Panthers Tracks: Christian McCaffrey is special, but should he be in MVP conversation?
A day that started with Christian McCaffrey being the last player out of the tunnel in the pregame introductions for the first time in his career ended with MVP chants filling Bank of America Stadium.
McCaffrey’s 58-yard touchdown in the 30-20 win over the Titans may have set off the fans’ excitement, but simply scoring touchdowns wasn’t what led to his name being called last.
It’s no secret that McCaffrey has been almost the entire Panthers offense with Cam Newton out, but is his performance enough to make him a legitimate MVP candidate?
“He is most certainly, I think, in the conversation,” Panthers coach Ron Rivera said. “But it’s still early, it’s only half way. And you don’t get awards for half of the season, so we’ll see what happens.”
On a day that McCaffrey didn’t need to be the entire Panthers offense — D.J. Moore had his second career 100-yard receiving game — he still totaled 166 scrimmage yards with two rushing touchdowns and a receiving score.
McCaffrey now has 150-plus scrimmage yards and at least one touchdown in six of the first eight games of the season. He is only the second player in NFL history to do so (Jim Brown, 1963).
He also joined Steve Smith as the only Panthers to have multiple career games of 150-plus scrimmage yards and three touchdowns.
Oh, and those numbers were without playing the final 10 minutes of the game due to an “abundance of caution,” according to Rivera, after the running back was cleared from concussion protocol.
Despite playing a condensed game and the offense not solely relying on him to be special, McCaffrey still was undeniably special.
Is it enough for him to become the second running back in 10 years to win MVP ? The chants from the stands at BOA certainly show that some think he’s halfway there.
“That was pretty cool,” McCaffrey said of the recognition. “We’ve got a lot of ball left, but I think we have some of the best fans in the world. That was pretty special — I was very appreciative of that.”
— Alaina Getzenberg
Here’s a weird stat for you ...
The Panthers’ passing defense is either great or confusingly poor. In five games this season — vs. the Rams, Buccaneers (Week 2), Cardinals, Texans and 49ers — they’ve held opponents to fewer than 190 yards passing. But in the three games teams have crossed the 190 mark, they’ve passed for 331 (Titans), 358 (Jaguars) and 365 yards (Bucs, Week 6).
Some of this is a matter of circumstance. In London against Tampa Bay, for example, the Bucs had no choice but to continuously air the ball out in a lopsided Carolina victory. Last week at San Francisco, Jimmy Garoppolo didn’t need to throw for more than the 156 yards he did because the 49ers’ running backs played so well. But it’s fascinating to see that halfway through a season, no quarterback has put up passing yards in the 200s; he either has a stat-padding day or a snoozer.
Look out, Ryan Succop
When asked Sunday about the performance of his newly activated kicker who missed all three of his field-goal attempts against the Panthers, Titans coach Mike Vrabel had this to say:
“You can go ask him. The locker room is open. I don’t know what to tell you.”
Required reading
+ Analysis: Panthers found their winning formula vs. the Titans — it was hiding in plain sight
+ Fowler: It’s time for the Panthers to put Cam Newton on IR
+ D.J. Moore and Curtis Samuel just proved Steve Smith wrong
+ Scott Says: Behind McCaffrey’s 3 TDs, the Panthers moved to 5-3
This story was originally published November 4, 2019 at 3:00 AM.
