Panthers Columnist Gets In-Depth Pat Yasinskas is a sports columnist who writes about the Carolina Panthers and the NFL for the Charlotte Observer. The following excerpts were taken from a recent interview with him, in which he talks about the Panthers, his thoughts on specific players, his most memorable moment covering the team and even his feelings on touchdown celebrations. Q: In your opinion which game do you think has been the best performance by the Carolina Panthers through the five games this year? Yasinskas: “Without a doubt I would have to say New England has really been their most complete game and even that was not a prefect game, but was a very good game against a very good team. That game more than any other game they played their style of football. There’s a style of football that John Fox wants, the kind they played in their Super Bowl year, where basically control the ball on offense with the running game, mix in a few passes here and there, and play aggressive defense and force some turnovers. That’s what they did in that game and they really haven’t done it in the other games on a consistent basis. They’ve done it here and there and they’ve done it enough to win three games, but if they’re going to get back there to being a Super Bowl caliber team they have to do that on a more consistent basis.” Q: Do you have a favorite player to interview with the Panthers? Yasinskas: “I’m going to have to give you a couple. Mike Minter is really good, so is Mike Rucker and Dan Morgan. With Morgan and Minter and Rucker you get a little bit of a personal relationship with those guys. Jake (Delhomme) is a really good interview, but it’s rare that I get to talk to him one on one because he’s the quarterback and when he talks on Wednesdays or when he talks on Sundays after a game there’s fifteen television cameras there too. It is a little difficult to have the kind of rapport with him that I do with some of the others, but I would say Minter, Rucker and Morgan are probably my three favorite to talk to. If you’ll notice, like in my game stories on Monday’s, those three are usually quoted, along with Jake too, but at any kind of peak where I’m looking for a perspective on an issue or on another player getting players to talk about another player, those three are often times in there.” Q: Do you have a most memorable moment in covering the Panthers? Yasinskas: “Probably just the night that they won the NFC Championship game; I mean I can’t say that anything special really happened to me, but just covering a team that was going to the Super Bowl that I never thought would go to the Super Bowl, I mean that was John Fox’s second season. I thought that they’d be better and they were all season, but even late in the season you still didn’t think that they were a Super Bowl caliber team. I thought maybe they make the playoffs and get bounced first round and then they got into the playoffs. They had the home game with Dallas and I thought ok they can win that, but then they’re going to have to go to St. Louis and there’s no way that they’ll win in St. Louis because it’s loud as can be in there and St. Louis is pretty good. Then they win that game in double overtime and still thinking there’s no way they can go to Philadelphia, it’s going to be very cold up there, the fans are obnoxious, it’s loud, loud as can be and they went up there and totally dominated. I remember just standing outside their locker room right after that game in Philadelphia, it was about as cold as I’ve ever been and we had to stand out there. I didn’t take my jacket down with me because I thought that we would get straight into the locker room. Well they did the trophy presentation and Fox talked to the team so I had to stand out there for about twenty or thirty minutes just freezing and all I remember is freezing and just standing there and saying, oh my God they are going to the Super Bowl. That was a point where I was a little bit challenged to try not to be a fan because it was exciting. It was one of the best things to ever happen to Charlotte.” Q: This season the Panthers offense seems to be getting it done at least more than the defense is so I wanted to ask you about some of the highlights. Running back Stephen Davis has 91 carries for 291yards and seven touchdowns coming off last year’s right knee injury which caused him to miss a majority of the season; did you expect this kind of production from him? Yasinskas: “No, I didn’t know for sure. I don’t think I was one of the ones saying he’s got no chance or he can’t do it, but I was definitely skeptical. A guy coming off that kind of surgery at his age, you don’t know. I certainly had my doubts and I’m definitely surprised at how strong he’s come back. I kind of suspected a scenario where maybe he wouldn’t be ready at the start of the season or wouldn’t do much at the start of the season and then they kind of worked him in as the year went on, but I never really expected him to come out that first game and just look like the Stephen Davis of 2003. His numbers are not spectacular, but I don’t think that’s his fault. They’ve fallen behind in a few games and had to pass the ball and sometimes the run blocking hasn’t been great. If he had gotten the same kind of situation that he was in in 2003 the numbers would be just as good and I still think that he’s going to put up good numbers.” Q: Running back DeShaun Foster will be a