Quarterback Cam Newton played only a limited role in the Carolina Panthers’ practice Thursday afternoon, and that was progress, as he attempts to get ready to play in their season opener Sunday at Tampa Bay despite a couple of fractured ribs.
Newton met with the media too, which was more than he could say Wednesday afternoon, after soreness kept him out of practice unexpectedly. By Thursday he didn’t have quite the resounding confidence he had over the past week that he would be ready to play, but he still had some.
“If I can go, I’m going to go,” Newton said. “And how I’m feeling right now, I’m on pace to be ready to go on Sunday. And that’s the only thing I can do.”
Panthers coach Ron Rivera said it’ll probably come down to a game-day decision. As of Thursday, he didn’t even want to say if Newton had made any throws during practice.
“We were concerned a little bit coming out of yesterday’s practice,” Rivera said. “We wanted to see how he was this morning. He had a lot of energy today, moving around pretty well. We stayed to the schedule. He wanted to do a few more things, but we slowed him down.”
Newton’s demeanor was jovial, which might be telling, too. He cracked jokes with reporters who Tweeted from their cellphones about his arrival to the practice field. He smiled at a photographer, looking right into the camera as he faked making a move on a tackling dummy.
The personality was coming through. The rest of the gifted repertoire is yet to be seen.
“Every day I have opportunity,” said Newton, who was kneed in the ribs in an exhibition game against the Patriots on Aug. 22. “Now we have days. And in a couple of days it’ll be down to hours. Then it’ll be down to minutes and hopefully when that clock starts, I will be on the field. I’m being optimistic about this whole thing and I have no other choice but to think that way.”
Newton took a medical redshirt with an ankle injury his second season at the University of Florida. Otherwise he said he has never missed a game because of an injury. Not in high school at Westlake High, not in junior college at Blinn or at Auburn, and not in any of his first three seasons with the Panthers. At risk Sunday is his streak of 49 consecutive NFL starts, including last season’s playoff loss to San Francisco.
That’s what made his day Thursday feel … “kind of weird and interesting,” Newton said.
The Panthers are coming off a 12-4 season. They released All-Pro receiver Steve Smith and are looking to Newton and a corps of talented young receivers led by first-round draft pick Kelvin Benjamin from Florida State to lead them to their first back-to-back winning seasons in the 20-year history of the franchise.
It’s been an uphill proposition for Newton so far. He had to undergo ankle surgery in March. He still wasn’t 100 percent fully recovered from that when Patriots linebacker Jamie Collins kneed him in a “dead spot” of his flak jacket, seven yards into a scramble. The typically upbeat Newton describes his physical state as “extremely frustrating.”
“It’s kind of like that old faithful car,” Newton said. “You fix the AC, now the carburetor’s out. Then you fix the carburetor. You’ve got a flat tire. You fix the tire, now your windshield wiper doesn’t work. And it’s frustrating because you know it’s a good car.”
Wait, this is Newton, the 25-year-old former Heisman Trophy winner and No. 1 overall draft pick, who’s helping to revolutionize the way NFL quarterbacks play. So the analogy only goes so far. When asked to elaborate on the make and model of the car he had in mind?
“A 2020 Ferrari,” Newton said.
That sounded more like it. And if he’s going to be able to go in Sunday’s opener, he’ll be running — quite literally — like he always does. As much as Rivera wants him to play it more safely, and at least slide more often, Newton’s instincts are to both run and pass.
“Let’s not get anything twisted, let’s not get anything misconstrued,” Newton said. “Fault me for it, kill me for it, do whatever you want to, but I only know how to play this game like I know how. I’m not about to sit up here and mimic somebody else’s game style. I’m going to go and try to win football games. So if it takes for me to scramble, I’m going to scramble.”
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