Christian McCaffrey will have an even bigger role in the Panthers' offense this season.
McCaffrey
Tyler Seguin Jersey , the team's first-round draft pick in 2017, carried the ball 117 times for 435 yards and established a franchise rookie record with
80 receptions. He finished the season with seven touchdowns.
While McCaffrey led the Panthers in receptions, he'll be counted on to carry the ball more after the team parted ways with its all-time leading rusher
Jonathan Stewart. Panthers two-time NFL Coach of the Year Ron Rivera believes
McCaffrey is up to the task, saying he can be a running back who carries the
ball 200 times this season.
McCaffrey's durability has been questioned at times because his body build is more akin to a scat back than a power back.
He averaged just 3.7 yards per carry in 2017.
"Yeah, why not?" Rivera said of the prospect of a 200-carry season. "Everybody forgets that when he was (at Stanford) he carried the ball between
the tackles more than anybody and touched the ball more than anybody. I don't
see why not."
McCaffrey is all for it.
"Obviously anybody on the team wants the ball as much as possible," McCaffrey said. "That is football. You should want to compete. But we are here to win
football games, so whatever that means and whatever that takes we're going to
do."
McCaffrey, the son of three-time Super Bowl champion wide receiver Ed McCaffrey, likes what he's seen so far from new offensive coordinator Norv
Turner, who has taken over for Mike Shula.
He feels "a lot more comfortable" in his second year with the Panthers, even though he's learning a new offensive scheme. But he wouldn't discuss what will
be different about his workload this year or in what different ways he will be
used under Turner for competitive reasons.
"However they want to use me
Ryan O'Reilly Jersey , that is where I will be," McCaffrey said. "I think we have a lot of great talent and a lot of different weapons."
He won't be carrying the entire load in the backfield, of course.
The Panthers added depth at running back signing 2017 1,000-yard rusher C.J. Anderson, who played in Denver and helped the Broncos beat Carolina in the Super
Bowl in 2015. Carolina is also expecting some added help from Cameron
Artis-Payne and Kenjon Barner.
And don't forget, it was quarterback Cam Newton who led the team with 754 yards rushing and six touchdowns last season.
The 21-year-old McCaffrey enters the season with a new perspective after a "traumatic experience" earlier this summer.
McCaffrey, his brothers and some friends were in Colorado when they saw an elderly man fall off a cliff while hiking with his 13-year-old grandson.
McCaffrey called 911 and one of his friends administered chest compressions.
McCaffrey said paramedics arrived at the scene in about 11 minutes. The 72-year-old Dan Smoker Sr. survived the fall and McCaffrey has developed a
friendship with him and his family. He even plans to invite the Smokers to a
Panthers home game this season.
"When you see something like that, you have a better appreciation for life and take every moment in," McCaffrey said. "We had a decompression moment after
that. You look at life and realize it can be gone in any split second."
Brian Bowen had the opportunity to spend a couple of days last week playing in real basketball games, replete with scoreboards and referees and with every
courtside seat filled.
It’s unclear when he’ll be able to do that again.
Bowen might have been one of the most talked-about players in NCAA basketball over the last year, without so much as playing a single second of a game. He’s
the one-time Louisville commit who left amid massive scandal – the federal probe
into the college game
Zach Hyman Jersey , including allegations that his father took money during the recruiting process – and subsequently transferred to South
Carolina.
But the NCAA hasn’t cleared him yet. It might not. So he’s taking a long look at the NBA, and Bowen’s invitation to the draft combine last week was a
fact-finding mission that will help him decide whether to formally turn pro or
return to school with hopes that his collegiate eligibility will be restored so
he can play with the Gamecocks.
”It’s the biggest thing I’ve ever been through in my life,” Bowen said after one of his 5-on-5 games at the combine. ”They took the game away from me, a game
I truly love. It made me realize how much passion and love I do have for the
game. I put that into my workouts every day and I go as hard as I can.”
The 6-foot-7 Bowen of Saginaw, Michigan has until the end of the month to decide whether to keep his name in the draft or not. The draft itself is June
21. And there’s been no indication if the NCAA will offer him any clarity before
he has not make his stay-or-go choice.
”My lawyer and the school are dealing with it,” Bowen said.
His is a most curious case, even in a draft that has a handful of players who have been tainted on some level by the ongoing mess that reverberated through
the college game last season and probably will continue having a ripple effect
for the foreseeable future.
Billy Preston, the 6-1o forward who left Kansas while being investigated by the NCAA and played professionally in Europe, was at the combine trying to show
his worth to NBA clubs. Same goes for the 6-4 De’Anthony Melton, who left USC
after not being able to play this past season because a family friend was linked
to the scandal.
Melton said the interviews with teams at the combine had little to do with basketball and mostly centered on his side of the story.
”I just broke it down for them,” Melton said. ”I told them from the very beginning to the very end. I know there’s a lot of reports out there about what
happened and what was going down
Authentic Jordan Reed Jersey , I told them my feelings about everything and why I kept quiet through the whole situation. I gave them what they were asking
for.”
That trio of players handled their unwanted down time in different ways.
Bowen said he locked in on academics, earning a 3.5 GPA. Preston went to Bosnia and played, albeit in only a handful of games and was back around the
Jayhawks – as a fan and friend, not player and teammate – for their Final Four
appearance. Melton started studying NBA games and looking at them as if he was a
coach, diverting his attention away from college ball with the exception of
USC’s schedule.
”Any decision I made, I don’t regret nothing,” Preston said. ”I don’t regret anything I’ve been through. It’s God. It’s in God’s hands. Whatever presents
itself, I’ll definitely fight my way through it. Being over there, I think that
was God putting a barrier in my way and I broke through it. I didn’t even think
I would be here right now.”
Bowen always expected to be at the combine, but never while in this situation.
He doesn’t speak ill of Louisville . He insists that he’s had no involvement with Christian Dawkins, the would-be agent who federal prosecutors say brokered
and facilitated payments to players during their recruitments in exchange for
them hiring him when they turned pro. He says he hasn’t even considered who he
would hire for representation if he stays in the draft.
”It’s a situation I have to deal with
Tom Kuhnhackl Jersey ,” Bowen said. ”It is what it is. Continue to stay focused, that’s my big thing.”
He’s also closer than ever with his father, which might surprise some considering his alleged role in Bowen’s problems. He’s been in South Carolina
with his son, and the younger Bowen said they begin each day the same way – a
hug in the morning, saying ”I love you” to the other before starting to attack
the daily schedule.
”Everything happens for a reason,” Bowen said. ”Somebody’s situation is always going to be worse than mine. Other people in my family have worse
situations than I have. I just have to learn, use it as a learning experience,
use it as motivation and have a chip on my shoulder.”
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