Wes & Walker- Live Wire

In this edition of the Live Wire, the guys react to some of the best audio around the Panthers ahead of Sunday's matchup with the Bucs.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
You ready for some sound. Let's do it all right?
Time now for some sound with floun it's the live wire.
Did you pick en State? I really wasn't listening. I
just realized, yes, I picked. I figured you did.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Okay, he said you'd never pick State, never picked them against.
But I need to be in order to stay on
this radio station. I need to be unbiased at you know,
certain points. I can't just every once in a while
making against like like last year in the Bowl game,
I probably would have picked ECU because they came in
playing hotter football. But I mean with with Memphis, I

(00:39):
mean you lost your head coach. Man, that's a tough
thing to overcome. So that's right.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
Are you proud of me? I am proud of you.

Speaker 1 (00:46):
Congratulations Thunder, you get your objective degree?

Speaker 3 (00:49):
What you gotta be? All right, let's run through some
panther sound here.

Speaker 2 (00:53):
Dave Canalis talking to the media on Wednesday, He was
asked about how the players feel and if they see
this as a big opportunity going into this week.

Speaker 4 (01:04):
Every game is a championship opportunity. We don't see this
one as anything different. It is it is obvious now
for the division right in front of us this opportunity
and how huge it is, you know, And I can
feel a sense that the players feel that and see
that and know that we can't let that be a distraction.
We can't make it more than it is.

Speaker 3 (01:22):
It's about us executing.

Speaker 4 (01:23):
It's about us playing clean football, you know, getting rid
of some of the things that showed up last week
and making sure that we play our best brand. And
I can stand in front of the group and say,
when we play good football, we can beat anybody. And
that's that's a true statement for this group. And I'm
proud that we've worked ourselves to that point. But we
got to make it happen. We got to bring it
to Sunday.

Speaker 2 (01:41):
So coming off the loss, I mean, there's there's no
way they're not going to have the right mindset for
this game, right, What do you think on that one?

Speaker 5 (01:49):
Was?

Speaker 3 (01:49):
Yeah, I think that they will. And that's Canal I said.

Speaker 6 (01:52):
I thought that that was a key point, he said,
when he can stand up in front of the room
and tell them that they can beat anybody.

Speaker 3 (01:57):
Because yeah, I mean, as great as that game.

Speaker 6 (01:59):
Was last night, Panthers did defeat the La Rams as
great as they looked and they also defeated the Green
Bay Packers, so they do have examples to show them that.
And I do think that that's vital coming up in
a game like this because when you do struggle against
some of the bad teams, it can hurt morale in
a major way. But when you can harken back on
experiences where you say, well, yeah, we did lose to

(02:21):
that team, but we also beat that team, So that
shows you what you're capable of and can sharpen your
focus and get you locked in for a match against
the big time matchups going into it.

Speaker 1 (02:31):
All right, allow me to play the defense or make
the case for the defense of the Panthers losing some
of those Okay, so you lose to the Bills with
Andy Dalton as your starting quarterback, and if your backup
quarterback being your starter, was it enough to overcome He also,
I guess, had a thumb injury immediately upon this game

(02:52):
being played. Happened in the first quarter. Okay, you'd like
to stop them from scoring forty points, but fair enough,
Andy Dalton not going to help you out there. You
chalk that one up as an outlier. The first Saints game,
Jac Horn fell down a couple times. That's what it is.
Excuses for jac Horn. I'm going to defend him. Forty
nine Ers game. Look, man, Rock Party gave you a

(03:14):
bunch of chances. Bryce Young down to the goal line,
throws a bad interception, all right, so that's a gift
for Sam Fran And then the officials didn't call team
at getting held on the other interception from Bryce. It
wasn't Bryce's fault, So that's another one. I'm going to
defend them there as well. So just a couple of
outlier things happening to Carolina when they're trying to get
ready for the big time opponents. Officials not giving you

(03:34):
the benefit of the doubt, so holding calls, not getting called,
some weird turnovers, they weren't taking care of the ball,
they weren't live laughing and loving Wes.

Speaker 3 (03:44):
You know. That's what I'm saying here.

Speaker 1 (03:45):
So it's not even just so much about the mindset, man,
it's all of these weird, little outlier things that have
kept Carolina from winning some of those games. I think
they'll be ready, and as long as they take care
of the football, I think they're going to be all right.
Stay ready and got to get ready. You know, free
and needs to be all over the place as well. Yes,
what you got found?

