Happy Half HourThis week on a Happy half Hour.
Good news for Bryce.
I mean, he's coming into a situation where the protection has been coold, you know, and Adam Feelen's back on the practice field as well. And if Adam is able to show that he's ready to be activated after a short week of practice, then you know, that's another benefit to Bryce as he goes into this deal.
What's the cow. It's time for the Happy Half Hour, presented by Southern Star, an official bourbon of the Carolina Panthers. Here are your hosts, Darren Gant and Cassidy Hill.
Hello, friends, and welcome to the Traffic Safety edition of the Happy Half Hour. We're gonna spend a lot of time doing public service announcements about you know, stopping at red lights and wearing your seat belts and cool stuff like that, because first and foremost, we are happy that Andy Dalton and his family are safe and secure. So it's going to be that kind of happy half hour. And as always, not that this fits with the public safety, traffic safety, but when you're safely at home. The Happy Half Hour is presented by a Southern Star and official bourbon partner of the Carolina Panthers. Celebrate the spirit of the Carolinas. When you're safely at home, do not drink and drive correct. That's at the top of the list. But yes, thank goodness for seat belts and airbags and all that kind of cool stuff, because the adorable Dalton family is safe and sound after a scary crash the other day, including Winnie the Dog.
I looked in Vain.
I put all my best investigative resources trying to find a picture of Winnie the Dogs, but couldn't really find a good one.
Andy also told us that it's a mini golden doodle. If you have a mini golden doodle, I want that dog to have its on Instagram page. Yeah, I want daily pictures. I want updates on all that is going on in the life of Winnie the Many.
It feels like it feels like they missed an opportunity there. I think that's part of the contract with dogs like that. If you have that kind of dog, it has to have a social media presence.
So somebody should tell Andy I may do that.
We'll work on that. But yes, thankfully, Winny the Dog and all of the other Daltons are safe and sound. But it has put a dent in the Carolina Panthers plans. You see what I did there? I did Yeah, soon too soon? Probably it could have gone so much worse. It really could have, literally and figuratively. But with that car accident the other day, again, fortunately Andy's okay, but he does have a sprained thumb, so grabbing a football and throwing it is problematic for him right now. And when that's literally your job description, that kind of makes it tough to go. So we're back to Bryce shawng heading out to Denver, and that's been the topic of all the conversations for the last forty eight hours.
Yeah, anytime there's a quarterback change that's going to dominate the week, that's going to I was looking up something earlier about the Broncos. I just wanted something simple, like I think their record as so I googled Denver Broncos and all of the news stories at the top of the page were Denver reporters and outlets talking about the quarterback change and how they would now be facing Bryce Young. Not an easy week to step into if you're Bryce Young. Not an easy week to step into if you're any quarterback having to play against this Denver defense. Their top five in passing defense. I want to say in total defense maybe even.
Yes, that's correct.
Third, third in yards per game allowed, third in points per game allowed, fifth in passing yards per game allowed, and second in the league with twenty eight sacks.
Ooh, not a fun Sunday, Bob. What are they in rushing defense?
I didn't write that one down.
You need to have answers for all of my possible questions.
That's not part I could just make something up. Good is the answer.
They're playing well on defense, and so whether it was handy, whether it was price, that was going to be a complicated ask anyway for the Carolina Panthers.
Right, the twenty eight sacks really really stands out as well, because that's something and this is this is not a knock. This is just looking at a game, looking at the game as the key to the game. Bryce likes to kind of move around the pocket some. This might be one of those weeks where he really does have to just trust that his offensive line is going to protect him and hang in there because if you if you get out, they've got you and so and we've seen, you know, last year how tough he is willing to take some of those sacks if it means he gets the ball off in time. It's gonna have to probably be one of those cases where if you because if you give them an inch, they're taking you down, buddy. So this is an offensive line that is capable of providing a good, clean pocket and take advantage of it and let them protect you and do their job.
Yeah.
And the good news for Bryce, I mean, he's coming into a situation where the protection has been good, right, you know. And Taylor Motens back on the field yesterday. We'll see how he's going the rest of the week. Obviously, that would be a benefit to a already good offensive line if you get an old HEADLG. Temo back in there. Jonathan Brooks is doing more and more in practice. He's still in his practice window. But Adam Thielen's back on the practice field as well. And that's you know, as we know having seen Adam throughout last year when he and Bryce had such a connection. If Adam is able to show that he's ready to be activated after a short week of practice, then you know, that's another benefit to Bryce as he goes into this deal.
