Panthers Tracks: Senior Bowl’s best moments come when players forget about the draft
Memory is a funny thing.
There were plenty of interesting moments at this year’s Senior Bowl week. It was my first time going and I learned many valuable lessons. Too many to count. On the Panthers side of things, we got a better sense of the coaching staff and were able to get glimpses of prospects and potential Panthers to be. The mock drafts are in full swing.
But when I was thinking over what my top memory or moment was from the week, it wasn’t one conversation or one interaction I personally had.
Instead it was standing on the sideline during the first of two practices Thursday watching the quarterbacks and receivers go up against the defensive backs in one-on-one drills. The competition got heated. There was just something about how locked in everyone got. There were impressive catches (including from SMU’s James Proche and Texas’ Collin Johnson) and good defensive moves (shoutout to Iowa’s Michael Ojemudia). There was a play with incredibly egregious holding, a complete tug on the jersey that resulted in all four referees in the vicinity throwing flags at the exact same time. It got a good laugh from everyone.
Sometimes with all of this draft hype and drama with organizational changes, the actual football gets lost in it all. The game itself is what everyone loves and seeing young players in front of so many important decision makers just fighting play after play was something I won’t soon forget.
From Utah State’s Jordan Love throwing a nice over-the-shoulder pass, to Johnson later making another impressive grab, it was hard to take your eyes off some of the one-on-one battles.
There’s plenty of takeaways from the Senior Bowl and we’ve got you covered from the whole week. But sometimes it’s good to stop and smell the football.
Required reading
+ Fowler: Panthers need to decide Cam Newton’s fate. Jordan Gross knows how it can be a win-win
+ Getzenberg: How Matt Rhule bringing his Baylor coaches to Carolina helps the Panthers rebuild
+ Denzel Mims is a natural fit to help the Panthers add much-needed depth at receiver
+ Getzenberg: Panthers watching a lot of 2 positions at Senior Bowl. They should like what they see
+ Javon Kinlaw and the Panthers a perfect fit? Carolina drafting him would “be lit.”
+ Justin Herbert impressive in his first Senior Bowl practice in front of Panthers coaches
This story was originally published January 24, 2020 at 4:00 AM.