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What does $1 million per game really buy?
That's the question I set out to answer. To do so, I reviewed every Carolina Panthers defensive snap for the first three games of this 2009 season.
I concentrated on No.90 - Julius Peppers, the player that the 0-3 Panthers are paying slightly more than $1 million per game.
Panthers coach John Fox sometimes says when talking about the NFL: "The eye in the sky don't lie." Although I watched the video feed available to anyone with a TV, while coaches often watch film taken from the end zone that offers a wider view, I saw enough to come away with three conclusions:
•NFL teams are no longer afraid to block Peppers with just one man. He used to consistently command an obvious double-team on passing downs. On 75 percent of the pass plays on which he has rushed the quarterback this season, only one offensive player has blocked Peppers.
•Peppers was practically invisible for the Panthers' past two games, even though he was single-blocked on almost every play.
Peppers did play a very good opening game against Philadelphia that was lost in the rubble of the 28-point beating Carolina sustained in its season opener. But against Dallas and Atlanta, he hardly ever came near the quarterback or any other player who had the ball. And he was on his feet almost the whole time. Peppers didn't make many tackles, didn't get close to a sack and usually was nowhere near the action in those two games.
•His ability to make big plays is severely hampered by the defense around him. The Panthers are currently last in the NFL in run defense, and much of the yardage is straight up the middle. Also, the defensive secondary's coverage has been soft enough to allow quarterbacks to throw completions quickly. So some of what is happening isn't Peppers' fault.
Nevertheless, I've covered Peppers for eight seasons - since his NFL career began in 2002 - and I can tell you with certainty after watching him for 12 hours on tape that something isn't right.
I saw a player whose effort I would strongly question. Peppers' pursuit to the ball has been lacking this season. He rarely catches anyone from behind anymore. I would argue that while Peppers may not take the first half of plays off, once his initial burst is contained he sometimes takes it easy on the second half of that very same play.
Maybe Peppers will fix all this against Washington today with a three-sack game and a victory. But he's going to have to try harder.
This is not 2004 (his best season) or even 2008 (when Peppers had a career-high 14.5 sacks). Peppers has gone such long stretches without making a tackle or doing anything else disruptive that the game announcers frequently haven't mentioned him for entire quarters at a time.
When they do say something, it's in the vein of what TV analyst Jon Gruden said on "Monday Night Football" about Peppers during the Dallas-Carolina contest. As Gruden recounted on-air: "Ron Meeks, the [Panthers'] defensive coordinator, told us last night it all goes through Julius Peppers. He has got to be dominant for everybody else to have a chance. And so far they [the Cowboys] have frustrated him."
'It's not a one-man game'
Some teammates have obviously noticed, too, how minimal Peppers' impact has been. Peppers has one sack in three games. His 10 total tackles rank 11th on the team. Linebacker Jon Beason, who like Peppers is a team captain, said Thursday on Charlotte radio station WFNZ that he planned to have a one-on-one talk with Peppers about his lack of production.
"The pressure is what you want to see - the intensity," Beason said regarding Peppers. Beason also said he wanted to tell Peppers: "I need everything you've got."
Others with a big stake in Peppers righting himself and having another Pro Bowl season defend him to the hilt. No one is more protective of Peppers than Fox (who made Peppers his first-ever draft pick as a rookie head coach in 2002 with the No.2 overall selection).
When I asked Fox to assess Peppers' production so far, Fox said: "Like the rest of us. We're 0-3. It's not a one-man game; that's why they call it a team sport. It's not one guy's fault."
When asked if Peppers was performing above or below Fox's personal standard for him, Fox said: "We're all performing below the standard. To pin it on one guy is not realistic."
Fox also said that while teams may not obviously double-team Peppers very often, they still subtly slide their protection toward his side of the field "a lot."
When a team slides its protection toward one side, it allows the offensive tackle to set up further outside. That way the tackle can anticipate an outside speed rush - Peppers' specialty - and knows he might be able to get help from the guard if Peppers instead tries to sneak inside to get at the quarterback.
The Panthers have tried to counter this tendency in 2009 by lining up Peppers all over the place. In Peppers' first six seasons at Carolina, he played left defensive end. Last year, he played right end. This season has been almost equally split. Peppers has participated in 156 of the Panthers 190 defensive plays - 80 plays on the right side, 72 on the left and four at defensive tackle. None of it has worked very well in the past two games.
Peppers - who rarely does in-depth interviews and declined to comment for this story - said back in February that he didn't think he could reach his full potential as a Panther. Through his agent Carl Carey - who also declined comment for this story - Peppers tried to force his way out of Carolina via free agency or a trade.
