Greg Cosell's Look Ahead: Panthers had new looks on offense and defense

The Carolina Panthers came out of their bye week looking like a new team. Or, in some ways, like the team they were last season.

The Panthers were aggressive on both sides of the ball, with schematic tweaks that worked very well in a 30-20 win over the Arizona Cardinals.

Before the Panthers take on the Los Angeles Rams this week, I wanted to point out some of the things that Carolina changed over the bye, after its 1-5 start.

DEFENSE

First I want to talk about a great individual play by Panthers middle linebacker Luke Kuechly. It’s one of the best plays I’ve seen by a middle hole defender in “Cover 2” zone.

In the first quarter, Kuechly opened to the field side on his drop, read Carson Palmer in the pocket, then flipped his hips with fluidity and explosion to cover Gresham. He got his hand on a great back-side seam throw by Palmer to tight end Jermaine Gresham that would have been a huge play in a game the Panthers led just 7-0.

That’s not a schematic change, I just wanted to point out the play because it was remarkable. It’s a reminder that the Panthers still have some extremely talented players.

And they used Kuechly in their most notable strategic tweak.

The Panthers used Kuechly more as a blitzer than I’ve seen in the past. It was evident that Panthers defensive coordinator Sean McDermott changed the tempo of the defense in the bye week. There were more diverse looks up front and more blitzes.

The Panthers blitzed 16 times against the Cardinals, and 13 of those involved Kuechly.

On third-and-10 on Arizona’s second possession, the Panthers had a five-man rush with Kuechly as the fifth rusher. The Panthers had a five-across front. Kuechly attacked the “A” gap as a three-technique (shaded outside the guard), with Mario Addison (the other three-technique) on a long stunt behind Star Lotulelei and Kuechly. Linebacker Thomas Davis was lined up on the line of scrimmage as well, running back David Johnson initially crossed the formation to his left for Davis, and reacted too late to Kuechly in the middle. Kuechly got the sack.

The Panthers also had another big defensive adjustment based on personnel. As we mentioned before, the Panthers didn’t line up in one snap of nickel (five defensive backs) against the New Orleans Saints in Week 6 apparently because of lack of depth at cornerback. The Panthers played free-agent addition cornerback Leonard Johnson in the slot in their nickel defense against the Cardinals and he was a huge part of their game plan. It gave the Panthers some options and the defense was totally different. Even though Johnson was just added he was a major part of what they did, in blitz packages as well.

The defense looked a lot different than it did before the bye, and it was effective.

OFFENSE

The story of the week was Cam Newton’s complaints about getting hit in the pocket. To me, the story was that the Panthers got back to using him more in the running game – which of course voluntarily opens Newton up for more hits.

But this is how the Panthers play best. They were very multiple in the run game, with a lot of different concepts including power, counter, trap, zone and Newton involved heavily in the run game with plenty of backfield action. The coaches made an effort to get Newton involved in the run game as part of the game plan. That was clear.

Here’s the kind of creative run we saw often from the Panthers in 2015. It came on Carolina’s first offensive scoring drive. It was a designed run by Newton. The lead blockers were running back Fozzy Whittaker out of the backfield and center Ryan Kalil. Tight end Greg Olsen initially aligned in the backfield and released outside, bringing safety Tony Jefferson with him. That lightened the box by one defender and helped Newton gain 19 yards on a quarterback draw. You can see how Olsen’s release opened things up for Newton.

The Panthers used Newton in draw, power and sweep plays, especially in the red zone. That was an offensive staple in 2015, when Carolina led the NFL in scoring offense.

The Panthers made some key adjustments over the bye, and now we’ll see how they look for the rest of the season.

Siemian management

The Denver Broncos use quarterback Trevor Siemian in an interesting way. He’s very controlled and modulated, but coach Gary Kubiak is willing to have Siemian turn it loose in critical situations.

After Siemian threw a fourth-quarter interception, Kubiak had his quarterback get aggressive. From a 3×1 set (three receivers on one side, one on the other), the Chargers had a “Cover 3” zone with Casey Hayward locked on receiver Demaryius Thomas. Virgil Green ran a seam route and no underneath defender ran with him. That’s pitch and catch for Siemian and Green. It was an aggressive play call.

The next play was 40 yards to Thomas on mirrored go routes with eight-man protection. It was another aggressive play call. Again, Kubiak didn’t hide Siemian in a big situation.

Keep this in mind on Sunday night when the Broncos face the Raiders. Although Siemian is controlled in the offense, when there’s a critical situation the Broncos aren’t scared to let him make a play.

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NFL analyst and NFL Films senior producer Greg Cosell watches as much NFL game film as anyone. Throughout the season, Cosell will join Shutdown Corner to share his observations on the teams, schemes and personnel from around the league.