Speaker 2 (04:03):
All right, let's move on to Dave Canlys. I believe
this is talking on Panther talk, but I could be
wrong on that one. He was asked about the crowd
and he says, crowd needs to show up and be
loud for this game on Sunday.

Speaker 4 (04:14):
Show up, be loud. Love the energy that we had
at the Rams game. You know it was cold and rainy.
We're expecting some beautiful weather. It's going to be in
the sixties. We're gonna come out and bring our best
and just a great division matchup exactly how we want it.
The environment's going to be beautiful, and we need you,
We need all the fans to come out. We need
that impact. I know it was an impact on that
third down against the Rams. We've got a sack fumble

(04:35):
right there to steal the game, and there was an
advantage there because of the noise, and we got to
jump on the rush and a nice stunt inside and
all that stuff matters. And even when we just make
great plays, the celebrations and when the officials make a
questionable call, let them have it. Have it because I'm
typically not yelling at the guy. So I need I
need all the Panthers fans.

Speaker 3 (04:53):
I haven't seen very many of those this year. I
don't know.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
All right, all right, well, what do you expect from
the environment in this game and do you think it
could be a factor that allows the Panthers to win.

Speaker 6 (05:05):
Yeah, whenever you get a great fan turnout and they
perform up to snuff, it's certainly going to be able
to help the home team. So for Panther fans, yeah,
this is their chance. And I mean Tampa Bay. They're
going to have their chef fans in the building. But
it's not like when they play against some of the
big brands of the league that bring a ton of
fans in there. So I would expect the Panther fans
to show up. They know it's at stake, because if

(05:26):
you don't, I think that that really looks bad on
your fan base if you're not able to show up
and support your team with the NFC West championship on
the line, that's.

Speaker 3 (05:35):
The old NFC South. It's all about the forty nine ers.

Speaker 1 (05:40):
It's all Fred in West's world. We're just little Carolina.

Speaker 3 (05:44):
Why don't you go.

Speaker 2 (05:45):
Donald Trump there.

Speaker 3 (05:46):
That was interesting was that Donald Trump.

Speaker 6 (05:48):
You think it's all about the West.

Speaker 3 (05:50):
It's unbelievable.

Speaker 2 (05:51):
This guy, he's worried about she should be worried about
the East coast, the South.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
I'll leave that up to you in Pitty. He does
that quite a bit in the Mac and Bone Show.
I have not I didn't realize I was going Trump,
but I will say that Carolina fans are going to
show up for this one, just like they did against
the Rams, like Dave Canal has just brought up. And
it was crazy loud, and I know Kyle talked about it,
Mac and Boone were talking about it. Man, the loudest
that it's ever been at Bank of America Stadium. I

(06:18):
go back to the Graham Gano field goal against the Giants.
There are a couple of other games sprinkled here and there,
but that Graham Gano field goal was huge.

Speaker 3 (06:25):
That one.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
That's still the loudest moment that I can remember being
in the stadium.

Speaker 3 (06:29):
Now.

Speaker 1 (06:29):
I wasn't there for the Luke Keighley return for a
touchdown against the Seahawks in the playoffs, but I was
at draft right outside of Boa and my head was
ringing it was crazy loud when Luke Keigley returned it.
So this Rams win, it just constantly right, consistently, very loud.
They're going to show up. And you said, you know
there's going to be a fair share of Buccaneers fans.

Speaker 5 (06:51):
I don't know.

Speaker 3 (06:53):
I don't see a lot.

Speaker 1 (06:54):
Of Buccaneers jerseys around here.

Speaker 3 (06:55):
I don't see a lot.

Speaker 1 (06:57):
So if the Rams, who kind of notoriously don't have
a huge fan base, especially at this part of the country,
not a lot of Bucks fans either. This isn't the
Steelers or the Cowboys or the Bills. We're not going
to have that much of a fan base. Infiltrating Boa, Yeah,
I think all of the signs are right, especially with
the weather being so nice. What's the not to get out?
What's the excuse? So I think the fan base will

(07:18):
show up. What you got over there flat?

Speaker 2 (07:20):
All right, Let's go to offensive coordinator Brad Izick because
he was asked yesterday about te Max slump and how
can you possibly get him going again?