free agent after this season; what do you think the Panthers need to do with that situation? Yasinskas: “They need to make a decision on what they want to do with his future. I don’t think they’ve decide yet. I think that’s still up in the air and that it’s going to be determined as the season goes on. They need to know if he can be their feature back. If they think he is, some point before the start of free agency, maybe it’s late in the season or maybe it’s in January or February, they need to resign him before he can test the market because someone will pay him big bucks. But that said he’s still got to prove himself to the Panthers. He’s got to hold onto the football and show that he can handle a fair amount of carries and even last week he had that big fumble, could’ve killed them, but wound up pulling it out. So that’s a big test for him the rest of the season and he’s also banged up right now and I don’t think he’s going to play this week. His health has always been an issue too so he’s really got to prove himself over the rest of this season.” Q: Steve Smith has 33 catches for 473 yards and six touchdowns. What do you think of him this year? Yasinskas: “He’s been phenomenal. Nothing short of phenomenal. I think he’s as a good of a receiver as there is in the league right now. He amazes me every week. He makes plays that you don’t think he can make especially at his size. He’s so athletic, so fast. I’ve never seen anybody quite like him and sometimes you see him take a hit and you say he’s never going go get up from that, he’s so little, and he’ll just bounce right up. He’s just amazing.” Q: Do you like his various touchdown celebrations from this year? Do you favorite? Yasinskas: “Personally I am kind of an old school guy. I am not a big fan of the celebrations. I kind of liked the one where he pretended like he was tapping a beer can or soda can and drinking out of the ball so I guess I’d say that’s my favorite, but I am not a big fan of those.” Q: No other wide receiver has a touchdown for the Panthers and has stepped up yet. Newly acquired wide receiver from this offseason, Rod Gardner, has yet to play much. Do you feel the Panthers will use him more and can he make an impact? Yasinskas: “Yeah, I think he can. For whatever reason he’s taken longer than he should’ve to learn the offense. I think he’s got it down now to a point where the coaches can at least trust him to put him in there. I honestly think that if Keary Colbert does not start producing in the next few games you could see a changing of the guard there, where Gardner, if he continues to show some good things, he could end up starting because they haven’t gotten much out of Keary Colbert which I’m sure is disappointing to them. They won’t say it, but that’s the truth.” Q: Do think the organization should have kept the old number 87, Muhsin Muhammad? Yasinskas: “No. I think that they were in cap situation where it was pretty much impossible to keep both he and Steve Smith. I think that Steve Smith is as good or better and was a lot younger than Moose. They can not pay Moose that kind of money. I personally agree with their decision to take that money and turn around and spend it on (Ken) Lucas and Mike Whale because I think both of those guys have been everything they hoped they would be. Yeah, it would be nice to have Moose, but let’s be real honest is Moose also going to have 33 catches? I don’t think there would’ve been enough balls to go around to get that kind of production out of the two of them. He’d certainly have more (catches) than Keary Colbert does, but Steve Smith’s production would be down to compensate for Moose getting more balls so really a lot of Moose’s balls are going to Steve. Bottom line was I just don’t think they could pay both of them.” Q: The Panthers seem to be trying to incorporate the tight ends more into their offensive scheme to compensate for the lack of production at wide receiver. How do you feel about the Panthers’ tight ends? Can they provide an answer? Yasinskas: “They can help. I don’t think that any of those guys are ever going to put up Shannon Sharpe numbers because I don’t think that Dan Henning is going to allow them to do that. He doesn’t call enough plays for the tight end. But that said all three of those guys are not bad receivers and they can help here and there and give Jake (Delhomme) another target. (Michael) Gaines, I like his potential and I think that they can definitely get more out of him. (Mike) Seidman, has kind of disappeared and I can’t really explain that one to you because that was a kid that when they drafted him they thought he was going to be the complete tight end, both a blocker and a receiver and he really hasn’t excelled in either area. Kris Mangum, to borrow a phrase from John Fox, he is what he is. He’s a solid veteran guy who’s not going to make mistakes. He’s going to make some plays for you, but he’s not going to do anything spectacular.” Q: On to the defense, the fast few years the Panthers have had the reputation of being a good defensive team. Why do you think the defense is not stepping up this year? Yasinskas: “I think there’s several answers, but there’s one that stands above all the rest and that’s that Kris Jenkins is not there. I think that’s just killing them because he is the key to their defense. When he’s in there he is such a disruptive force that he takes blockers away from Peppers, from