season with a bad flashback to his rookie year. Cam Newton began his NFL career with the kind of up-and-down performance that should have been expected from a quarterback who played only one full season on major-college football. But it was the Panthers' third-string quarterback who sealed the 20-10 win Saturday over the New York Giants in the preseason opener in front of an announced crowd of 71,936 at a damp Bank of America Stadium.

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