Cam Newton is always particularly energetic before a home game.
He’s in the warmup huddle firing up his offense, sharing a secret handshake with each offensive lineman or doing a running jump to as many Panthers players as he can as they come out of the tunnel before introductions – but today, at only the second home opener of Newton’s career, against the storied Dallas Cowboys, after a complete offseason with a full complement of weapons, Norv Turner must have seen something different.
“Norv just felt – kind of watching him during warmups – Norv just felt he had to get him going early, which he did,” Ron Rivera said after the game about the first drive that saw Newton rush three times for 45 yards. “He got in a good rhythm and we moved the ball well. Unfortunately in that first drive we did everything but score the touchdown.”
When he says the team moved the ball well, what he actually means is that Newton moved the ball well on the nine-play, 58-yard drive that ended with a Christian McCaffrey fumble from the five-yard line – the 2015 MVP quarterback accounted for 62 of the team’s 63 yards on that first drive – only 59 if you remove the swing pass to DJ Moore that technically was a rush as it traveled slightly backwards, but when Newton gets going early – particularly on the ground – the offense seems to just click more.
And Newton certainly was able to get it going on the ground. You expected the lion not to roar?
After setting career highs in both rushing yards and attempts in 2017 – last season was the second time in his career that he has led the team in rushing, which he did again today with 58 yards on 13 carries – 45 of them coming on the team’s first drive and 29 of them coming on a spectacular scamper that ended with the 6’5, 245 pound QB throwing down Cowboys’ safety Jeff Heath – it’s not often a quarterback has four inches and over 30 pounds on a safety, but that’s what happened.
A quarterback leading the team in rushing doesn’t bother the other running backs on the team.
“I think me and C-Mac complement each other well,” said CJ Anderson, who averaged five yards per rush on seven carries and was inches from a third-quarter touchdown that ultimately went to Alex Armah. “There are some cuts and some plays that we’d [like to] have back, but we took our opportunities when we got them.”
“If you’ve got a chance to put your hands on the ball, you’ve got to make plays – that’s what playmakers do. When [Cam’s] running the ball successfully like that, he’s a lot more energetic and he’s into the game. You want to get him going; he’s our leader and you want to get him going – it makes it easier for us to do our job when he’s playing that well.”
The dual threat ability of Cam Newton that has been such a huge part of the Panthers offense, but Ron Rivera was impressed with the majority of his quarterbacks’ decision making Sunday afternoon – that’s what both he and Turner have harped on all throughout the preseason. What the success of the offense ultimately comes down to are the decisions that Newton makes and that’s not just when he drops back to pass but in the run game as well. When it comes down to it, the decisions are in Cam’s hands – whether it’s pulling it or giving it to the runner on a zone read or trying to divvy the touches up between the largest number of weapons he’s had in his career.
“Part of it is what the defense giving you and what are you going to try and take from them,” said Rivera this week. “It’s a whole bunch of factors that go into deciding who gets the ball and the ultimate decision maker is the quarterback.”
While Newton completed 65.4% of his passes, he only averaged 6.2 yards per attempt, a number that would have ranked him 29th in the league in 2017 – he was much more impressive on the ground than in the air, although he did most of his damage in the first half – seven rushes for 45 and a score in the first half and six for only 13 in the second; in fact, the Panthers offense as a whole seemed to stutter in the second half, racking up 209 yards by halftime and only 84 the rest of the way. The team was 4-for-7 on third down in the first half, including two third-and-shorts that Newton picked up with his legs.
They didn’t convert a third down in the second half.
“Going out there and playing four quarters of football is something that we haven’t done in a long time so [we’re] just trying to get back into the groove of things,” said Newton about their offensive performance. “But all in all, the offense did a lot of good things but we’ve just got to stay on rhythm; that’s when we’re at our best. Those methodical, long drives from running the ball, throwing the ball and keeping the defense off-balance; you saw flashes of those today.”
“There were lulls that we can’t keep allowing ourselves to get in.”
Perhaps one way to keep the offense out of those lulls will be to keep Cam running, something that he has said in the past helps him stay in the flow of the game. And when the quarterback had a conversation with his new offensive coordinator about Newton running the ball, Turner didn’t have a problem letting the player with the third-most rushing yards amongst quarterbacks in NFL history off the leash.
“Hey, baby,” Newton said with a huge smile on his face in what can only be described as a hilarious impression of Turner’s uniquely southern drawl. “I’m going to let you be you now, baby – just let it go out there, baby.”
“He loves baby.”
When Cam is successful on the ground, the Panthers tend to come out victorious, baby.
