Tom Talks

Jimmy's turn

   Panther problems obviously are greater than quarterback. But if Jimmy Clausen can consistenly move the team via the pass defenses will be unable to commit their safeties to run defense and the world will become a better place to live. Or at least the Carolina offense will be able to scare somebody.

    I said the Tampa Bay game was not a must-win because nobody has to win the second game of the season.

    Panthers have to win the third.

    I feel bad for Matt Moore. But he looked vulnerable after the game, like a boxer on the ropes, in the rope-a-dope, covering up.

     For Clausen to succeed, Panthers need to find another offensive player fast. I'm not talking about a free agent. I'm saying that somebody on the roster and in the huddle needs to emerge.

    I wouldn't be surprised if all the young Panthers  begin to figure things out a month from  now. But that will be too late.

Youth must be served (up)

    After an impressive opening drive, Jimmy Clausen imploded. He threw the ball so hard to Mike Goodson it was as if he disliked him. The ball was too hard and too high and it bounced off Goodon's hands and was intercepted.

    You could not start a season as terribly as Carolina has started this one. To lose at home to Tampa Bay, in a game that wasn't even close, doesn't cut it.

    Carolina ought to start Jimmy Clausen next week at home against Cincinnati, a game the Panthers really do have to win. Youth either will be served or served up.

 

 

 

Jimmy Clausen, your time has come

    The Jimmy Clausen era began with 10:03 remaining in the third quarter. Matt Moore stood on the Tampa Bay 37 without a helmet, with a towel around his neck. Clausen replaced him at quarterback 43 yards away on the Carolina 20. Via handoffs and a screen, Clausen picked up two first downs.

    After an incompletion to Steve Smith, I think I heard a fan chant for third-team quarterback Tony Pike. But his era hasn't started yet. One at a time.

All hail the big quarterback

    You can why Tampa Bay moved up to draft Josh Freeman last year. The guy can win a game with his feet, not necessarily by running for first downs -- although he does that -- but by moving and breaking tackles and waiting for his receivers to break free. When Carolina quarterback Matt Moore runs, it's out of desperation or frustration. Freeman runs with purpose, breaking two tackles on third-and-17 before hitting tight end Kellen Winslow for 40 yards.

    Freeman is 6-6, weighs 248 pounds and is only 22 years old.

Not too good

   You imagine the boos at Bank of America Stadium if Jake Delhomme, and not Matt Moore, had thrown the interception? As sparse as the crowd is, Jake might not have heard them.

Change the halftime speech

    After watching Carolina's first drive of the second half, I fear that whatever John Fox told his players in New Jersey last week he told them again today.

Football weather

    Sunday was football weather. Cool morning, hint of fall. Walking down the street with a dawdling dog beside me I wanted to go deep. But nobody had a football. This was at 6:15 a.m.

    Early scouting report on Tampa Bay fans: They're slow. Was walking down Mint St. when three buses of them began to unload in front of me. They made the dog look energetic. They crawled down the sidewalk.  I can't do that.

    Interesting, the different tailgating techniques Panther fans have. I show up about 10:30 a.m. and walk around until I run into somebody I know, and I always run into somebody I know. Fans are always in a good mood before the game begins. They're nervous, worried about what they're going to see. But when they eat their chicken, ribs and wings, drink their beer, wine and water, and laugh and joke with friends, the nerves are put on hold.

    I tailgate like a spectator. I don't drink the drinks because I'm working, and I rarely eat the food. But I still enjoy the experience. I like the enthusiasm. Great way to ease into the day.

 

 

I'm not going to wrestle you, Roy

   Five quick opinions, because opinions are more interesting than facts:

    (1) I think Jimmie Johnson wins the NASCAR championship. Be a fool to pick against him. But if he doesn't, Kurt Busch does. Busch is the most underrated of the elite drivers.

    (2) How about my Wolfpack? I hear regularly from N.C. State fans that think I'm out to get them. You know, like I wake up in the morning and think, I can't stand the Wolfpack. If I wake up thinking about a college football or basketball team, my life is a sham and a waste and no longer worth leading. Quarterback Russell Wilson was outstanding. The ACC needs a jolt. Why not him? Why not his team?

    (3) Dreamed about North Carolina basketball coach Roy Williams. Hey, don't look at me like that. It's not as if we were wrestling.

    He was sitting in a small room at the end of a narrow hallway. The Tar Heels had just lost to somebody they weren't supposed to. I was at the front of the hallway and asked him a question. A North Carolina public relations guy, somebody I've never seen before, shook his head at the question, at how dumb it was, and Roy told me how dumb it was. I was flustered, flummoxed and turning red. But I didn't want to give the floor up to somebody who might ask him why his players didn't quit. Yet I couldn't think of a question. So I asked, "Why do this?" And he said, "Why do what?" I said, "Why try, why play, what's the point when you perform like this?" Now, this really was a dumb question and the PR guy shook his head slowly and Williams told me how dumb I was and I turned as red as Sidney Lowe's N.C. State tomato sports coat. But no matter how stupid I sounded, I kept asking questions. Then I woke up.

    The moral of my dream was threefold: Ask good questions, never give up and don't have eggplant for dinner ever again.

    (4) I have a program from the New York Giants-Carolina game last week, the first at New Meadowlands Stadium. If you're a Giants' fan, and not some greedball who will sell it on eBAY, you can have it. Email me.

     (5) If you don't own a bike, mountain or street, this is the kind of day that will convince you to buy one. Freedom is two wheels. 

 

 

 

     

There is no next best thing to being there

    One theory I've heard in the wake of the Ines Sainz episode -- she is the TV Azteca personality who was treated crudely by the New York Jets -- is whether reporters ought to be in NFL locker rooms.

    This is the time of Twitter and Facebook and other forms of instant gossip. Doesn't locker room reporting feel as  antiquated as a Smith Corona typewriter?

    It does. But what's the alternative? I don't know anybody in my business that says, "I get to go in the locker room, hooray." I don't know any athetes that say, "The media is here, hooray."

    We go to collect information. Those of us that work for newspapers disseminate the information in Tweets and blogs and even stories.

    I spent about 40 minutes in the Panther locker room Wednesday. I talked to DeAngelo Williams and Jimmy Clausen about football, Tony Pike about his small market team, the Cincinnati Reds, dominating the NL Central while my small market team, the Minnesota Twins, dominates the AL Central. I said hello to Rhys Lloyd, whom the Panthers signed Tuesday. I asked Travelle Wharton, a former South Carolina star, if he saw the Gamecocks pound Georgia.  

    I didn't hear anything  I can build a career around. But I shook some hands and heard some things. My goals are simple. I want to set up a more extensive interview later. I want to hear a player blow up and say something in anger (and honesty). I want insight. I want humor.

    But mainly I go because there's no choice, because if we don't the  information will be divulged in canned quotes (we gave 100%, we play 'em one game at a time, it is what it is) or in group interviews. And the bigger the crowd the less effective the interview. It's tough to generate a conversation in a group because somebody always asks about the key play.

    A locker room is inconvenient and messy and occasionally awkward. But at times it's all we have. So we continue to show up. There is no next best thing to being there. 

 

 

   

New Jersey state of mind

    Our New Jersey hotel has a fence on three sides and a highway on the fourth. The fence is topped with barbed wire. The hotel lost power Sunday morning but one elevator worked and security guards would escort guests that lined up outside it to their rooms via flashlight. Also, the water was cold, which meant showers were, too. 

   After watching Sunday's game, the best thing about the New Jersey trip is the hotel.