Speaker 7 (07:28):
We just got to continue to put him in the
best spots, uh, to execute and then uh, you know
when those those moments come up, when you know the
look is right we you know, we gotta we got
to cash in. So there's a couple of those ops
that were just near misses. But at the same time,
as coaches, you know, we put an onus on Okay,
what are the best looks to get this guy involved,
to get our best players, whether it's Team mac are

(07:49):
running backs, you know, really Jalen, all those guys, all
of our our playmakers on the offense, Like, what are
the best chances to get them the ball early, to
get them in a rhythm. And then as the game
for us is continuing to find those opportunities, we got
to continue to do that as a coaching staff. And
then that dialogue's got to happen during the game as
things start to change a little bit.

Speaker 2 (08:08):
All right, So what do you guys want to see
from this coaching staff to get their lead wide receiver
going again? Is there something specific or is it just
about him playing better football?

Speaker 6 (08:18):
Well, I think it's the thing that a lot of
teams do and they have a top receiver, I mean,
get them the ball early, let them touch the rock early.
We know that for a lot of receivers, that gets
them in a rhythm, that gets their juices flowing. They
want to block a little bit harder. They want to
go a little bit harder on their routes. Not that
they're not great professionals and want to do it anyway,
But when they're able to touch the pill a couple

(08:39):
of times early in jobs, it does get them going.
So I think for the Panthers, the plans should be simple.
Your first few passing plays, try to make sure you
work to the royal McMillan into those, whether it's a
big play or a smaller play.

Speaker 1 (08:51):
But just let him get a little bit of love
on that football, you know. I do like that Dave
Canalis continues to move him around a little bit. He
is running out of the slot, which is nice way
to free up your guys. They're just still not targeting
him nearly as much because there's not as many passing
attempts as we would like. Just overall, when the volume
is down, there's not as many passes, which means there's
not as many targets, which means there's not as many catches,

(09:12):
which means there's not as many yards. Here's what I
would like to see. I don't know why they just
completely abandoned going to t mac all the way down
the field on some mono and mono situations, it feels
like when they throw to t Mac downfield, now they're
scheming him open and or it's off of like the
secondary action, which he's very good at helping his quarterback out.
I thought that was one of the big reasons why

(09:33):
they drafted him is because he was better than any
receiver out of the draft at coming back to the
football to help out his QB. Bryce Shung has taken
advantage of that. But I kind of do want to
see what we saw in the preseason where the welcome
to Carolina moment for t Mac preseason against Cleveland, it
was down the sideline, take a few what was it,
three to five step drop, whatever it was, let it

(09:55):
hum over there to the right sideline, and t Mac
made a great catch for you. Even if t Mac
didn't come down with a couple of those opportunities at
the beginning of the year, they still tried it. Why
are we abandoning this? Why is it only xcel? Why
is it Jalen Cocher seemingly now a couple of times
you can scheme them open, and that's great. I clearly

(10:15):
it's fantastic scheme them open. Take some shots. Man, see
if t Max got the goods me against Jamel Dean,
Benjamin Morrison, whoever's going to be on him. Let's see
if he can come up with some of those contested
catches downfield. It doesn't mean that he's never going to
be able to benefit from it. It doesn't mean he'll never
be good at it. We saw him successfully do this
very thing at Arizona. I just don't feel like we

(10:35):
see those shots to t Mac anymore like you have
with Excel, like you have with Coker. Try that a
couple of times, and if t Mac comes up with
a big play, you talk about getting him the ball
early to create some momentum.

Speaker 3 (10:47):
Guess what. Guess what else will.

Speaker 1 (10:48):
Create some momentum, big time catch with Boa roaring because
of what he was able to do against whoever it
is that's covering them. I just don't feel like they've
tried that nearly as much as they did the first
three weeks four weeks of the season. Would love to
see him try that. What else you got over there?

Speaker 3 (11:03):
Flat?

Speaker 2 (11:04):
All right, let's go to Isziro Everro, the defensive coordinator,
because he was talking about Dave Canalis calling the secondary
disjointed late in the New Orleans game, that's.

Speaker 3 (11:14):
A strong statement.

Speaker 5 (11:15):
I would say that, Like, you know, there are serving
some areas that we could have been more connected in
the second half. But yeah, you know, we we were
playing a really, really good game up to those last
two series. Some of those things I can certainly do
a better job at in terms of coaching, and in
some of these areas we know we could execute better
as players and so but you know, it's one of

(11:38):
those things you can be off just a little bit
here or there, and it can make a big difference,
especially in those critical moments.

Speaker 2 (11:44):
All Right, So when it comes to this secondary, do
you trust this group going against the talented wide receiving
core of the Tampa Bay Bucketing.