Rucker, and off of Dan Morgan. Without him in there they’re getting to Peppers and putting two or three guys on him and Rucker is getting more blocking and Morgan is getting hit where he can’t cover much ground. It’s just a trickle down effect. The secondary is giving up plays because the pass rush isn’t putting any heat on the quarterback so I think that’s the major thing. There’s a couple other things. They’ve got to tackle better. Peppers has got to step up, yea he is getting double and tripled teamed, but so does Dwight Freeney (Indianapolis Colts’ defensive end) and he’s still producing. In the past guys like Bruce Smith and Reggie White have gotten that kind of blocking and they fought through it and produced a bunch of sacks. Those would be the main couple of things.” Q: The Panthers have very few sacks sacks, only five in five games, after having 40 in 2003 and 34 in 2004. Did you expect this little? Yasinskas: “No, not this little. Any time you have a talent like Julius Peppers you expect a pretty good number of sacks. When Jenkins went down maybe the expectations dropped a little bit but not this much. You would still expect them to have more than they have.” Q: How do you feel about first round draft pick and rookie Thomas Davis, who has 11 solo tackles with a sack, and his contribution to the defense thus far? Yasinskas: “Well, I think in the Arizona game was the first time that you really saw his potential. He made a couple plays and that was encouraging and I think there will be more of that. He got off to a horrible start in the New Orleans game when they started him at strong safety. He got abused by Ernie Conwell and they benched him after that. I think what they need to, this is just my personal opinion, they need to just let the kid focus on being a linebacker because I think that’s where his future is. The other day when he made a couple of plays he was playing that joker-linebacker spot in the nickel situation, kind of the old Mark Fields role, so I think they need to let him do that for a while and then start trying him at linebacker on first and second downs. We may be a year away from that, but I think as the season goes on as the joker-backer I think he’ll make more plays.” Q: Free agent signing Ken Lucas has his first interception as a Panther against Green Bay. He then followed that performance with three big passes deflected, two of which resulted in an interception for Marlon McCree in the game against the Cardinals. He also had a fumble recovery. You pointed out on Oct. 6, 2005, in “Lucas picks his comfort zone” that Lucas has had past success against the Cardinals including his only touchdown, but Arizona now has very good wide receivers. So do you feel that he can be the consistent shutdown corner the Panthers defense needs? Yasinskas: “Yes I think he can and I think we are seeing the early stages of that. What he did in the Arizona game in that second quarter where Larry Fitzgerald was lighting Chris Gamble up, Lucas went to the coaches and asked them to put him on Fitzgerald and I think after that, I mean in the second quarter alone Fitzgerald had what six catches for 106 yards or something like that and after they switched and put Lucas on him he had three catches for thirty yards. I think that’s a pretty good sign that he’s for real if he can step in and do something like that, and also shows his confidence and leadership skills to go and ask the coaches to put him on Fitzgerald.” Q: Do you feel that the Panthers most recent win coming from behind against the Cardinals will mark a turn around for them and bring about more consistency? Yasinskas: “It totally could. If you think back to 2003 they got off to the great start at 5-0, then they lost a couple games in a row and then were kind of mediocre and they played a couple weeks in a row where they had a chance to clinch the division and they lost each time and then they went out to Arizona and they finally clinched it in another game where they didn’t play real well, but they clinched it and then they didn’t lose again after that until the Super Bowl so a game like that can certainly trigger a nice little run, we’ll see.” Q: The Panther play the Lions (2-2) next. What do you think they must do to extend their current two game winning streak? Yasinskas: “Basically play their style of football which they have not done very much of this year. I think they need to go out and control the game from the very start with Stephen Davis and the ball control offense. Defensively they need to be aggressive. Joey Harrington is the kind of quarterback that makes mistakes especially if you put pressure on him so they can create a bunch of turnovers if they can put any sort of pressure on this guy. So that’s what they need to do, we’ll see if they are able to do it.” Q: Panthers were the only team in the NFC South to win in week five and the current standings are Tampa Bay 4-1, Carolina 3-2, Atlanta 3-2 and New Orleans 2-3. Can the Panthers win the division? Q: On Aug. 31, 2005, you wrote an article pointing out Sports Illustrated’s pick for the Panthers to win the Superbowl this year. You quoted safety Mike Minter as saying “It’s an opportunity to prove that two years ago, when we went to the Super Bowl, it was not a fluke. We’ve got that type of team.” After the first five games would you agree with this statement? Can they go to the Super Bowl this year? |
By Gaither Jones