5 free-agent Panthers who haven’t helped themselves in 2020
By Dean Jones
Tahir Whitehead – Carolina Panthers LB
There is simply no getting away from this one.
The Tahir Whitehead experiment was a disaster.
It can’t have been easy for the free-agent signing to step into Luke Kuechly’s shoes after the perennial All-Pro retired following eight seasons with the Carolina Panthers. But any hopes the organization had regarding Whitehead being a solid short-term option quickly evaporated.
And some would argue this hope was never really there in the first place.
Whitehead has now been phased out of the starting rotation, and with good reason. His angles in run support were nothing short of abysmal and his inability to impact the game in coverage has been there for all to see during his career.
Jermaine Carter’s level of production has reinvigorated things at the second level to the point where it is not glaringly obvious that Whitehead was holding them back and it’s a move that should have been made a lot sooner.
The former Temple star had a chance to earn a longer stay in Carolina with his old college coach. But that window is now firmly shut and Whitehead will be one of the easiest releases the Panthers will decide on when it is time to do so.