Right, Adam would be huge because he's so helpful to have on those passes where you do have to get the ball out quick and you don't really have time to go through your reads and you just need to check it down. Adam Feeling's always there where you need him to be, So that would be huge. As you mentioned Timo, just if that's if you get Timo back in there. The only offensive lineman you're missing from the start of the sea is Austin Corporate and Brady Christensen is doing a pretty good job and so that's huge. And then on the other side of the ball to possibly get you know, Jadavian Clowney, Jose Jewel, both guys that were on the practice field yesterday, So was dj Wantum. I would be a little surprised if he plays on Sunday.
Yeah, his practice for the first time, and that's a yike almost a year. And that's one of the things I wanted to bring up. I mean, the quarterback conversation obviously dominates it. If there is a website about football, it has had Andy Dalton traffic accident news on it this week, and so I just think that kind of takes up all the oxygen. But I want to, you know, spend a little bit of time talking about the other side of the ball, because on any other day, Jadavian Clowney coming back after missing two weeks with a shoulder injury, and having DJ Wantum on the practice field for the first time, even though it's probably ambitious to think he's going to be able to play this week, that would have been a huge deal. That would have been kind of stuff we spent all week talking about, and instead it's kind of an afterthought. But they're getting to that point. They're getting some dudes back, and that's going to be a benefit to Gero Everrow and the entire defensive staff.
And you know, Dj want Them is obviously someone that you want on the field. You saw what you liked in him from Minnesota. You knew he could bring something to this defense opposite Jadevi and Clonne. Colonne talked yesterday about just the relationship the two of them have been able to form, even though he hasn't been playing all that to say, Charles Harris has been playing pretty well, and so if you get Charles Harris out there and you have Clowney back on the field just to kind of stabilize things and draw a little bit more attention, that leaves Charles Harris open to kind of make an impact, which he has. Simply having Cloonnie back on the field will stabilize a lot in that front seven.
Yeah, and still there is a lot that's still up in the air because we don't know how close some of these guys are to getting back in uniform on Sunday and getting back on the field. But you know, Nick Scott wasn't on a practice fore yesterday, So if Jordan Fuller's not ready to go this weekend, you know they're gonna have to turn somewhere. Is that Sam Franklin to my Richard and what you know, Jamie Robinson somebody like that. Don't know yet because there's still a lot of uncertainty about that defense, but it does feel like it's beginning to stabilize. And just the idea seeing Josie Jewel out there, and this is nothing against any of the other guys who were out there with rookie signal caller Trevin Wallace, but having somebody like Josie next to him is going to have a calming effect on everything. And that was one of the things I kept going back to during the off season, was thinking the run defense had the potential to be a strength of this place. When you add a Nateshawn Robinson, a Josie Jewel as Shaq Thompson to a group that already had a Derek Brown. Again, there's some complications. Shaq and Derek no longer here. They're in the training room. Saw those guys yesterday and they're getting worked on and they're in good spirits. But you know, getting Josie back will be significant for the education of Trevin Wallace.
Is exactly what I was about to say too, because even when Trevin continues to call the plays, you've now got somebody else out there who has worn that green dot before and can kind of just help translate for Trevin if need be, you know, just depending maybe make a few calls on the fly if need be, and kind of help facilitate that. That's a huge, huge help for Trevin Wallace. And also if you have Josie on the field this week, he's spent the past few years in Denver, he never played with bo Nicks, but he knows the rest of this offense pretty well, and so having just that familiarity could be huge.
Yep, And maybe they can mix things up. Denver has not been a happy place for the Carolina Panthers. Obviously there's some Super Bowl fifty PTSD involved that wasn't even in Denver, but they're owing three out there all the time, so they're looking to change something else.
It is a tough place to play.
It is a tough place to play, and you know, it's the altitude, it's the crowd things, and also they're a pretty good team.
Right now.
I'm flashing back to John Fox who said it's not it's.
Not where you play, it's who you play.
Okay, well these are both tough and who so that makes it tough.
