Kicker Rhys Lloyd adjusting just fine

Some of the Carolina Panthers play table tennis after lunch. It’s not ping-pong the way they do it. They have talent.

   “We’ve started rankings,” says kicker Rhys Lloyd. “Matt Moore’s No. 1, I’m No. 2. Lester (Ricard, a quarterback) says he’s No. 3.”

   But Lloyd and Moore have yet to make it official.

   What is official is that

Moore

is No. 1.

   “He’s beaten me twice and I’ve beaten him a lot,”

Moore

says.

   Lloyd is an athlete, an excellent golfer and soccer player. He grew up in

England

and loves soccer. Football, our football, attracted little interest there.

   “There might be a five-minute episode on the London Monarchs,” says Lloyd. “It would be, ‘Oh, really.’ That’s it. We’d hear about the all-American teams like the Cowboys, the Dolphins, the 49ers.”

    Lloyd has one of the most powerful legs I’ve seen. The impact sounds different when he strikes the ball. In soccer, the idea was to keep the ball low, below head level. In football, he had to adjust to height, to getting the ball up quickly.

   That was his only adjustment. Being part of a team here is like being part of a soccer team there.

   “It’s something very special,” Lloyd, 26, says. “Charlotte's a great city and N.C. is a great state, and I can sit here with my teammates and talk to somebody making the league minimum or with a millionaire. It’s all the same.”

   He regularly checks Sky Sports and the Internet for soccer news.

   Are you saying the Charlotte Observer’s soccer coverage is not sufficient?

   Lloyd laughs.

   “A few scores in the corner and then back to the regular stuff,” he says.

   Lloyd has good taste in literature. I’m not a soccer fan. But I read a great novel, life entwined with soccer, by Nick Hornby (“High Fidelity”) called “Fever Pitch.”

   “First book I read cover to cover,” says Lloyd.

Comments

[SeaShark]

Rhys Lloyd played college football for the University of Minnesota. His positive, outgoing, fearless personality and zest for life in general made him a favorite of then Head Coach Glen Mason. Lloyd has total passion for the game of football and supreme self confidence in his ability to split the uprights. He was always shocked--SHOCKED!--when Mason declined to send him into a game for a field goal attempt whenever the Gophers faced fourth down within 60 yards of their opponent's goal line. I hope that Rhys Lloyd has the time of his life playing for the Carolina Panthers.

[Real Players Only]

Please write articles about the real football players.

Thanks

[DanCat]

"realplayers only", You are pathetic. Your moniker should be "real-jerk-only". You have to be a dubbyah worshiper.

[A Charlotte Observer]

Dude, for whats its worth that new pic of you on the front looks like a combo of Jay Lenos chin and Herman Munster. That old one on this page is the best you will ever take and you look like a race car driver or high school football coach badazz mutha fuka but that new one totally SUX so it may be wise to stick with it but thats your call..

[haprx300]

This guy is a great addition to the team field position was a huge problem last year
definitely a good idea to have 2 kickers -the guy is a special teams player anyway

[Ditch The Midget Smith Thug]

Whatever .. but concerning the little midget thug Steve Smith he needs to be traded and get his scrawny ass (without pads on)out of Charlotte North Carolina as soon as possible.
NC law give a dawg one free bite.

Steve Smith got his free bite a few yrs ago and now he must pay the price of his actions. A 2 game suspension and fine is peanuts.
Smith is overrated anyway. If a 5'7" guy can make it big in the NFL thats self explanatory. He did nothing in high school as a shrimp and went to a junior college 2 yrs before going to some unknown weakling Mountain West conf western school like Utah.

Anyone remember his 1st season fumbling out of fright 10 times on kickoff special teams?

Smith should be history. JR is just a big wus to keep this little midget thug around scared to punch anyone bigger than a CB or someone he knows wont hit back.

It is sickening to listen to wimp sport nutjobs take up for this thug. Ditch this punk. What another major mistake to resign butter fingered Moose over the hiller who is washed up and will retire after this season anyway? Who makes these dumb decisions? Moose was mediocre in college at Mich and a high school linebacker walkon anyway. He had one good yr for the Cats. All the rest sucked.

[shawn1925]

hope he makes it, seems cool, we could sure use some touchbacks

[Estela]

My club switched from Nike to Adidas and Nike had an unniilevg of our new kits at a Soccer Fanatic store. Our whole club (only under 14 and up) were invited to the unniilevg. So what happened was that we all got in a giant NIKE bus, and then the bus dropped us off at a nice grass field where we went through the Nike Elite training courses. They were things such as the Iniestia challenge (control), pique challenge (touch), ronaldo challenge (speed), rooney challenge (accuracy) and then physical tests (20 meter dash, arrowhead agility test, & vertical leap). We competed with our own age groups and the fastest (ronaldo challenge + 20 meter dash + arrowhead agility), the one with the best touch (rooney challenge + pique challenge), and the one with the best control (iniestia challenge) were given a professional grade ball (retails for 150 USD). There was also a huge vault filled with what must have been 200 boots with t90’s, vapor vii’s, tiempos, & ctrs and we got to choose which boots we wanted to use for all of the challenges (we had to return them at the end of course ). I ended up getting a total 90 professional grade ball for being the fastest in my age group, but that’s not the only amazing thing. the nike spokespeople there showed us the NEW Mercurial Vapor VIII. we got to hold it and try them on!!!! they also showed us pictures of the new boot colorways they are releasing for the euro 2012!!!!! the boot is split in half, and the front portion of the boot is colored white with the back portion colored in one solid color. looks pretty sleek. they told us we should be seeing them on the feet of ronaldo, dempsey, rooney, iniestia, etc. IM GUESSING THAT’S WHATS GOING TO BE REVEALED ON MARCH 19. AINT IT THE NEW COLORWAYS GOING TO BE RELEASED FOR EURO 2012. or the unniilevg of the vapor viii. haha either way its cool.