NFL 2016: Regular season grades for every team
By John Buhler
Whatever went right for the Carolina Panthers last year went horribly wrong in 2016. Carolina went from 15-1 and NFC Champions to a sub-.500 team almost immediately out of the gate. Who’s to blame? A little bit of everyone.
Carolina got atrocious play from its front-seven in the early part of their schedule. That unit is usually the Panthers’ bread and butter. Combine that with a non-existent running game and the Panthers found themselves in a hole they could never dig themselves out of.
Quarterback Cam Newton’s footwork was abysmal, as was his completion percentage. The 2015 NFL MVP regressed significantly in his sixth year in the league. Linebacker Luke Kuechly spent half the season in concussion protocol. One has to wonder if his brilliant NFL career will be only a brief one?
There were some player that had good years like tight end Greg Olsen, wide receiver Kelvin Benjamin, and rookie cornerback James Bradberry. In short, Carolina revealed its true colors in 2016: a team full of front-runners that benefited from a Charmin soft 2015 schedule en route to Super Bowl 51.
We expected regression to maybe 11-5, but not to anything sub-.500. Carolina looked decent in about half of its games, but that was nowhere near good enough to win the NFC South for the fourth year in a row. This team has serious work to do in the offseason, with an attitude check being priority No. 1.