It can’t be just McCaffrey and Moore. Robby Anderson must be a star for Panthers offense
You know all about Christian McCaffrey. You’re fully aware of DJ Moore.
But one of the biggest mysteries of the 2020 Carolina Panthers is Robby Anderson, the $10 million dollar man who will need to be great for this offense to be great.
Anderson, 27, enters his fifth NFL season without a 1,000-yard receiving year to his credit. But he does have speed to burn, and he does have the advantage that defenses will need to try to stop McCaffrey and Moore first.
Like close to half the players on the 2020 Panthers, Sunday’s home game against the Las Vegas Raiders will be Anderson’s first for Carolina. He was one of the Panthers’ most notable and most expensive offseason signings — a two-year, $20-million bet by coach Matt Rhule and general manager Marty Hurney that a player who Rhule coached in college at Temple could be a difference-maker in Charlotte.
“This is the best I ever felt throughout training camp,” Anderson told me. His mind is in a good place, too.
“Mentally, physically, spiritually, my life outside of football — everything is the best it could be,” Anderson said.
How will that translate? Moore, Anderson’s receiving partner, thinks he knows.
“He’s a player that is sneaky,” Moore said of Anderson. “You can lose them in a game plan and he goes for 100 yards. And you won’t even know it. ... Until he gets the notice that he deserves, he’s always going to be under the radar and be able to make big plays on people that don’t expect it.”
Rhule, Anderson and Temple
Rhule and Anderson have a long history. In 2013, when Rhule took over as Temple’s head coach, Anderson was a redshirt sophomore cornerback stuck on the second team. He was also homesick. He quit the team and went home to south Florida.
Later, Anderson asked Rhule if he could come back, and Rhule allowed it with the caveat that Anderson wouldn’t get his scholarship back right away. A position change to wide receiver followed, and some success.
But then came another setback. Anderson then missed the entire 2014 Temple season because of poor grades, going back to Florida again. Rhule helped him get one more chance.
Said Anderson at his introductory Panthers press conference in April: “He (Rhule) stood on the table with the university to get me back into school, to open up that door for me to right my wrongs. ... I wasn’t handling my business in the classroom. I fell short. I was academically suspended. And I wasn’t supposed to be able to come back to school for five years or some ridiculous amount of time … But Coach Rhule fought hard, literally over a full year, and finally they decided to change the university rule. That allowed me to come back over the summer, work hard, raise my GPA, and take a crazy amount of summer classes just to be eligible to play my senior year.”
Rhule said Anderson has matured since then.
“I think Robby has had a fantastic camp,” Rhule said recently. “I knew him four or five years ago, and seeing the level of professionalism and maturity that he brings to everything that he does is really exciting for me. ... He’s a guy who’s going to have a really good year for us.”
‘He always treated us like grown men’
Anderson said Rhule’s coaching style isn’t much different from then until now.
“To be honest, he still coaches us the same,” Anderson said of Rhule. “He didn’t treat us like little kids in college; he always treated us like grown men. ... He’s still who he was back then, he’s still a hard coach but honest and straightforward. And like I always say, you want to play for someone who’s straightforward with you.”
After going undrafted, Anderson played his first four years for the New York Jets, making a mark as a speed receiver who averaged 14.8 yards per catch. His other average numbers were solid but not spectacular for an NFL starter — 52 receptions for 765 yards and five touchdowns per season.
Anderson would like to eclipse those numbers this season, but mostly he just wants to win. To that end, he is a big fan of his more highly publicized teammates like McCaffrey. At his first Carolina press conference, Anderson came dressed in a No. 22 Panthers jersey. He knows that McCaffrey will give him more room to get open, and give the Panthers more of a chance at victory.
“That’s why I came here,” Anderson said. “With winning comes greatness. It’s as simple as that.”