But yeah, some of those games, I mean, obviously people are going to remember the Super Bowl. People are going to remember the sixteen opener when they blew a lately Graham gon O miss the field going late when they had a chance to win, drop the opener out there. The ninety seven game was about the ninety seven It was special. Darien Gordon returned two punts for touchdowns in the first quarter and I think they were like eighty two and seventy five yards, so that one got away from him earlier. The four game stands out my memory because that was the Julius Peppers play where ninety seven yard interception, not touchdown.
Where did he intercept that ball out for it to be Let me actually, let me try to guess. I've not seen this play. Ninety seven yards but not a touchdown. Did he intercept it in the end zone?
He did intercept it in the end zone and took it and took it to Okay, I have failed in my indoctrination of you because you have not seen one of the most amazing plays in franchise history.
We will watch it today, we will.
We will get to that later on this afternoon. But yeah, it was actually the cool thing about that game. There were two cool things I remember about that game, not just that play. And Julius he did intercept it in the end zone, took it the length of the field and basically ran out of gas at altitude. And Dan Morgan, now the GM and a pretty fit guy in his day as a middle linebacker. Dan's like, that's how you knew how special Julius was as an athlete because everyone else was out of gas, everyone other than him had dropped off the pace before. And Rod Smith, the old Broncos wide receiver, kind of got in the way and forced Julius to adjust and he ended up sort of tripping over the five yard line. But the play before that was the one. And that's the thing I remember about Denver Is Julius was capable of those big eye popping plays, but this one looked fairly simple. They were, you know, third and you know, third and goal from the three. Jake Plummer, who's a pretty mobile guy, is just gonna.
Boot way related to Jack Pummer, not.
Related to Jack Plumber, who we may or may not see this week. But Jake was a pretty mobile guy and all he was trying to do was bootleg quick to the corner and get there. Pretty easy play to make for a guy with wheels like Jake Plumber. Julius got cut on the play, was on the ground, gets up, runs Plumber down from behind, and gets him out of bound short of the goal.
Wow.
I mean, it was just one of those things where after the fact, it's like, that's not supposed to happen, that thing right there. But I also remember that game. One of my fond memories of Obscure Panthers passed Matt Willig, who has played Andre the Giant in movies. He's a gentleman of stature. It's like six ' eight three and forty pounds or something like that.
Willig was playing right tackle that day and got called for a.
Penalty and picked up the flag and threw it back at the official. So, yes, Denver contains multitudes for the Carolina Panthers.
I don't think you can do that.
No, that's against the rules. They frowned on that. That actually pushed him out of a field goal range late, and it was an ideal, but yeah, it was just the kind of you know, but in a week where in a week where the starting quarterback changes because of a traffic accident in South Charlotte, it feels appropriate that we're talking about Matt Willig throwing flags back at officials.
We're just talking about anything and everything. Yeah.
Oh and you know, speaking a story time with Uncle Darren.
You were asking earlier we were talking about quarterback changes, and I said, well, I mean it's no Brian Saint Pierre.
Yeah, I have no idea who that is.
We gotta do.
I'm gonna have to do football one oh one or Panthers football one oh one for this offseason where I just tell her all the strange and unusual stories.
I would love to do a podcast where I go back and watch the best Panthers games that I've never seen live reaction.
Do I get to offer commentary of all the sidebar stories that goes along with this kind of stuff. I might sign up for that podcast. Matt write just down in the notes, We'll work on this later.
But no.
In twenty ten, this was not a traffic accident, but Jimmy class and suffered a concussion the weekend before against Yeah, when a story starts with Jimmy Claws and you know it's good. Jimmy Clawson gets a concussion against the Bucks. They needed help in a hurry. So John Fox, in the middle of twenty ten's youth movement, when he had no interest in playing youth, urged them to go out and get a gentleman named Brian Saint Pierre, who had not thrown a football in Anger in two years, had been on the Steelers practice squad, bounced around, was in Arizona for a little bit. Saint Pierre rolls in here and ends up starting against the Baltimore Ravens. Bryan Saint Pierre what year and that would have been ten, twenty ten.
So a pretty good Ravens defense.
Yeah, ed Reid out of pick six that day. Ray Lewis was running around doing ray Lewis things. But Saint Pierre came here thinking he was going to hold a clipboard.
I mean it was.
