Who’s the most improved player on the Panthers? He showed up again in loss to Chiefs
A lot of things went wrong in the second half for the Carolina Panthers in their 33-31 loss to Kansas City, but Curtis Samuel just kept going right.
Samuel had the first 100-yard receiving game of his career against the defending Super Bowl champions. He had 105 yards receiving, and that included an acrobatic 28-yard catch and his fourth TD of the season. He also caught all nine of the balls thrown to him. If there was a team-wide award for “Most Improved Player” for the Panthers in 2020, Samuel would have my vote.
▪ Another positive force in the game for the Panthers: defensive end Brian Burns.
Burns has rapidly developed into a disruptive presence in every contest, and he was in Patrick Mahomes’ face on numerous occasions and had a big tackle for loss on Kansas City’s final drive that helped force a punt. No sacks, though.
▪ It seems a long time ago that the Panthers were 3-2. Now they are 3-6 after their fourth straight loss in a one-possession game. Said quarterback Teddy Bridgewater: “We don’t want it to be the common theme of being right there.... This is one of those games that pisses you off a little bit, at least it should piss you off.”
▪ Of Carolina’s three fourth-down conversions Sunday, I’d have to pick the one in which Bridgewater somehow scrambled for a first down as the best.
The fake punt was an awesome call, and the fourth-and-3 TD pass to Christian McCaffrey worked nicely, but Bridgewater’s sell-your-body-out scramble for 15 yards in which he flew for about the final 5 yards was one for his personal highlight film.
As Bridgewater described it: “It was just one of those deals as I was running, I just looked to the sideline to see where the chains were. I knew if I would have went down head-first, they might have marked me down a little shorter.... So I just decided to take flight and sacrifice my body and try to get the first down.”
Bridgewater played very well in a loss — 310 yards passing, 19 yards rushing, three total TDs and no turnovers.
▪ Panthers coach Matt Rhule was particularly frustrated with Carolina’s 12 penalties for 82 yards.
“We just didn’t do enough to win the game,” Rhule said. “And that starts with me as the head coach. When you have 12 penalties in the game, it’s hard to deserve to win that game when you play a team as good as the Chiefs. It has to be a 3-4-5-6 penalty game. It can’t be a 12-penalty game.”
Rhule singled out in particular the 10-yard penalty on offensive guard Chris Reed for illegal use of hands on Carolina’s final march as a significant flag.
▪ Both kickers had problems in the swirling winds at Arrowhead Stadium. Panthers kicker Joey Slye missed from 51 and 67 yards. Kansas City’s Harrison Butker, a former Panther, missed from 48 yards and also missed an extra point.
You can’t have Slye having to kick field goals from 65-plus yards at the end of a game, although the Panthers have now had to do that twice. Slye’s 65-yard miss against New Orleans was a lot closer than the 67-yard miss against Kansas City, in which the ball quickly faded to the right and never had a chance. Either kick would have been an NFL record.
▪ Kansas City quarterback Patrick Mahomes had four TD passes, pushing his career total to 101. He reached that number in 40 career starts, the quickest QB ever to 100. Mahomes now has 25 TD passes and only one interception on the season, as Carolina never really came close to picking him off.
▪ Slye’s most important misfire Sunday was on Carolina’s first onside kick. Catching Kansas City very flat-footed, Slye needed to push the ball 10 yards up the middle and recover it. Instead, he hit it only about 9.5, which meant his recovery didn’t count. Slye has actually had a good season, but his near-misses sure have been memorable.
▪ Panthers safety Sam Franklin said the 28-yard touchdown pass to Tyreek Hill that Carolina allowed early in the fourth quarter was “completely on me.” Franklin said he didn’t get the correct call in to Carolina’s corners on the play, resulting in a blown coverage. Franklin did have Carolina’s lone sack of Mahomes.
▪ The Panthers had huge trouble containing Kansas City tight end Travis Kelce, who had 10 catches for 159 yards. The same went for Hill, who scored twice and had 113 yards receiving.
This story was originally published November 8, 2020 at 6:25 PM.
