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CAROLINA
Joseph Person of The Athletic looks at the prognosis for Coach Matt Rhule and the Panthers:
When head coaching vacancies emerged at USC and LSU this past fall, Matt Rhule told his Panthers’ players he could get one of the top college jobs and make more money but he wanted to be with them in Charlotte. Rhule’s comments, made during a team meeting, presumably were meant to assure his players of his belief in what he calls “the process,” which has come under increasing fire as the Panthers have lost 21 of 31 games under Rhule’s tenure.
Rhule was hired in Carolina in 2020 after overseeing quick turnarounds at Temple and Baylor, but sources say owner David Tepper is unhappy and embarrassed after the $16 billion hedge fund manager gave Rhule a seven-year, $62 million deal to outbid the New York Giants for his services. Tepper apparently plans to give Rhule a third year, with Rhule saying this week the owner had privately expressed “nothing but confidence about me and the future and moving forward.” But the three-month collapse after a 3-0 start has tested everyone’s patience, with one Panthers source characterizing the team’s regression in Rhule’s second season as “a clusterfuck.”
A 32-6 loss to Tampa Bay last weekend matched the largest margin of defeat in his two seasons, but Rhule said his process is “1,000 percent working,” even if the results don’t show it. There is growing skepticism among some Panthers players about whether that’s the case. Many of the 20-plus players, staffers, team and league sources interviewed for this story believe the same attributes that made Rhule a successful college coach are undermining his efforts in the NFL.
They say Rhule — like a lot of ex-college coaches used to controlling every facet of the program — has the tendency to micromanage “everything that touches football,” as one source put it. Rhule has the final say on roster decisions, although he called that a formality when general manager Scott Fitterer was hired in January, saying the two would work collaboratively.
Fitterer said the arrangement is similar to the setup in Seattle with head coach Pete Carroll and GM John Schneider. But where Carroll had been an NFL and college head coach before being hired in Seattle in 2010, Rhule’s only previous NFL experience was a one-year stint as the Giants’ assistant offensive line coach in 2012 under Tom Coughlin.
Rhule, who turns 47 in January, has leaned heavily on his Temple and Baylor connections in building his staff and roster. And though more than half of the assistants on Rhule’s first Panthers staff had at least some NFL experience, none had been an NFL head coach or coordinator.
“The proof’s in the pudding,” said one veteran personnel official. “The product on the field is bad.”
Rhule points to the team’s defense — ranked second in the league in yards allowed — as a sign of progress and has praised his team’s effort level even as the Panthers have dropped 10 of their past 12 games. And Rhule’s defenders, including current Panthers receiver Robby Anderson, note that Rhule’s college teams made their biggest jumps in his third season. “We’re still stacking bricks,” Anderson said this week. “We’re still building the foundation. We’re still building the culture.”
For Rhule to replicate his third-year success in Charlotte, he needs to fix the offensive line, solve the quarterback question that to this point has eluded him and hope Christian McCaffrey stays healthy. He also needs to find an offensive coordinator — among other expected staff changes — after firing Joe Brady on Dec. 5 during the team’s bye week.
That’s the shortlist for a coach who has lost at least a portion of the team’s fan base while trying to maintain the support of his players and owner.
In addition to “the process,” Rhule also likes to talk about “the brand,” which he describes as being a tough, hard-nosed, competitive team. It’s a philosophy shared by ex-Giants coaches Coughlin and Bill Parcells, whom Rhule aspired to be growing up in New York City.
Rhule wants to run the ball 30-33 times a game, but that’s been a challenge with McCaffrey hurt again and the Panthers being forced to throw the ball after falling behind. And though he says he’d prefer not to do it, Rhule also has been using two quarterbacks, a platoon system more often seen in college.
The defense has been the strength of the team, but it’s built on speed and athleticism, which makes the Panthers susceptible to downhill, power-running attacks. Defensive coordinator Phil Snow’s group has shown cracks while being forced to play almost flawlessly to keep the Panthers in games. “The defense is starting to wear down,” said a longtime NFC personnel executive. “They don’t have a lot of size on defense, which is starting to show late in the year.”
The Panthers have allowed 30.4 points during their current five-game losing streak. Only the Steelers (31.0 ppg) and the Chargers (30.5) have allowed more points since Week 10. Facing an injury-depleted Buccaneers offense last week, the defense gave up its longest run and longest completion of the season — both in the first half.
The Panthers are tied for 23rd with 16 takeaways — a statistic Snow said has to improve for the defense to become elite. “We are making progress, but it’s not where we want,” he said. “To be a championship-level defense, we’ve gotta get more turnovers and create more plays that change the game, and not give them up.”
Another veteran scout said it’s tough to say what the Panthers’ identity is, but it’s not toughness.
“(Rhule) can say toughness in his mind, but they’re not oozing toughness on the field,” the scout said. “They’re soft. They’re a really soft football team. I don’t see the defense stopping anybody where it’s a 14-13 score. That’s tough football.”