Middle of the youth movement and played football in a couple of years. He was joking at the time about changing diapers a week ago. This time, I walk out on the practice field on Wednesday, and Brian Saint Pierre is not holding a clipboard. He is running with the ones in practice, and I distinctly recall calling his agent and saying, Rick, did you know your boy was coming here to start? And the agent said he's doing what.
Now?
To his credit, Brian Saint Pierre did play creditably against that pretty good Ravens defense. He had an eighty eight yard touchdown pass to David get Us. Yeah, another another blank stare from Cassidy. David get Us is one of the all time social media punches for Panthers fans because he was kind of a tease. He would catch an eighty eight yard touchdown pass and then you never really heard much from him for weeks and weeks, and people would always say.
How's David get Us looking in practice.
So yeah, depending on who you ask me, Jonathan Jones show person, they've gotten a good dose of how's David get Us looking out there? And that's one of those things. David was good player, Baylor guy, track guy, longstrider. He was a four hundred meter runner.
But boy, well.
Show itself in an eighty eight yard touchdown.
We have gone way down the rabbit hole.
We've gone from talking about Andy Dalton's dog to Matt Willig, Brian Saint Pierre and David get Us.
And Andre the giants thrown in there.
What have we become here on the happy half hour? But yeah, it's it's going to be interesting, and you know, there's obviously a lot to be done, but I do think there is some degree of opportunity for Bryce to get things right because they have been running the ball. So will I mean, we'll see how any of that goes. There's no it's you know, too soon to talk about what it means for the future. Does Andy go back in the line up when he's healthy any of that kind of stuff. I'm kind of assuming he does, just based on things Dave Canalis has said previously and by previously, I mean Monday and Wednesday and Wednesday, but you know, we'll see how it goes. It is another twist and another turn in this in this great saga of Carolina Panthers football this week.
So what else? What else we got this week to cover?
Don't forget that Sunday is National tight Ends Day, so tight ends should to.
All who celebrate.
I bet Jatavian Sanders is going to celebrate by wearing a big hat.
That sounds like him. It seems like might possibly get Tommy back, and so that could be a good little get. That's a safety blanket for Bryce as well. And uh that's also a good you know, blitz Beeaters is having a tight end yep. And so if you've got we saw Jatavian Sanders kind of start to take steps forward the past couple of weeks as a pass catcher. I think having Ian Thomas on the field has been really good for JT because he doesn't have to worry about blocking as much. He can kind of focus on what he was known for coming out of college, which was being a really good pass catching tight end, something that he had struggled with a little bit his first few weeks in the NFL seen him take a step forward the past couple of weeks. I think he was even the leading receiver on Sunday. Yeah, six targets, six receptions.
Much as it was.
Yeah, And it was a little on purpose that we went straight into the news and not recap last week's game, because there's not a lot.
To just forget last week's.
Let's just pretend College Park ever happened and our trip to suburban Maryland. So it, uh, we'll let that one go. We'll get back with you next week. Oh, jukebox time.
Yeah, yeah, I was walking around humming your song earlier. I didn't even know if you heard it. Is that first little Gillian wilchis so high that that little opener, The whole song was good. I like the storytelling aspect of it, of course, anytime. It always makes like I say always, the few times I've listened to it in the past week, makes me think of a pageant queen. As was a story about a pageant queen. I don't know if it was, but you hear miss Ohio and that's what you think, m hm, Like, is this a girl chasing a crown? I don't again, I don't know if that was meant to be the case.
I kind of picked that one a because she was just here in town and it was a concert I missed, and I always enjoy that song. But it's got one of my favorite lines, I want to do right but not right now, so story.
Of my life. Yeah, but know that that little opening hook gets it. That's a good earworm. That just it's just your brain in the right way and kind of gets stuck in there. So yeah, good song. It My iPod I music app whatever you want to call it, kind of kept rolling through some more Gillian Welsh songs after that one was dying and it was enjoyable, especially this time of year. That was the right vibe.
Yeah, it was the right vibe. I'm actually glad with it everything going on. You told me to listen to Leon Bridges River and I've actually heard that song and was familiar with it and have seen Leon Bridges play that song next to a river in Charleston. Oh so that was pretty cool. But yeah, that was kind of the vibe. That was like the old spiritual almost him kind of vibe me to the river. It was it was kind of a song you need on a week like this, when there's traffic accidents and all kinds of mayhem and quarterback changes.
