Carolina Panthers Week 2 awards from defeat at the Bucs
By Dean Jones
Biggest Disappointment: Teddy Bridgewater – Carolina Panthers QB
There is no getting away from this one, no matter how much you want to root for Teddy Bridgewater.
The Carolina Panthers invested and sacrificed a tremendous amount to make Bridgewater their starting quarterback this offseason. But this performance was littered with uncertainty and errors in equal measure.
If Bridgewater’s debut for the Panthers got off to a great start, then the exact opposite occurred at the Buccaneers on Sunday. The signal-caller was unable to go through his reads efficiently and paid the price with some costly turnovers that Carolina was unable to recover from.
Tampa Bay ended up scoring 17 points from Bridgewater’s mistakes, which cannot happen too much more if the former first-round pick wants to make a real go of another starting chance,
There are some sections of Carolina’s fanbase who are hoping Bridgewater fails, for two reasons.
Number one is their fierce loyalty to Cam Newton, who is absolutely lighting it up with the New England Patriots after being released from an organization that selected him No. 1 overall back in 2011.
The second element to consider is Clemson quarterback Trevor Lawrence. The longer that the Panthers continue to lose, the more realistic drafting a player with franchise-changing potential becomes.
Bridgewater is no fool, so he knows full-well what is at stake in 2020 despite signing a three-year deal. One suspected it wouldn’t be long before the knives were out, and all it seemed to take was this sort of performance.