The Carolina Panthers have gotten some good quarterback so far this season. They faced Cooper Rush and the Atlanta Falcons in Week 2 and the Tanner McKee-led Eagles in Week 6. Both of those games were wins. For a while, it looked like the Panthers were going to be the beneficiary of another backup quarterback situation. Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield left the team’s Week 3 game against the Vikings with a dislocated thumb. The most optimistic side of his recovery timeline had him
back just in time for this game, and that’s where he ended up.
In his absence, the Bucs turned to undrafted rookie Jalon Daniels. While his personal production is somewhat muted, it’s a lot better than you’d typically expect for an undrafted rookie quarterback just a few weeks into his NFL career. He even led the Bucs to a win over the Cowboys, which remains their only win of the season.
So that brings us to our question, is the return of Baker Mayfield good news or bad news for the Carolina Panthers?
MY TAKE: At first glance, this seems like an obvious answer. Baker Mayfield has been a very good quarterback since he found a home in Tampa, and Daniels is an undrafted rookie. However, the circumstances make this a little bit murkier of a take. Daniels has a better QBR than Mayfield in their starts this season, and he’s a much more dynamic runner. Mayfield hasn’t played a game in nearly a month and is going to be taking his first live reps since he dislocated the thumb on his throwing hand. I’m not a quarterback, but I think throwing thumbs are important.
All that said, I think Mayfield’s return is bad news for the Panthers. It’s not as bad as it maybe would have been if previous versions of Mayfield were playing, but I think there’s more that can go wrong from a Panthers perspective against him. We know how much he feeds off having a chip on his shoulder, and I think there’s only one team that he holds more ire towards than he does the Panthers. He could come out and flop given everything that’s going on, but I can’t fully trust that he’s not going to get revved up and do some nonsense to give the Panthers a hard time.
