The Carolina Panthers are about to find out everything they need to know about their run defense.
As President George W. Bush once said, “Fool me once, shame on, shame on you. Fool me, we can’t get fooled again.”
After Browns’ running backs Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt poured 200-plus rushing yards (5.6 yards per carry) on Carolina, the Panthers face another Pro Bowl-caliber challenge in Giants star Saquon Barkley.
“With all great backs, the best way to contain them, neutralize them, whatever you want to call it, is to have as many hats at the ball as possible,” defensive end Brian Burns said, “pretty much just swarming (them) with physicality and speed.”
In Week 1, Barkley played like a fusion of Hunt and Chubb. A year removed from an ACL recovery, Barkley reminded football fans and coaches why he was selected No. 2 overall in 2018. He gained 194 yards from scrimmage, his most since Week 16 of the 2019 season. On 18 carries, he had only two negative rushes against the Tennessee Titans in a 21-20 New York win.
He’s poised for a repeat performance against Carolina unless the team corrects mistakes in its run defense, specifically gap assignments, rush lane integrity and tackling. The Panthers had 18 missed tackles against Cleveland and allowed 124 yards after contact.
“The key to stopping great tailbacks, make him go east and west, you know, sideways.” defensive coordinator Phil Snow said. “(Their run game) is different than Cleveland, they are vertically downhill, so that he can square his shoulders. And that’s why they’re not having negative runs. They do a nice job with that.”
Barkley will try to run north and south while Carolina attempts gang tackling him. Burns said the team’s defensive front and linebackers met together this week in preparation for Barkley and quarterback Daniel Jones, who had six carries in Week 1.
Burns said both rooms meeting together was linebacker Shaq Thompson’s idea ,though it is something the team did late last year as well. Burns said it was important to “knock it out now.”
“We need to attack the run game with our linebackers,” Burns said. “It was a very productive meeting. (It helps) us know what they are thinking in certain calls and certain situations. We need to know what they are thinking so we are all on the same page.”
The Giants (1-0) are coming off a thrilling victory in Tennessee where the team needed a gutsy two-point conversion (scored by Barkley) to win. Reports from New York suggest the Giants are rolling after new head coach Brian Daboll’s first win.
Sunday will be the Giants’ home opener.
Limiting Barkley will take 11 defenders playing assignment sound football for about 65 snaps. The average NFL game produces 67 offensive plays per game. On Sunday against the Browns, Carolina played 81 snaps (including penalties).
That’s too many. To offset that workload, the Panthers’ defense practiced “differently” than the offense on Wednesday. Baker Mayfield and the offense ran about 50 plays versus Cleveland.
Linebacker Damien Wilson said he is not feeling fatigued because the Panthers deploy enough linebackers to stay fresh. Frankie Luvu played 68 snaps. Thompson was on the field for 60 plays. Wilson rolled in for 31, picking up the team’s lone sack.
The Panthers have an opportunity to effectively pressure Jones. The Giants’ fourth-year quarterback was pressured on 18 of his 26 dropbacks against Tennessee.
“Daniel is really a good athlete,” Snow said. “He caught the ball one-handed last year. Hell of a catch. And he hurt us running the football on two critical third downs.”
Snow is alluding to the Giants-Panthers game last year, which Carolina lost 25-3.
For the Panthers’ pressures to result in sacks, either Burns or Snow’s blitzes will have to connect.
Burns had four hurries and six tackles against the Browns. He’s facing constant double teams on obvious passing downs but must find a way to combat multiple blocks.
“They’ll find a way to get two hats on Brian, no matter what we do,” Snow said. “That’s just the way it is. He’s one of the elite pass rushers in the league. ... That’s just the way it’s gonna be. Nobody’s gonna let Brian sack the quarterback.”
If Burns cannot end drives then the blitz must. The Panthers sent an extra rusher on 21% of snaps last week, the 17th most in the league. It’ll be interesting to see if Snow blitzes more facing a Giants team that deploys a lot of 11 personnel (one running back, one tight end) compared to the Browns, who play more two-tight end sets.
Sacking Jones won’t matter if Barkley runs for whatever he wants on early downs.
“If we were going against Christian (McCaffrey), you have to surround him with hats because they’re likely to make the first guy miss,” Burns said. “So if you make someone miss then you got to have your brothers behind you to clean up that mess.”
