Matt Rhule - Head Coach of The Carolina Panthers

I’m less interested in the sports science stuff. That’s a long range deal. I want to know how the front office will be structured, who will be reporting to who, and how the rest of the coaching staff fills out.

The rumor is he will bring his current DC with him. His name is Phil Snow. I didn’t know anything about them until yesterday. I spent about two hours researching him and his product. I came away impressed.

https://twitter.com/onepantherplace/status/1214904769162158081?s=21

 

lol

 

While I'm happy with the Rhule hire, I'm a little underwhelmed by his first two hires. I hope they work out, but I would feel better if he gets an assistant with significant NFL coaching experience, not just a few years teaching/coaching a position.

 

Ryan might have potential, but Snow is a non-starter. You don't hire a college coordinator to fix one of the NFL's worst defenses.

 

To be fair, Harbaugh followed a similar formula in 2011. Fangio was the more established NFL assistant, while Greg Roman was a glorified errand boy for Seifert and Capers.

Fangio did have DC experience. Roman did not. They both came with Jim from Stanford.

Like I said, I want to see a couple established NFL names on the staff really quickly here. You need an assistant head coach, one with prior HC experience. That’s a no damn brainer.

Tepper has paid this guy a record rookie deal, and has given him total control. Say what you want about JR: he played football for the Colts with Johnny Unitas. He understood the dynamics of building a football team far greater than the current owner.

By the way, Pat said on the radio that he’s 100% certain a good name is about to be hired in Carolina for that other football exec role.

Trying to be realistic, not blindly optimistic. And I’m not thrilled with all of this, but I’m certainly not panicking yet.

 

It would be nice if Tepper would land on a philosophy. Either that, or shut the hell up. I've heard about five different versions of what he wants his team to look like.


Understate and overperform.

 

I think we have come to understand this is who he is. In fact, he’s kind of morphing into a little bit more of a caricature than I expected. Nobody knows what his philosophy is. Probably because he doesn’t have one philosophy. His entire fortune was built upon shifting philosophies. And, more than the money, he’s the kind of guy that takes pride in bragging to folks that he found something that nobody else did. It’s a big reason they did the Eric Reed deal. It’s a big reason they, at the last minute, overpaid for a good college coach who presumably wants his two coordinators to come with him as part of the package deal.

 

I like that Rhule is an old-school pitbull who's coached in all three phases. It just seems antithetical to what Tepper was describing in his last State Of The Tepper address.

 

If his staff is good, it will likely be beneficial they come with him so there's already continuity.

We'll see if their collegiate experience translates to the nfl within the honeymoon period.

Any replacement of the staff here by most anybody should be an improvement over the product witnessed over the past 2 seasons.

 

Tepper is probably more Trump like.
He will say anything he wants and then do anything he wants even it contradicts what he said.
I wish him much success.
Rhule sounds the same.