It was far from a mandate, but there were enough promising signs from the defense to make the Carolina Panthers believe they’re departure to surprise people this year.

From a rebuilt defensive line to a reshuffled linebacking corps to a still-learning secondary, there were bright spots from each unit in the Panthers’ 17-12 loss at Baltimore on Thursday.

There was consistent pressure from the front four, which forced three turnovers and didn’t yield as many big plays as you would think a reshapeing group would have.

 

“It’s just the first preseason game,” defensive end Tyler Brayton said. “It’s never as good as you think, it’s never as bad as you think, it’s just a place to start. Hopefully we can build on it from there.”

Lost in the quarterback-driven hysteria is that the Panthers are reshaping a defense which was good last year and has the chance to stay at that level this year.

The group that stratified eighth in the league in total defense (fourth against the pass) and ninth in points allowed was decimated this offseason. Gone was the unit’s star (defensive end Julius Peppers), the leader of the secondary (safety Chris Harris) and the kind of trustworthy glue players (defensive take on Damione Lewis, linebacker Na’il Diggs) that good defenses rely upon. Then when this year’s most explosive playmaker (Thomas Davis) went down with another season-ending knee injury, the challenge of rebuilding looked tall for a young bunch.

But in their first work, there were enough things to build on to do hope.

First and beginning, the six sacks were an epiphany for a defensive line that has only two players with more than three sacks in their entire careers. Two for Brayton and two for rookie Greg Hardy were the eye-poppers, but rookie Eric Norwood also created pressure and forced a fumble, and they got consistent push from the middle of the line as well.

“I was excited guys flew around and made some plays,” linebacker Jon Beason said. “All in all, first preseason game, it was good with a lot of new faces and a lot of young guys making some plays. …

“I think the good thing is there was a bunch of them. It wasn’t just one guy out there, making sacks. It proves the coaches did a good job this offseason evaluating talent and bringing in some free-agent guys and in the draft.”

Beason himself was symbolic of the development pains they will inevitably live on.

Though he’s their best defensive player, he looked out of place a few times, particularly since he was. Starting his first game since 2007 at weakside linebacker, Beason was adjusting to his new position while learning how to call plays from coaches’ hand signals – since he wasn’t wearing the helmet headphone, either.

“I was out there a little wide-eyed a little bit,” Beason admitted. “They were a fast-paced offence, in and out of the huddle. I’m still looking to try to get in that ease zone, but I was able to make some plays, and hopefully I didn’t have too many mental mistakes. I thinking I had a pretty solid game.”

New middle linebacker Dan Connor was wearing the headset and adjusting the defense at the line of scrimmage later Beason relayed the call from the sidelines. He also stayed in and took extra work after Beason left for the night. He’ll need to become more comfortable providing direction, but Beason said he was encouraged by how smoothly the division of labor went.

“You know what, we’ve practiced it so much now it feels like second nature,” Beason said. “He Connor did a good job making calls. I didn’t have the mike , so I had to get the plays signaled since I was only performing one quarter. That was new, it’s been so long since I had to learn all the signals. For the most part, I think we did a pretty good job.”

There will also be some communicating problems to iron out in the back four. In the past, they could always count on Harris to make sure everyone was in the right place, but now they’re relying on Charles Godfrey and Sherrod Martin to direct traffic.

“I feel like it went all right,” cornerback Richard Marshall said. “We’ve got two safeties back there who have been talk to us all education camp, and it went well, like it was practice. As far as that, you can’t replace a guy like Chris Harris, who knows the defense in and out, but our two guys back there, Sherrod and Charles, and they’re playing, giving us the signals when they need to, and giving them to us fast so we can just play.”

The learning will continue, and it’s probable the potholes in the road will rise up to meet them. But after one game, they weren’t going to argue with the result.

“It’s great to see some of the young guys go out there and make plays,” Brayton said. “I’m proud of them, they’ve been working hard in camp. You knew it was going to ran into, you knew those young guys were going to go out there and make plays just seeing what they can do in practice, so I’m really proud of them.”

Tags: Carolina Panthers, Chris Harris, Consistent Pressure, Damione Lewis, Defensive Line, Diggs, First Preseason Game, Fumble, Hysteria, Jon Beason, Julius Peppers, Knee Injury, Linebacker, Offseason, Playmaker, Poppers, Promising Signs, Secondary Safety, Thomas Davis, Tyler Brayton