Sorensen: So which Panthers team are they?

Sorensen: So which Panthers team are they?
Posted: Monday, Oct. 20, 2008
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http://www.charlotteobserver.com/panthers/story/264728.html


We made too much of Carolina’s lopsided road loss to Tampa Bay last week and we’ll make too much of Carolina’s one-sided home victory Sunday against New Orleans.

The NFL is so wildly popular, and teams play so few games, that we want to treat every week as a referendum. The Panthers beat San Diego on the road and Chicago at home. They’re world-beaters.

The Panthers lose to Minnesota on the road. They’re overrated.

The Panthers beat Atlanta and Kansas City at home. It’s like 2003, the Super Bowl season.

The Panthers lose by 24 points to Tampa Bay. We were only kidding about the Super Bowl. Somebody should be fired.

The Panthers beat the Saints 30-7 Sunday at Bank of America Stadium. Rehire the guy we fired last week and give him a raise.

The difference between the Tampa Bay loss and the New Orleans victory is?

“If you can come up with an answer for that you’d be a millionaire,” says Carolina defensive tackle Damione Lewis.

Here’s one.

Carolina fell behind 14-0 to the Bucs last week. A good team became better and a loud crowd became louder and the Panthers covered up, completely overwhelmed, and were unable to recover.

This week, Carolina drove 50 yards on the game’s first drive, a drive John Kasay ended with a 39-yard field goal. “That was huge,” says Panther safety Chris Harris.

It was huge because Bank of America Stadium has never been a place that visitors fear to tread. Wachovia is scarier.

Going into the season, the Panthers were 51-53 all-time at home and John Fox was 24-24.

There has been no home field advantage. Fans would show up enthusiastic. And then the Panthers would fail to pick up a touchdown, a first down or the ball. Here we go again. And the enthusiasm would deflate so simultaneously you could hear it.

The more somebody does a thing, the more they expect to do it. The Panthers are 4-0 at home this season for the first time since 1996.

“We want to make this sacred ground,” says Harris.

Despite the early field goal, the ground was not sacred right away. The Saints scored on the first play of the second quarter to take a 7-3 lead. But they did not score again.

Obviously New Orleans was muted in the second half without Reggie Bush, their elusive running back, whom they lost to a knee injury, and without center Jonathan Goodwin, who also was injured.

But Carolina was to New Orleans what Tampa Bay was to Carolina. The longer the game went, the better the more dominant the Panthers became. This was their game.

Muhsin Muhammad made a one-hand, tap the ball into the air and hang onto it reception. Steve Smith caught a touchdown pass with his body as he fell to the end zone on his back.

Julius Peppers forced a fumble, had a sack and would have a second if his jersey had not been implanted in the hands of New Orleans tackle Jammal Brown. Ken Lucas plucked a no-look interception from the air and didn’t drop it.

Jonathan Stewart ran into the middle and tripped. But before he did he flipped the ball back, as planned, to Jake Delhomme.

Is there no end to Carolina’s trickery? The Panthers ran a trick play as recently as 2002, and here they are trying another. Delhomme caught the lateral from Stewart and hit Smith for 29 yards.

Delhomme, 33, was Wishbone Jake Sunday. He took off on one scramble as if propelled and picked up an immediate eight yards. He averaged more yards per carry than any player on either roster, more than Bush and Carolina’s DeAngelo Williams.

“That was a little shocking to me,” Williams says of Delhomme’s eight-yard jaunt. “He has a little speed on him to be 47 years old.”

Told about the compliment, Delhomme says: “He missed it by a year. I’m 46.”

Maybe he means he runs a 4.6.

“I’m a five-flat guy,” says Delhomme.

But with Jake, it’s not about speed.

“I’m more quick than fast,” says Delhomme, and he demonstrates by swiftly moving his hand from side to side. “And I’m proud of it.”

Now, that’s a statement. And that’s the only statement Carolina made. Teams do not make statements seven weeks into the season.

It’s like this.

The Panthers are 5-2. They have yet to lose at home. And they have nine games to play.