And all this sort of news. But what do you got? What do you got for me this week?
I do have a couple of options for you, But I was gonna say this real quick. I have a couple of Leon Bridges vinyl albums.
Oh okay, And that.
Is such a good little like moodsetter, Like if you're just turned like open the French doors to the porch, start cooking dinner, put a Leon Bridges on vinyl. That that sets a mood. I have a couple of options for you this week, because there's a chance you might have already heard a couple of these in celebration of the concert that will be happening here on Saturday night that we unfortunately, we will I say unfortunately, we will be in Denver, not unfortunately, but we will be in Denver. I am sad about missing the concert because it's for a great cause. What a freaking line up to and it's gonna be a lot of excitement for the people here in Charlotte and the people in the Carolinas. So if you have a chance, then there are still I don't even know if there are still tickets, but if there are, try to grab one. Come to Charlotte on Saturday night see very special concert in celebration of that. I've got two songs in mind. If you have heard both of them, we will go to my third option. My first song is Luke Calm's Where the Wild Things Are.
That'll actually work for me because I am not I am familiar with Luke Calms as a general concept rather than his music in particular.
Okay, listen to Where the Wild Things Are. Not to put pressure on you to enjoy it, but I will say this. The first time I heard that song, my brother and I were driving cross country to move me from Green Bay to Charlotte, and he I had listened to a lot of Lukecolm songs before, but for whatever reason, had not listened to that one. And my brother turned it on and all he said was who does this song make you think of? And he started playing it and we got through the first verse and into the first chorus, and I realized that there were tears running down my face. And I looked at him and he was like, I know, right. It reminded us so much of my uncle Terry, who passed away last year from als. Such a man lived so many lives, very very special man. And there are just so many little points in that song. He moved to Wyoming, not Hollywood like the brother does in the song, but there were. It sounds like a song that my dad would have sung about his brother, and so it was just a really special song. Yeah, it's a good song. It's a good song period. It's a good storytelling song. Luke sings it beautifully, So yeah, listen to Where the Wild Things Are?
But will is this related to the Mari Sindak Children classic Will there be a Wild rump Us?
Maybe, depending on how you want to interpret the characters in the song.
All right, fair enough, that sounds good.
Continuing the trend of concerts, I'm probably not going to go to tonight at Oven's on auditorium. Are you familiar with a band called Men at Work? I am not the big Yeah, they were big. It's kind of down that same road, except Australian. They were big in the eighties and early nineties. So the time because somebody always said, if you're having a party, you try to try to track your playlist to the most mentally deranged portion of a person's lives. That is to say, when they were in high school. So Men at Work was big in the in the late eighties and early nineties, and they had a song.
It was not one of their hits.
They've actually got a remarkable number of songs you'll recognize once you listen to them. Okay, but you want to talk about it, earworm, go listen to be good, Johnny.
Not the most aesthetically technical.
Why does that song so familiar?
Yeah, you probably heard it.
I mean literally, if you say the title of the song over and over about a million times, you will understand the vibe. But yeah, minute work playing at Ovens Auditorium tonight. That one's going to be a game time decision, depending on depending on how I feel when I get out of work.
I might just wonder wander down there. What is the Thursday night game podcast?
Man, it's the Rams and the Vikings Rams in the Viking.
I might be mildly interested in watching.
That one got a.
Really high point total, so there's gonna be points, I think tonight.
You know what else? My new Thursday Night Guilty Pleasure is the new Kathy Bates Mattlock reboot it's Kathy Bates, but I'll probably miss it has no business being as good as it is.
The next bid on the Happy half Hour. Guess which one of these two or older? So I'm talking about going to a concert, you're talking about watching Matt Locke at all.
Wait, so I live next to Ovens the minute work is playing? Or just Colin Hayes No Men at Work?
It's apparently the entire band or such the I mean, what band from the eighties is still together in its original sure in Carnaby old videos of their contrat Colin Hayes going to be in Charlotte singing men at Work song?
I like that overkill song.
Yeah, that's my favorite by them.
I think, Yeah, they've got a lot, They've got a lot of bangers.
We will listen to many of the men at Work songs while we go to work, men and women at work, because we're out here doing it for the people. We will catch you guys next week on the Happy Half Hour.
Bye.
