The body wasn't even cold in Atlanta when Washington cornerback Josh Norman was asked about the carnage left behind by Julio Jones's record-setting day.
After the Falcons wideout torched the Panthers' secondary for 12 catches and 300 yards, Norman and the Redskins were celebrating a 31-20 win over the Browns.
And what did he think when he heard about Jones's day against his former team?
"I'm just gonna sip my tea on that one," Norman said, according to CSN Mid-Atlantic's JP Finlay.
In case you're not familiar with internet memes, that's a reference to the Kermit the Frog's "but that's none of my business."
Even though they didn't truly start until late-2014, Norman relished his 1-on-1 battles against Jones. In three meetings (Weeks 10 and 17 of 2014 and Week 13 of 2015), Norman helped limit Jones to 17 receptions for 205 yards and no touchdowns. But in the Panthers' lone regular-season loss last year, Jones went off for nine receptions, 178 yards and a score.
With Norman now in Washington, the Falcons targeted Jones on their first three plays and kept feeding him. Nothing and no one — including cornerbacks James Bradberry, Daryl Worley, Bené Benewikere — could do much to slow him down en route to the biggest game a receiver's ever had against the Panthers.
I’m seeing a lot about this generally on the Twitterverse and at ESPN, basically positing that the Panthers made a huge mistake letting him walk. That may be, but it’s not provable, and it’s largely a straw man based on the laziest of lazy analysis: results-based analysis.
1) There is no guarantee that Norman would’ve done much to stop what happened today, since you can’t prove a negative. Other relevant factors still would have been in play, if we give that all of them remained equal, lack of consistent pass rush chief among them. Julio pulled down 178/1 last year in ATL with Norman on the field, so give me a break anointing him the hypothetical Savior of this defense.
2) Most of the criticism of letting Norman walk is based on the assumed straw man that Bradberry (or whomever else the Panthers did or would have brought in) is better individually than Norman. I don’t think this was ever anyone’s position within the organization. The case was always about cost vs. usage value WITHIN THE SCHEME. Right or wrong, the Panthers simply don’t put a #1 CB man-to-man against a #1 WR throughout any entire game, and unlike WAS, CAR did not want to pay a CB the highest amount of any corner in the league to NOT do that type of work. You can agree or disagree on the overall merit application of the secondary scheme, and there’s plenty to discuss in this regard, but given that the team has settled on this approach it’s completely understandable that they wouldn’t want to invest that money in such a way.
3) There’s no doubt that this team’s defense is out or sorts, maybe even downright bad, right now. But it’s not substantively due to Norman alone not being on the roster. They may indeed be marginally better with him, but not so much to appreciably improve the pass rush, the run defense, the over-the-top help, the blown assignments, the penalties, or the missed tackles (to say nothing of the contributions the offense has made to these defeats). Sorry, but to get beat as badly as the Panthers have in the last two outings requires a full team effort. Coaches, players, and coordinators all contributed to these beat downs, and Norman’s presence would not, on its own, likely impact this in any meaningful way (particularly when remembering the reigning MVP and Defensive POY from just two years ago themselves are not enough to right the ship right now – surely none of these pundits think Norman is a better individual player than Newton and Kuechly?).
Of course our secondary would be better with Norman than without, but the cost of keeping him would have hurt us elsewhere on the defense. The big problem is that Cam’s got no protection. Yes, the defense has problems, but putting more points on the board would allow us to compensate. I liked special teams today, when in the past I’ve cringed every time we punted or kicked the ball. We’ll turn it around on Monday Night Football. Keep Pounding.
Omg Lee had tremendous punting today. That kind of punting wins teams games. Except us of course with all of those 90+ yard drives.