Riverboat Ron Gambles His Future
EDIT 2: This illness has turned me into a pile of snot sludge and I’ve spent the last 3 days basically lying around unable to do much of anything. I might be on the uptick now, but I’m still a mess, so unless I have a miracle turnaround by Tuesday don’t expect a comic till Friday at the earliest
FRIDAY EDIT: I am sick as hell and everything aches too much to finish a comic for today. It’s partly done so it’ll be up soon enough but I need to sleep and drink nyquill like there’s no tomorrow
Wow that came out of nowhere yesterday! I’m lucky I’m stuck with a terrible sinus infection and didn’t get anything done on Monday so I could just quickly pump this one out. I MADE A COMIC WHEN THE SUBJECT WAS STILL TOPICAL! BOOYAH! People don’t say booyah anymore and I’m sad about it.
Farewell, Riverboat Ron. I eagerly look forward to what team picks you up this offseason. Maybe the Giants will do it! I’d rather have the gambler than Jason Garrett at least. (The Giants are going to hire Mike McCarthy and I’m gonna hate myself).
Ron was one of my favorite coaches. Not because he was the best by any means, but I just kinda liked him. I like that the Panthers stuck by him, and I liked that when he was first at risk of firing he seemed to loosen up and take risks and have some fun. It made him better, it made the team better, and it reminded me of when Tom Coughlin let loose and took the Giants to the Super Bowl in 2007. I have respect for coaches who actually appear to listen to critique and not get stuck up their own ass. Rivera seemed like a real one.
I was surprised to see this happen so early though. Obviously the Panthers are underperforming even with the excuse that Cam is out. Rivera was starting to reach that “overstaying his welcome” level that sometimes hits coaches who have been successful but not won it all, and now the team is starting to degrade. I think Rivera’s fate was going to be tied to Cam’s and Cam appears to be dead now after two broken seasons so maybe moving on is the right move. I think they should have let him play out the season though. I feel like he earned that. That 2015 run, despite the ending, was one for the ages.
So is Riverboat Ron the best coach in Panthers history? He might be! Let’s look at the list:
-Dom Capers: Reached an NFC Championship in the second year of the franchise, never got to the playoffs again. 4 years, one good playoff run.
-George Seifert: Never reached the playoffs, went 1-15 in 2001.
-John Fox: 8 years! One Super Bowl appearance where they had a great chance and blew it. They only reached the playoffs three times under Fox, however. The last time was the famous “Jake Delhomme breaks completely” game against the Cardinals. 3 playoff runs in 8 years.
-Ron Rivera: 9 Years! Well almost 9 years. I didn’t realize he was tenured longer than Fox. The Panthers reached the playoffs 4 times under Rivera, including 3 years in a row and that one Super Bowl run. Things haven’t worked out lately but looking back on it, it feels right to say Rivera is the best Panthers coach ever. Out of 4 dudes that’s not spectacular but it’s something.
I bet you Riverboat Ron is going to coach for the other ’95 expansion team next year.
This may be the first time I’ve actually gotten a piece of news FROM your comic. What a time to be alive!
My Falcons friends who don’t follow football as hardcore think he’d be a good hire for the Falcons. While he might be better than Dan Quinn, without a good offensive coordinater, they’d just be waisting more of Matt Ryans good years.
If the Browns fire Freddie, I could definitely see them picking up Rivera. There’s a good chance he’d keep Wilks on, and the defense has done well enough this year, showing signs of dominance that could translate into better consistency. The offense is broken, mostly because of poor play calling (especially situational play calling), and he’d presumably hire a coordinator who would know when to run certain plays and formations.
Just wondering as a non-Browns fan, but what’s the likelihood of Kitchens getting fired this year?
Hard to say. He won’t get fired during the season, but he probably should be fired after. His situational and tactical awareness just isn’t showing any signs of improvement. The team has also had discipline issues all season, both behaviorally and technically, and at some point that has to fall on the coach. Between losing games they should have won against Seattle, Denver, the Rams, and now Pittsburgh, his stubborn refusal to make situational adjustments, and the discipline issues, I think the Garrett thing was the last straw. If I were Haslam the only thing that would have saved his job would have been getting to the playoffs and getting a win, and after last week that’s, for all intents and purposes, impossible.
The Eagles will need a new DC after this season. (Or, at least, they better. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever why Schwartz should stick around any longer.) Ron and Doug Pederson are familiar with each other, and I think a couple of years break as a coordinator/assistant would probably do him some good.
Though I’ve come to appreciate many things about Stuart Scott since his passing, I don’t miss “booyah” one bit.
Side note, I believe Rivera was one of only 2 Hispanic head coaches in NFL history (with Tom Flores), so it’s a little sad to lose that.
Jack Del Rio also
Also Brian Flores in terms of current coaches.
If you’re stretching the definition, I think Wayne Fontes was Portuguese.
Tom Fears was the first Hispanic and Latino head coach (Saints in the late 60s), followed by Flores. Del Rio and the Jim Moras were also Hispanic, but I’m not sure if they are also Latino.
Greg Roman come on down! We desperately need to switch to an offensive-minded head coach to make full use of our QB (I will address this later), and who better than the guy who’s currently working magic with Lamar Jackson? We can hire a defensive coordinator, and probably needed to do that this past offseason anyway because Eric Washington sucks as a DC and even in a reduced role with Ron calling plays, our defensive line, which was Washington’s original responsibility, has been a sieve in the running game.
As for Cam, because the question about what we’re doing with him is gonna be in the media for a while until someone says something conclusive: it would be incredibly stupid for the Panthers to trade him or cut him. With only $18M in potential savings, Cam is incredibly cheap to keep for the last year of his contract, essentially putting him on a prove it deal. $18M isn’t worth saving unless you’re extremely confident in Kyle Allen (and you shouldn’t be if you’ve watched him play) compared to the possibility of an MVP caliber quarterback being actually healthy. A new HC might want his own guy but the free agent market is scant and we’re not going to be in the position to get a top 10 pick. Cam isn’t in any position to hold out because he’s coming off of 16 missed games and 8 straight Ls with 2 seasons ended on IR. If you just look at it from the position of the Panthers, there’s no reason to move on.
$18.6M is about 8% of the salary cap, so it’s actually a huge amount to save, especially when the team has 8 starters and 4 key reserves hitting unrestricted free agency after the season. I agree that they should probably keep Cam and try to extend him to bring some of that $21M cap hit down, but the amount they would save by cutting him outright is a check in favor of cutting him, not keeping him.
It’s a lot to save if you plan on using it on something important. We’re not hurting too bad for cap space and can probably secure at least two of those important free agents without cutting anyone. After that, there are some other candidates that I would choose to cut before we start make cap-based decisions on quarterback. And $18M is not that much to spend on a QB who could be an MVP if he returns to form.
Lisfranc injuries are tricky, especially if he needs surgery to correct it. That usually means it’s severe enough that it will be either a significant change in his mobility and footwork, a long recovery time, or both.
I hope Cam figures it out. The league is better with him playing at a high level. Roman would be a great hire, and at the very minimum would make the Panthers must see TV. Cam also needs some receiving help IMO. I bet the NFC South will be a tight race next year, with two former MVPs getting better offensive coaching.
Bust out them rocket pops. Eli’s going in.
I still say booyah…
Me too!
I am just now getting over pneumonia. Portland is a Petri dish right now. Be careful!