Still, the defense has easily outperformed the offense, which ranks near the bottom of the league in total offense (28th with 305.7 ypg), passing offense (29th with 196.1 per game) and scoring offense (26th with 18.5 ppg).
Rhule’s success or failure likely will be determined by his ability to find a franchise quarterback. After moving on from Teddy Bridgewater, the Panthers traded three draft picks to the Jets for Sam Darnold, the NFL’s lowest-rated passer in 2020. Before Darnold ever threw a pass for them, the Panthers picked up his fifth-year option for ’22 at a guaranteed $18.9 million.
After a promising start, Darnold — without McCaffrey and behind a suspect line — reverted to what he called “choppy feet” in the pocket, resulting in interceptions and poor timing in the passing offense. When Darnold cracked his shoulder blade near midseason, the Panthers signed Cam Newton in the hopes the 2015 MVP could salvage their playoff chances. Newton accounted for two short touchdowns in a cameo roll at Arizona and completed 21-of-27 passes against Washington before hitting a wall.
In his past four starts, Newton completed 47.4 percent of his passes and had a 44.5 passer rating. Panthers’ quarterbacks have combined for a league-worst 67.5 passer rating and have thrown 19 interceptions, more than any team except the Jets (20).
The offense has improved slightly yardage-wise in three games under interim play-caller Jeff Nixon. But the Panthers have averaged only 13.7 points a game over that span, eight points a game fewer than their output in Brady’s final three games as coordinator. (It’s worth noting Nixon did not have a placekicker in the Buffalo loss after Zane Gonzalez was injured in warmups.)
Rhule’s decision to fire Brady followed a 23-point loss at Miami and was made during the bye week. Despite the Panthers’ 5-7 record at the time, Rhule stuck to his plans to give players and coaches the entire bye week off, which Kansas City’s Andy Reid and other coaches have done.
Rhule said he made up his mind on Brady later in the week. “I kind of came out of the (Miami) game with some feelings in a lot of different areas,” Rhule told reporters, “and just took the week to go back and watch tape and think about it.”
Brady’s firing — a jarring development for a 32-year-old play caller who interviewed for five head-coaching vacancies last offseason — came just after the early Week 13 games were beginning. Rhule, who was in Charlotte for the ACC Championship Game on Dec. 4, planned to inform Brady of his decision Saturday, but Brady was unavailable.
Brady, LSU’s passing game coordinator during the Tigers’ 2019 national championship season, was the rare Rhule assistant who was not with him at Temple or Baylor. Although the two have the same agent, they had never worked together before Rhule brought him to Carolina.
“When I took the job, I decided to be bold and step outside my comfort zone, (not with) someone I knew,” Rhule said.
With the promotion of Nixon, Rhule’s former State College High and Penn State teammate, two of the Panthers’ three coordinators were with him at Temple and Baylor. It’s not unusual for coaches to surround themselves with people they know and trust. Ron Rivera did the same thing in Carolina and Washington.
Panthers assistant special teams coach Ed Foley said there’s a benefit to such an arrangement. “You go through battles, wars with guys, and you get a comfort level with what they can do. And it goes two ways,” said Foley, a former Temple and Baylor assistant.
“The one thing I’ve always been able to provide for the guys on the staff with Matt is, this is what his vision is,” Foley added. “It’s not so much that he’s going to micromanage it and tell you what you have to do. He’s got a brand, and the brand has to be adhered to. Or it doesn’t have to be, but it’s the best way to do what we’re trying to get done.”
But some NFL insiders — including one high-ranking official with another team — believe the Panthers’ problems stem from Rhule’s limited NFL background, coupled with the fact that he has the final say on all football matters.
There’s also the feeling among league sources that Rhule keeps too many of his former college players, which can affect his credibility in the locker room. An agent who represents multiple Panthers’ players called Carolina “less meritocratic” than any team he deals with, adding the Panthers have Temple and Baylor players who wouldn’t make a roster anywhere else in the league.
A couple of the Panthers’ higher-profile players were with Rhule in college, including Anderson and outside linebacker Haason Reddick. Anderson, Temple’s leading receiver in 2015 when the Owls won 10 games in Rhule’s third season, still believes in Rhule’s process, “If I didn’t, I would’ve requested a trade or wouldn’t have signed an extension to stay here,” Anderson said in a phone interview last week. “How often have you seen a coach go into a situation and in Year 2 take them to the Super Bowl?”
The answer is 10 times, and the list includes John Fox, who guided the Panthers to the Super Bowl in his second season.
But Tepper has said he expected the Panthers rebuild to take time after they turned over an aging roster and became the NFL’s youngest team in Rhule’s first season. The Panthers were more competitive in 2020, when they finished 5-11 with Bridgewater at quarterback. Carolina lost six games in 2020 by 7 points or fewer, compared to three this year. Their average margin of defeat in ’20 was 9.2 points; this year the Panthers have lost by an average of 13.7 points.
