Carolina Panthers’ defenders have one thing on their mind

The Carolina Panthers are making a concerted effort to try and force more turnovers this year under new head coach Dave Canales. Canales and defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero have been in the lab working on solutions to right the ship in Carolina. The defense has constantly been working on trying to punch the ball out of the ball carrier’s hands during training camp. Jaycee Horn commented on this aspect recently via panthers.com, “Coach Canales has been highlighting in team meetings, even at the end of the run plays. DBs run all the way to the ball and just show me you punching at it.”

Canales knows that in the NFL, most games come down to the slightest of margins, so he wants to give his team the best opportunity to win that he can. That involves creating as many turnovers as possible, but how are the Panthers doing that during training camp? “You just have to have more attempts,” stated Canales. “You have to have more attempts at the ball than numbers of plays. If we played a 65 play game, your attempts got to be in the hundreds. It's got to be like multiple guys trying to get it out to actually create just one or two.”

Carolina players are all singing the same tune as the coaching staff is preaching attempts on the football. Middle linebacker Shaq Thompson talked about their new philosophy, saying “We just got to get more attempts every game, got to do it in practice and just got to go out there and then create havoc.” Jaycee Horn echoed Thompson’s thoughts. “Our coach is showing us how many attacks we've taken on the ball per practice. And the more we take, the more we get the ball out,” Horn said. “It’s always good to get a turnover and change the whole game.”

So how does that become second nature, so that everyone on the defense is trying to rip or punch the ball away from opposing ball carriers? Just like anything else in life, practice. “You got to practice at it,” stated Thompson. “You got to do it every day. It has to be repetitive, it has to be ingrained. And that's what he's doing. We're doing it every day, working on practicing, tackling, working at getting at the ball, raking.” Horn is doing his part to lead by example. “I just try to punch at the ball every time because I know that that'll do a good job with leading the defense and just giving us the mindset to attack the ball.”

This mentality is becoming second nature to the team as Thompson noted. “Take that attempt, take the shot. You never know if it's going to come out or not. So that's what we're doing every day.“ The defense should be a steadying part of this Panther team. The ability to create more turnovers will make life easier for everyone. Giving the offense more opportunities with the ball, and constantly putting pressure on the opposing offense, that sounds like a winning formula.