Carolina Panthers set themselves up perfectly for this NFL draft. This is no accident.
The tangible value of the eighth pick in the NFL draft has been generally agreed upon for decades now, and while every team’s analysts and quants may concoct their own formulas for pick values, the end results aren’t going to vary by that much. Whether you’re trading up or down, you know what you’re going to get.
It’s been a busy if mostly unremarkable offseason for the Carolina Panthers, but they have quietly done themselves a great favor: They have managed to make that No. 8 pick more valuable.
Hard to believe a summer that started by blaming the previous quarterback and ended by trying to cover those tracks would lead them there, let alone one that made its biggest splash when the Panthers added a new quarterback better known as a Twitter meme than a passer. But the persistent incremental assembly of smaller parts filled holes on the roster, added depth, gained experience, built structure and gave the Panthers the most valuable draft commodity of all: Flexibility.
While there are obvious no-brainer picks at No. 8 if they somehow fall that far — Florida tight end Kyle Pitts or Oregon tackle Penei Sewell — the Panthers aren’t boxed into taking a quarterback. The Sam Darnold trade took care of that.
They’re not required to take an offensive lineman with that pick, as much as that’s their primary need. It’s better if Pat Elflein or Cam Erving isn’t pressed into starting, but both can play multiple positions and patch over any holes in the short term, especially with the uncertainty over Greg Little’s future.
They added veterans on the defensive line with DaQuan Jones and Morgan Fox, and got better at linebacker with Haason Reddick and Denzel Perryman, although there’s certainly still work to do. But there’s no imperative to use an eighth straight draft pick on defense.
They have options. More to the point, without making a big deal about it, they slowly and meticulously gave themselves options. Whatever the eighth pick is supposed to be worth, they’ve maximized its value.
“That’s what the job that was done in free agency allowed us,” Panthers coach Matt Rhule said. “There’s not any one position where we feel like we need to take someone here.”
Other than the Darnold trade and perhaps the addition of the pass-rushing Reddick, none of the offseason moves seemed that consequential at the time, especially when compared to losing Curtis Samuel to free agency. Taken together, in the big picture, they removed any pressure to do something specific in the first round, leaving the door open to a bidding war among teams salivating over whichever quarterbacks might still be on the board.
Which means when their time comes Thursday, the Panthers can do anything they want. They can take a quarterback if one they like is there, although they’re better off upgrading the rest of the roster while seeing what Darnold can do. They can take Pitts or Sewell if the stars align.
Or they can trade down without really hurting themselves — as far as 16th, general manager Scott Fitterer said, where he thinks the talent level starts dropping off. The way Fitterer talked about it last week, it almost feels inevitable.
Northwestern tackle Rashawn Slater will probably still be on the board in the low teens, and while there are questions whether he’s really a guard at the NFL level, he’ll help the Panthers either way. Want a lockdown cornerback like Alabama’s Patrick Surtain II or South Carolina’s Jaycee Horn? One or maybe both will almost certainly still be available if the Panthers trade down a few spots.
When that eighth pick comes up, there are going to be enough players available who can help the Panthers immediately that they can safely trade down, and almost certainly at least one player worth taking at No. 8. For a team with a lot of weaknesses, still, it’s a rare position of strength.
“We’re going to take the best player available,” Fitterer said. “That’s what we did in free agency. We filled a lot of needs. We’re a build-through-the draft team and that’s what we want to do, take the best available player. We don’t want to be forced into taking a need.”
And yes, part of this is that the Panthers have enough gaping voids on their roster that several positions call out to be filled by a first-round pick, but they have given themselves the freedom to take the best player on their board, the freedom to trade down, the freedom to make the right decision for the long term.