“We obviously are not ideally where we want to be right now. That’s obvious,” Anderson said. “But I feel like once things get to a collective turn and everything clicks how it’s supposed to, I think we’ve shown signs and shown flashes early on in the year and at points throughout the year. It’s just what we’re trying to build is not going to happen overnight.”
Nixon echoed Anderson’s comments.
“We knew it’s gonna take some time for us to get to where we want to be. But without a doubt, we think we’re gonna get there,” Nixon said. “If you look at (Rhule’s) track record, it’s always been around year 3 or 4 where his teams have really excelled. We’re just continuing to pound the rock, try to get better each and every day, each and every week and eventually we have confidence we’re gonna break through.”
The week Rhule was hired by Carolina, ex-Baylor player Jordan Feuerbacher predicted Rhule would do well in the NFL. But the former Bears tight end offered a word of caution about Rhule’s ability to motivate pro players.
“My only thing is — and I don’t say manipulate in a bad way,” Feuerbacher said. “It’s definitely easier to manipulate the work effort, the toughness and the minds of 18- to 23-year-old kids, rather than 23-, 26-, 29-year-old men that are making millions of dollars. So I’m kind of intrigued to see how that goes.”
Rhule has employed some college-type techniques during his first two seasons, including punitive conditioning for poor play or penalties. Beginning at training camp this year, players who drew a penalty flag, dropped a pass or made another similar mental or physical error had to run to a DBO (Don’t Beat Ourselves) placard and back. Rhule said he viewed the missed reps as the punishment more so than the running, which some players did at a leisurely pace.
Sources also say Rhule sometimes gets concerned with seemingly trivial matters, pointing to one week when Rhule was upset when a player signed an autograph before a game.
Rhule has not been afraid to call out or bench underperforming players, as he did recently with defensive tackle Derrick Brown, last year’s first-round pick. Rhule created a mini-controversy recently when he was critical of Newton’s decision to check out of a running play on a fourth-and-1 call at Buffalo. Rhule later walked back his comments a bit, saying he should have made sure there was a better play call.
“I don’t feel like I’m being real critical. I listen to Bruce Arians and some of those guys, they’re highly critical. I think even a couple times some of you guys have intimated why am I not more critical?” Rhule said last week. “I believe that everything that happens in football is my responsibility. I think I’ve said that maybe every press conference.”
Anderson said Rhule has always had a direct approach and sometimes will change his view on a player or situation after reviewing the tape.
“I think for the most part coach Rhule has always been a transparent, straightforward individual. That’s just his personality on and off the field,” Anderson said. “I think there’s times where he might sometimes see something on the field and then watch it on film and see something different. And he might’ve been wrong about something. He has no problem addressing that or taking accountability.”
Stephon Gilmore has only played for Rhule for a couple of months after the 2019 NFL Defensive Player of the Year arrived in a trade from New England in October. And while Gilmore is disappointed the Panthers haven’t been winning, he’s enjoyed his time with Rhule, whom he called a players’ coach.
“He listens to his players. He cares about his players. He really cares about them. He actually asks them about their life, their family,” Gilmore said. “Most coaches don’t do that. He actually cares about the players. You don’t see that too often. I think guys appreciate that.”
With his quiet professionalism and thorough preparations, Gilmore is what Rhule often refers to as a “brand” guy. Rhule has less patience for a player like Denzel Perryman, a middle linebacker with a big personality whom the Panthers signed to a two-year, $6 million deal in free agency then traded a month into training camp. Perryman missed most of training camp with injuries, and the Panthers shipped him and a seventh-round pick to Las Vegas for the Raiders’ sixth-round selection next year. Perryman has racked up 138 tackles and made the Pro Bowl. Jermaine Carter, Perryman’s replacement, has 76 tackles and will be a free agent this offseason.
As the Panthers (5-10) wind down the season with road games at New Orleans and Tampa Bay, Rhule — like nearly every NFL coach — is dealing with a COVID-19 outbreak. Rhule has two more chances to evaluate Darnold, who gets the start Sunday against the Saints over Newton.
If the Panthers fail to make the playoffs again in 2022, it’s hard to imagine Tepper sticking with Rhule, who would have college football opportunities if this year is any indication. Several of the big schools that Rhule mentioned in his team meeting reached out to gauge his interest, according to a source with knowledge of the situation.
In the meantime, Rhule will try to finish a rebuild in Charlotte that stalled this year. With the exception of a few areas or specific players, it’s hard to look at the Panthers and see progress. But during a 19-minute press conference after the Tampa Bay loss — which included references to Jay-Z and “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” — Rhule insisted it’s there.
“Everyone sees the results, I get it. But there’s a process happening underneath,” Rhule said. “Everyone’s kind of looking at it like: ‘Well, it’s not working, Matt. It’s not working, Matt.’ I see all the good things that are happening and I believe that it is.”
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