Panthers HC Dave Canales explains what stood out to him on Bryce Young's film
New Panthers coach Dave Canales has a way of reviving quarterbacks. And he already has plenty to work with in Bryce Young, who probably was the most battered rookie in the NFL last season.
So will it be a simple reno job with Young? Canales thinks so.
“”The accuracy, the mobility, the courage under fire. This is a guy that just bounces back,” Canales said in an interview this week with NFL Live. “He’s seen NFL football, and he sees what it is. These are really talented players, and then for him to have 16 games of experience under his belt of seeing just the variety of defenses and rushes that can happen, I’m really excited about just his makeup and the way that he just kept bouncing back.”
The Panthers won only two games in 2023. By the time they picked up their second victory, first-year coach Frank Reich was long gone. Panthers owner Dave Tepper then hired Canales as Carolina’s new head coach. Canales had worked a year as Tampa Bay’s offensive coordinator and helped to turn around Baker Mayfield. Before that, he was with Pete Carroll in Seattle. There, he helped revive Geno Smith‘s football career, as Smith evolved from Russell Wilson‘s backup to full-fledged starter.
Opposing defenses battered Panthers rookie QB
The Panthers are far from giving up on Young, although the former Alabama Crimson Tide star went through football hell his rookie season. Opposing defenses sacked him 62 times. That averaged to almost four sacks per game. Still, Young survived. He missed only one game because of an injury.
However, survival is one thing — now, it’s to see whether Young can thrive in Canales’ system. The new head coach said everything is there for a successful year.
“My approach with Bryce is it doesn’t feel like a fix-it project at all,” Canales said in an interview with Charlotte radio station WFNZ. “For me, what I see is an accurate passer. I see a guy who’s got courage in the pocket. I see a guy who pops back up and just keeps rockin’. He’s just built and wired that way. So for me, it’s no different than any other quarterback.”
The new Panthers coach continued: “Like, what are the fundamental things? What are the most basic fundamentals that he can sink his teeth into to just take the next step into improvement. I want to make sure that he understands and I want to make sure that everybody understands the way the quarterback position is supposed to be played is you do your one-eleventh. You just do your job.
“And the talent, the innate ability, the first overall pick — all that ability will fill up and we’ll need those special plays three to five times a game. But we don’t need it on every single snap. We just need him to be able to understand what we’re trying to get done and just do his part in it. And I think that really is an approach that I’ve taken with a bunch of guys to alleviate that stress of having to carry something.”