The Panthers have had three weeks of irregular practice schedules, be they weather-related or otherwise, this season – add Week 11 to the total after the team decided to move their Thursday walkthrough to Friday because of the cold and driving rain in Charlotte.
In Week 2, as Hurricane Florence bore down on the southeast, the Panthers scrambled to make adjustments to their travel schedule before traveling normally on Saturday – they then lost in Atlanta.
In Week 6, the Panthers moved their Thursday session from the practice fields to Bank of America Stadium to deal with heavy rains – three days later they would fall down 17 in Washington and lose.
Last week, with Thursday Night Football looming, the Panthers did not have a full practice, choosing instead to have a walkthrough without helmets or pads before traveling Wednesday – we all know what happened in Pittsburgh. While the disruption to their practice schedule certainly isn’t the full explanation for their lackluster performances on the road in their three losses this season, it hasn’t gone unnoticed by Ron Rivera.
“Some of the positive things that have happened, really, has just been being able to practice,” said Rivera after Wednesday’s rain-soaked practice session; it has rained every day this week in Charlotte. “We’ve had some tough days this year in terms of practice; we’ve had to work ourselves around two hurricanes, unseasonably hot weather, untimely rain – this week, again, rain yesterday [and] rain today.”
“Sloppy conditions.”
While the Panthers have never had an indoor practice facility, that may be changing sooner rather than later – owner David Tepper said before the season that the lack of an indoor facility was a top priority and had the team “falling behind a little bit” in terms of competitive advantages; he doesn’t expect that to be the case for much longer.
“Let me just say this, I’ll be very surprised if we’re not playing indoors before the end of next summer for practice, somehow or another,” said Tepper ahead of Thursday’s game in Pittsburgh. “I’m not going to say much more than that to you guys, but I’ll say that.”
“Where? Why would I do that, don’t I want to keep you guessing a little bit?”
A temporary solution might be to place a bubble over one of the three practice fields adjacent to Bank of America Stadium while the team builds a larger, more permanent facility that could potentially team offices and Panthers training camp – the club’s contract with Wofford College in Spartanburg is up after the 2019 season.
The Panthers had an extra day of practice this week after playing on Thursday last week – their long weekend, deemed the ‘mini-bye’, gave the players four days off to recharge both mentally and physically before returning to practice on Tuesday. Usually the team meets Monday for film review, gives the players the day off of Tuesday and practices Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.
For now, the Panthers will continue to deal with the elements as they prepare to face off with the Detroit Lions, who both practice and play indoors, Sunday at 1p.
