4 NFL Draft prospects the Panthers will miss out on in 2021
By Dean Jones
Zach Wilson – QB (BYU)
There isn’t a hotter quarterback aside from Trevor Lawrence entering the 2021 NFL Draft than Zach Wilson. The BYU prospect seems to have that rare ability to make plays out of nothing and providing he impresses during the evaluation process, the player might become a top-five selection next spring.
The calls to draft a franchise player at the position from some sections of the Carolina Panthers’ fanbase are deafening. Teddy Bridgewater simply hasn’t done enough to convince people he is the right man to lead the franchise forward and one could argue that he was on a hiding to nothing coming in thanks to the way Cam Newton’s departure was handled.
Carolina made the call to give Bridgewater a three-year, $63 million deal with a $15 million signing bonus and $33 million guaranteed this offseason. They don’t have an out regarding his contract until 2022, which was a gamble that doesn’t seem to have paid off.
They are now stuck between a rock and a hard place.
And they only have themselves to blame.
Wilson is a boom or bust prospect that needs time to develop in order to make a real go of things at the next level. The Panthers could have sat him behind Bridgewater before he was ready to assume command under center, but this scenario won’t come to pass unless they trade up.