PANTHERS FACE TOUGH FOE
Getting team over Super Bowl loss not an easy task
BOCA RATON, FLA. One of the best resources Cam Newton can bank on sat at a table during the NFC coaches media breakfast Wednesday and defended the lightning rod quarterback to the hilt.
Not that you wouldn’t expect this from Carolina Panthers coach Ron Rivera, whose bond with the 2015 NFL MVP has been strong and steady since they arrived there in 2011.
Yet Rivera unleashed more emotion than usual as he expressed his agitation with criticism aimed at Newton after the quarterback’s surly, walk-off news conference following a Super Bowl 50 loss.
“I think there’s an appreciation of what superstars like LeBron (James) go through, what Kobe (Bryant)’s gone through,” Rivera said. “I promise you, if you ask those guys, ‘ How were you those first few years?’ That sounds like Cam Newton.
“Think about Jerry West, and the way he was. People talked about how bad of a loser he was. Mr. West was one of the most tremendous athletes ever, but he struggled with losing. So let’s all take a second to really think that this is not a unique set of circumstances. It’s the true raw emotion of who (Newton) is. Well, let’s celebrate that, too.”
Listening to Rivera reinforced the reason players love playing for him. He relates. He provides the benefit of the doubt, and, for some things, even excuses. He has their back.
But his well-meaning words also reflected a layer of the next challenge.
It has been more than six weeks since the Panthers were drubbed by the Denver Broncos. Granted, Rivera responded to questions served from the media. But for Newton’s postgame news conference to dominate the session before the NFL meetings ended underscored the residual effect of losing on the big stage. The Panthers will not only be challenged to catch up with a shorter offseason but also to recapture their special chemistry.
To do that, they also will be pressed to overcome a psychological hangover.
Call it the Super Loss Syndrome.
According to people who have been there, Super Bowl losses are the worst. It’s a harder fall.
Maybe that has something to do with the fact that you’d have to go back more than 20 years, to the Bruce Smith-Jim Kelly Buffalo Bills, to find a team that lost a Super Bowl and then returned the following season.
“You may have just given me my next challenge as we move forward,” Rivera said when I mentioned the Bills. “Something people say we’re not going to be able to do or we can’t do because it hasn’t been done. Why don’t we try? Seriously, that’s the way I look at it.”
Chicago Bears coach John Fox understands. Fox lost Super Bowls as the Broncos and Pan- thers head coach and as defensive coordinator with the New York Giants. He thinks the psychological impact of losing a Super Bowl could be one of the factors but points out it is one of many things.
Comparing today’s challenge to the Bills teams of the early 1990s, he mentioned how it was easier to keep teams intact before liberalized free agency took effect.
“Creating that same chemistry on the team is so much harder,” Fox said. “So it will not be the same team. Might be the same logo, but that team is completely different.”
Across the room, Seattle Seahawks coach Pete Carroll maintained, “Coming out of a Super Bowl is a much bigger factor than people realize. It’s a wonderful factor, whether you win it or don’t. But it is something to deal with.”
Injuries are another key variable. And so unpredictable. No two seasons are alike.
“Getting to the Super Bowl, a lot of cards have to fall right, in a lot of different ways,” Fox said. “Maybe not even good for you, but bad for somebody else. For that same reason, it’s hard to get back. I don’t know if you coach it any different. The team’s different, but I don’t know that they’re not trying as hard.”
This is all part of the new territory Rivera has to deal with. He was encouraged by the outlook that Pro Bowl center Ryan Kalil shared, maintaining that the experience of getting to the Super Bowl provided a valuable template.
“Now all of a sudden the great unknown is no longer the great unknown,” Rivera said.
Of course, all eyes will be on Newton to see how he responds.
“I’m anxious to see him be him,” Rivera said.
Newton comes off as a man who is very secure with whatever image he chooses to project — from the funk of losing to the unbridled joy of winning.
A common link across the spectrum, Rivera intimated, is emotion. Newton wouldn’t be himself if he tried to come off as bland and ultra-programmed. And Rivera said he probably wouldn’t be the same player, either.
“The emotion is what drives him,” Rivera said. “That’s why he’s been so great. I think he’s an emotional guy, and he feeds off his emotion and energy. I know his teammates feed off his energy.
“Plus, if he was bland, you guys would probably say, ‘Boy, he’s bland.’ ”
When Rivera talked to his quarterback in the days after the Super Bowl, Newton consciously refused to dwell on the drama flowing from the news conference.
Said Rivera, “It was more about him getting past this.”
Good idea. The next challenge awaits.
“Creating that same chemistry on the team is so much harder. ... Might be the same logo, but that team is completely different.”
Bears coach John Fox, on rebounding after a Super Bowl loss