It didn't work. The Panthers instead made him their franchise player, obligating them to pay him $16.683million this season for a one-year contract.
"Julius is viewed as one of the top defensive ends in the league," Panthers general manager Marty Hurney said last week. "He's a guy with special ability, and his records and his Pro Bowls have documented that. I don't think there's any question he can still be a difference-maker. You don't let those types of players go."
But for must of this season Peppers has instead looked like what some NFL types call a "JAG" - "just a guy."
Meeks, the new defensive coordinator, said Peppers is doing a "pretty good job" but also said: "There's no doubt he has to step up and he has to do his job. But, still, it's 11 guys. The other guys have got to help out, too. We can't put all the weight on his shoulders to get it done. He's just one part of it."
Unique blend of size, speed
Peppers, 29, leads the Panthers in all sorts of career numbers, including sacks, forced fumbles and blocked field goals. A former football and basketball standout at North Carolina, he is named after basketball great Julius Erving, and hoops was his first love. But while his skill set isn't terribly unique in basketball - he was a good 6-foot-7 power forward for the Tar Heels but not a great one - in football, it is almost unheard of.
"At defensive end," said former Panther Mike Rucker, who paired with Peppers as the team's starting defensive ends for six years, "you probably need to weigh at least 260. Those are your fast guys. On the high end, you might see a guy who is 275 or 285, but they don't have the blazing speed of the 260-pound guy. Enter Julius Peppers. The guy is 290 and runs like a linebacker. You just don't find that."
When Peppers is at his best, he makes at least a couple of stunning plays in every game and a truly extraordinary one every three or four contests. Peppers' best season, for instance, was 2004. He had 11 sacks and set what is still his personal career high with 85 tackles (fourth on the team), playing the run far better than he had in his first two seasons.
Peppers also made a handful of plays in 2004 that would still lead off any Peppers highlight film - a 97-yard interception return against Denver, a 60-yard fumble return off Atlanta's Michael Vick after stabbing the ball out of the air and a 46-yard interception return for a TD against Tampa Bay.
That was back when all seemed possible for Peppers. Fox even occasionally inserted Peppers as a wide receiver in goal-line situations in 2004 and '05. The experiment never bore much fruit; Peppers never caught a pass while playing receiver. But it turned him briefly into a two-way player and made him seem a threat to capture the nation's imagination like William "Refrigerator" Perry did in the 1980s.
But the Panthers eventually stopped that experiment. And eventually, the "did-he-really-do-that?" highlight plays for Peppers tailed off, too.
He has remained extremely durable - missing only two games due to injury in his career. But Peppers has had one interception since 2004. He hasn't scored a defensive TD in five years. After a career-low 2.5 sacks in 2007, he did have 14.5in 2008.
Of course, sack stats don't tell the whole story. As Rucker said: "You can make 20 sacks and get pushed into the secondary on every other play, and people will still say you had an unbelievable year."
A play he didn't make
Against Philadelphia, Peppers won enough battles that the Eagles double-teamed him on nine of 22 passing plays. He still had a sack, a forced fumble, five tackles, two passes batted down and a blocked field goal on special teams.
But Dallas tackle Flozell Adams - a five-time Pro Bowler considered a bit past his prime at age 34 - and relatively unknown Atlanta tackle Tyson Clabo neutralized Peppers one-on-one on virtually all pass plays. Peppers only pressured the quarterback one time apiece in those games.
With that sort of uneven performance, it's hard to imagine the Panthers giving Peppers more than $20million to play for them again in 2010 - which is what they would have to do under franchise-tag rules unless they sign him to another long-term contract.
Alternately, Peppers' contract runs out in February and he will be free to sign with any team he likes.
Although the Panthers are sometimes criticized for dropping Peppers into coverage too often, in fact they have done so on only seven times all season (six on pass plays). And occasionally, surprising the defense by not having Peppers rush does put him in good position to make a play.
For instance: Early in the third quarter against Dallas, Carolina clung to a 7-0 lead. On second-and-6, the Panthers ran a zone blitz and Peppers dropped back into coverage.
It wasn't a pass play, however. Instead, Dallas running back Felix Jones got the ball and circled toward the left sideline, in Peppers' range and running fast.
Peppers shifted to full speed, too. For a moment, he was in high gear - still an awesome sight - and looked like he might have an angle on Jones.
Instead, Peppers got one arm on Jones' shoulder, but that was all. Jones flew through Peppers' attempted tackle and ended up gaining 40 yards on a run that changed the momentum of the game.
This was the sort of freakishly athletic big play that Peppers was once known for - chasing down a running back in open space to prevent a big gain.
Instead, on this play and far too often this season, Julius Peppers looked like just another guy not able to keep up.
