Here at Cat Scratch Reader we have counted down the final 100 days leading up to the Carolina Panthers season opener for at least the past ten years. We’ve always done this by highlighting the current player on the roster whose jersey number matches the day on the countdown. This year, we decided to change that up a bit by counting down our own list of the Top 100 Panthers of all time. This does not correspond to jersey number, does not need to be somebody who wore a jersey, and will in no way be controversial.
#34. Wesley Walls
Panthers stats: 98 games, 324 receptions, 3,902 yards, 44 touchdowns; 5 Pro Bowls, 3 All-Pro Second Team
Career stats: 196 games, 450 receptions, 5,291 yards, 54 touchdowns; 5 Pro Bowls, 3 All-Pro Second Team
If you looked up the term “late bloomer” in the NFL dictionary, the image of Wesley Walls would appear somewhere next to Steve Young.
Walls played his college ball at Ole Miss and became a second round pick by the San Francisco 49ers in 1989. He spent his first five seasons with the 49ers and had a very unremarkable career with them while backing up Pro Bowl tight end Brent Jones. Wall missed the entire 1992 season due to injury, but in the four seasons in which he was healthy for the 49ers he amassed just 11 receptions for 67 yards and one touchdown.
That’s not the level of production teams look for in second round picks after five years in the league.
He went to the New Orleans Saints in 1994 and spent two productive seasons there with a total of 95 receptions, 1,100 yards, and eight touchdowns.
In 1996 the Panthers brought him to Carolina for what would become a fantastic seven-year run in Charlotte that included five Pro Bowl seasons and three All-Pro Second Team nods.
In his first season with the Panthers — his age-30 season, by the way — Walls made his first Pro Bowl after reeling in 61 receptions for 713 yards and 10 touchdowns for the 12-4 upstart Panthers. He would put up similar numbers in each of the next three campaigns to follow, and he made the Pro Bowl in each of those four seasons.
His best year came in 1999 with career highs of 63 receptions, 822 yards, and 12 touchdowns.
Over seven seasons with the Panthers he hauled in 324 receptions, 3,902 yards, 44 touchdowns with five Pro Bowls and three All-Pro Second Team nods.
After leaving the Panthers following the 2002 season he played one year for the Green Bay Packers before calling it a career.
Wesley Walls was a late bloomer by NFL standards, and we were fortunate as Panthers fans to go on that remarkable journey with him.
