What can the Carolina Panthers do to seek out a pivotal victory against the New Orleans Saints on Monday Night Football in Week 2?
Well, this week could have gone a lot better.
It is bad enough to lose the linchpin of your secondary again, but to follow that up with your starting left guard going down for the year is just adding insult to injury. Something the Carolina Panthers are all too aware of at this point.
This is the nature of an NFL season - you cannot predict injuries and that is why depth is often the deciding factor when it comes down to who succeeds at the end of the year. Something that the Panthers are sorely lacking in, especially at cornerback. But more on that later.
Week 1 was a less-than-stellar debut for the new-look Panthers. Things started off promising and quickly devolved into a painful reality as rookie mistakes and gaps in personnel started to rear their ugly heads.
That isn't to say there weren't some bright spots, as Bryce Young showed real promise and the Panthers' young receiving core performed admirably. Especially Terrace Marshall Jr., who hauled in a pair of really nice catches. But that is also the main issue the team faced, there simply weren't enough plays to look back on and be proud of.
With missed tackles galore and running backs galloping to gains like the defense was on vacation, a lot needs to be worked on in a short period of time if this team wants any hope of remaining competitive against much stiffer competition in the New Orleans Saints.
No one expects the Panthers to even be remotely close in this matchup, but what are some key areas of the game that could lead the underdogs to victory?
Carolina Panthers must tackle with conviction
There are few things that are more infuriating as a football fan than seeing a running back dead to rights in the backfield only for the defender to slip off their tackle without affecting anything.
This is a sight that Carolina Panthers fans have become all too accustomed to in recent seasons as nothing seems to fix the glaring issue that is this team's rush defense. Even if the Atlanta Falcons have a pair of truly special running backs, there is no excuse for just how bad this defensive performance was at times. This is something that has to change in Week 2.
The New Orleans Saints' rushing attack didn't get up to much in Week 1, only racking up a measly 69 yards, but they didn't have to with Derek Carr putting in the best quarterback performance of the NFC South by a large margin. However, they would be stupid to not take advantage of the chance to get some momentum in the run game against the Panthers' often porous defense.
Sadly, the Panthers lost their best tackler at the cornerback position when Jaycee Horn went down. Donte Jackson and C.J. Henderson don't instill much confidence that anything will get better. Although newcomer Troy Hill showed some promise on a nice stop of Bijan Robinson behind the line on a screen pass.
With that said, the Panthers have to shore up their tackling and vision in the run. If not for this game then for the future as a whole, because the NFL will take note of this and nothing punishes weakness like an NFL head coach.
A dozen missed tackles in Week 1 is way too many for any professional football team and this needs to be rectified.
Carolina Panthers must help C.J. Henderson
Does anyone else hear a broken record? C.J. Henderson will be the deciding factor in this Carolina Panthers secondary for better or worse.
The Panthers are well aware of Henderson's limitations at this point. What remains now is how the team decides to mitigate against them.
The only problem is that with the absolutely stacked New Orleans Saints receiving room, there isn't really the opportunity to send much help Henderson's way in the form of double teams and the like. Because if you take away that help from one side it leaves a gap that cannot be filled and will be exploited.
Between Chris Olave, Michael Thomas, and Rasheed Shahid, the Saints have plenty of options and all have the ability to break open the game. This begs the question of where you line up the weak point of your secondary that gave up a 100 percent catch rate in Week 1. There is nowhere to hide, no player that isn't a legitimate threat before or after the catch.
The only possible solution to this problem, which isnt a very good one, would be to put Jeremy Chinn in the game as an extra defensive back at the linebacker position. Simply to have another body on the field that is capable of covering. Even though this would further open up the Panthers against the run which is exactly what doesn't need to happen.
There are not many good options here for the Panthers and it may come down to sliding a safety wherever Henderson happens to line up for the entire game. But that is not sustainable in the slightest. The team has to figure out how to help the troubled corner as best they can as there is no one else on the roster that can replace him.
Donte Jackson did perform rather well in Week 1, showing just how effective the aggressive corner can be when healthy. Something that the Panthers will desperately need in Week 2 if they want any hope of containing the Saints' passing attack.
Carolina Panthers must get the run game going early
This is quite often a key to winning most NFL games, even with a lack of importance being placed on running backs in today's league. But this is no more true than when trying to protect a young quarterback against an opportunistic defense.
The Atlanta Falcons didn't come into the season being known for takeaways. Yet they managed to haul in two interceptions from Bryce Young on plays where the young quarterback didn't see the defender watching his eyes.
The New Orleans Saints managed to intercept Ryan Tannehill three times and make the veteran quarterback's day the stuff of nightmares from the word go. They also sealed up every Tennessee Titans wide receiver so well there were only a handful of times separation was created.
If the Panthers couldn't gain any meaningful separation against the Falcons, then what hope is there against the Saints? That hope lies in the run game.
If the Panthers can lean on a resurgent Chuba Hubbard and Miles Sanders to take the brunt of the early load and trust in a banged-up offensive line to move the trenches, that will open up the passing game. As well as take some pressure off the under-strength protection.
One can also hope that the team will have deep threat D.J. Chark back from injury to help spread out the field a little bit more.
Keeping the run game going also means that the team isn't stuck in a hole that Young has to try and dig out of, something that inevitably leads to the kinds of mistakes that doomed the Panthers in Week 1. So keeping as much pressure off the young quarterback's shoulders is paramount both to this game and future development.