Speaker 6 (11:52):
No, because the statistics tell me that you should not
trust them, and I mean going up against a group
like that. Now, the thing about it is this secondary
can get beat, but they can also have moments where
they make big plays sometimes to make up for it,
like Mike Jackson getting interceptions on one. J. C. Horn
as able to nap interceptions. But again I pointed out
earlier in the show, they're twenty fourth and opponents yards

(12:15):
per completions, there's seventeenth and opponent passing first downs per game. Now,
the one area that you do trust them a little
bit is they are eighth and opponent passing touchdowns per game.

Speaker 3 (12:27):
So there's that.

Speaker 6 (12:28):
But as far as just giving up the yard into
some of those big plays in the passing attack, the
numbers tell me that I shouldn't trust them, and I don't.

Speaker 1 (12:35):
So I think with Mike Evans, you're just going to
have to chalk that up to Mike Evans being trusted
more than whoever's covering them. So Mike Evans, no, I
don't trust them. Abuka is interesting to me. The way
that he was getting big plays at the beginning of
the year was with Baker throwing fireballs with insane accuracy.
It was because Amuka was just Abuka was just destroying

(12:57):
dudes off of the line of scrimmage. If you go
back and look at some of those catches downfield, he
did what he had to do. It's no hate, it's
just Baker. There was a reason he was playing at
an MVP level back when Abuka was going for one
hundred yards and then grabbing all of the touchdown catches.
It hasn't happened nearly as much, and they are throwing
him more screens. So when you see the production for Abuca,
now now you're seeing him yards after the catch, which

(13:18):
he's good at. You mentioned that stat. He has been
very good at that. I just wonder if you can
have j C. Hornon Mike Jackson stick with the Buka
down field at a pretty nice rate where then you
can just see the contested catch rate for Abuka goes
down because they're covering him quite well. Mike Evans, Yeah, man,
I'm not what you gonna do with Mike. That's the

(13:38):
thing for me. Do you want me to go to
you or not? What you mean, well, you're smiling. It's
fifty to fifty whether I go to you or not.

Speaker 6 (13:45):
Well, I was gonna say, I mean even if JC
Horn contests, he'll probably fall.

Speaker 1 (13:48):
Yeah, it's so it's like that for JC. Now we're
starting to get into some bad territory. I just like
to have a fun with you guys. Yeah, no, it's
not from any places. Every time he hears j C. Horn,
it's this guy sucks.

Speaker 3 (14:01):
I mean that's what.

Speaker 1 (14:02):
I'm the hem ando one leg down now on the
D line, you know what I think actually has happened here.
You know what I think has happened. I think when
Smoke tweeted at Wes, that's when we saw him turn
into the hardcore JC filming, when Smoke went to social media.
I'm blaming Smoke Ludwick for this because it's not like
Wes has been a huge fan of j C. Horn

(14:24):
throughout his entire career, right. I think a lot of
this is very rooted in Panthers fans feeling good about
a first round pick and Wes is here to destroy
you for feeling that way. But when Smoke tweets at
him after JC comes up with a couple of plays,
now it's in the public eye.

Speaker 6 (14:39):
I mean, I think when we look at some of
my verses on the shows, you have your share of versus,
and you know, mine has always been Jac Horn.

Speaker 3 (14:45):
He's been my Lebron James. Since I've been on this show.

Speaker 6 (14:48):
That's been the you know, the number one adversarial athlete
for me that the fans just don't agree with me.

Speaker 1 (14:53):
It was dormant for a while though. Yeah, first year,
the same game woke it up. First year it was,
you know, all against j C.

Speaker 5 (15:02):
Horn.

Speaker 6 (15:02):
But we can't say that because I did give the
preface of saying that I thought he was a good player.

Speaker 5 (15:07):
No.

Speaker 1 (15:07):
But see, this is what you do with all of
this stuff, because you try to say, no, what I'm
saying is this like you No, I know exactly to
a t what you're saying. I disagree with it. That's
the thing. And now you can't even say that you
think he's a good player, because I don't think you
think that man with the sixty four, he's not sixty fourth.

Speaker 3 (15:26):
Right.

Speaker 1 (15:26):
So when Smoke went to the public eye with this,
to me, this is my theory, that's when we ramped
it up again. That's when the volume got turned up.
Because even when the Jets he had a great PFF grade.
Yeah that was no, that was time.

Speaker 6 (15:39):
I just said that, you know, a cornerworth this assault
should have made those plays.

Speaker 3 (15:45):
That's that's all I'm saying. Any quarterback could make those plays.
That's all I'm saying. See, that's I think it was Smoke.
I need to look back