Catalyst

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so, in other words, no matter what the saints do, cam will torch them

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Not really, no. It has to be a mix. Ideally the way to beat him is to get good pressure with your front 4 and blitz a safety or linebacker rather than just all-out blitzing.

If you blitz Cam heavily he'll get the ball out to Shockey or Olsen or just run up the middle for a good gain. Not to mention you run the risk of Steve Smith getting one-on-one, which is a mis-match against even a good corner.

The one game Cam was off in was against the Jaguars and that was more a result of him just being inaccurate for whatever reason. He was making the right decisions and would've had another big day if not for his accuracy being off - not to mention the monsoon that hit in the 2nd quarter - but he was off before that.

All in all I'd say the best approach is to get pressure with your front four and mix in some light blitzing to dial up the pressure in key situations. No doubt we're expecting you guys to blitz early and often and have a safety valve option on every play - likely Shockey and/or Olsen.

Our running game has been slow to get going so far, but was a lot better against the Bears last week. I think we ran for 160 yards as a team (80 for Williams, 60 for Stewart, the rest for Cam).

I would expect us to continue to work on running the ball more. I can't imagine it's a long-term issue as we have essentially the same OL & RB's as we have had for the last 3 years. Plus, our run game has historically been slow to get started every year.

As for Cam's usage... I think he probably is being over-used to a degree due to the lack of a consistent run game so far, but this is also the offense we want to run. He's played so well we've been able to run the aggressive pass offense our O.C. has wanted to run without having to 'protect' Cam with a run game.

His TD/INT ratio is a bit skewed. You have to factor in the rushing TD's, which he has 4 of and also consider that 3 of those INT's came in the one game against the Packers basically during a rough single quarter, which he later rebounded from.

Have to say, he's been great for us so far. Has had 2 TD's called back due to bogus penalties, but has been a leader and really has helped Cam along.

Our offense is designed to use the TE's a LOT. We start both Shockey and Olsen and use both of them together on probably 80% of our plays offensively.

Along with Williams/Stewart, Steve Smith, and Cam's threat to run, it creates a lot of matchup problems for defenses.

Panthers fan here...

I come in peace. Well... sort of. I like to visit other team's forums and discuss the game; haven't been here before, but Google is my friend.

I've watched a bit of you guys this season and I am impressed as expected. Drew Brees is doing his thing and Mark Ingram looks to be a beast in the making. Looks like Deuce McCallister back out there. I fully expect he'll have a huge day against our sorry run defense. We're starting 2 rookie DT's and have lost two of our starting linebackers for the season, so it's probably going to be a tough road defensively for us.

I expect you guys will take this one, but we gave the Packers a run for their money an probably should have beaten the Bears had our special teams not imploded. I hope we keep the ball away from Sproles Sunday.

But if we do have a shot, it's on offense. I don't know how it's happened, but our piss poor, worst in the league passing game from last season has very quickly emerged as one of the most explosive offenses in the NFL. We added Shockey and traded for Greg Olsen and Steve Smith has been re-born with Cam Newton throwing the ball.

Anyway, I figured some of you might be interested in an in-depth look at Cam's performance thus far this year. Below I have posted YouTube videos containing every pass Cam has thrown this season with the exception of the Jaguars game, which I can't seem to find online.

Cam @ Arizona - 24/37, 422 yards, 2 TD's, 1 INT + 8 rush, 18 yards, TD
LINK

Cam vs. Green Bay - 28/46, 432 yards, 1 TD, 3 INT's + 10 rush, 53 yards, TD
LINK

Cam @ Chicago - 27/46, 374 yards, 1 TD, 1 INT + 8 rush, 35 yards, 2 TD's
LINK

Should give you a better idea of how he's looked so far. That said, I still think you guys take this one. I feel good about the future of the Panthers, but we're not there just yet.

Hopefully the NFC South comes down to Saints/Panthers starting next year. I really think the Bucs and Falcons are overrated - particularly the Falcons.

I expect you'll be able to run all over our defense and Brees will do his thing as usual. If we have any shot at winning this it'll be with our offense, which is very quickly developing into one of the most explosive in the league.