Biggest takeaways from Panthers' 3rd week of OTAs

First-round pick Xavier Legette wasn’t the only injured Panther to sit out. Joining the rookie wideout was running back Miles Sanders, who is dealing with a heel issue, and a recovering D.J. Wonnum.

Head coach Dave Canales spoke about his outside linebacker’s road back from a quad tear.

“Just working through some different things,” he said of Wonnum, who remained away from the team. “He had some complications . . . he had a quadricep tendon rupture there. And so he had a repair and there was some different things they had to clean out. So it’s kinda just like this back-and-forth trying to get him as healthy as we can so we can get him on the field and get him back to full speed. So he’s still kinda working through some of those things.”

Speaking of players who weren’t present, Canales also spoke on the absences that aren’t being attributed to injury—specifically those of outside linebackers Jadeveon Clowney and K’Lavon Chaisson and kicker Eddy Piñeiro.

“I have not asked them,” he said of their whereabouts. “What I don’t wanna do is I don’t wanna send a message that I’m pressuring them to be here at all. This is voluntary. But what I have done is kinda reached out and touched base with them and makin’ sure they’re doin’ alright and just kinda hearin’ what their life has looked like.

“That’s what I’m concerned with is that during this time—we don’t just have this huge personal absence of just not connecting. And from the reports I’ve got, the coaches have also had a chance to reach out and connect with guys–just to let them know that something good is happening here. I just don’t want them to come back in with us and just not have a feel for the whole thing and what’s happening.”

Mandatory minicamp is set to begin on Tuesday.

Perhaps ironically, cornerback Jaycee Horn is not one of the current absentees. Canales talked about the importance of having the talented fourth-year defender, who has played in just 22 of a possible 51 games in his NFL career.

“It’s been really great just to have him out there,” Canales said. “We’re being really smart about how we transition him in, especially during this phase. But when he’s out there—I think the cool part I didn’t know about Jaycee, which has been fun for me to see—is he’s vocal. And he loves to talk and he loves to kinda bring that edge and that energy.

Defensive passing game coordinator Jonathan Cooley agrees.

“I think having Jaycee—like, a player like that—he affects a lot of people around him,” Cooley replied. “So it allows us to put more pressure on him, to take away one side of the field and it allows other guys to grow within a role that we can see express. You don’t have a lot of guys that are blessed with what he has in his body and if he’s available, he’s one of the best.”

Canales and offensive coordinator Brad Idzik have seemingly made an impression on 14th-year veteran Andy Dalton, who said the following about their installment of the new offense:

“I will say this—and this has nothing to do with last year, this has everything to do with what we’re doing right now—Dave and Brad came in and they know exactly what they want. They know what they want it to look like, they know how they wanna install it and they have had a plan from the very beginning and it’s been known.”

One of the early focuses of this new offense has been the footwork of second-year quarterback Bryce Young. New passing game coordinator Nathan Carroll spoke with Kassidy Hill of Panthers.com about making the 2023 No. 1 overall pick more comfortable and effective.

“We are focusing on getting his feet right and organizing the concepts that he gets to throw, so that he’s getting the ball out quickly,” Carroll told Hill. “Trying to be consistent with his footwork so that everything flows through from the ground up.”

He went on.

“We’re going to fit this offense to Bryce,” Carroll added. “Right now we’re in the process of teaching all of our concepts still. As we get closer through training camp and then finally in the season, we’ll finally get to our real offense and what we’re going to be with Bryce, and he’ll have input at times on certain things that he likes. And we’ll try to make the best out of what we have here and try to be as hard to stop on offense as possible.”