Do 2015 Panthers Compare To Undefeated 2007 Patriots?
By Michael Hurley, CBS Boston
BOSTON (CBS) -- Through 14 weeks of the NFL season, the Carolina Panthers are 13-0. They'll face a tough test Sunday in a Giants team that's fighting for a playoff spot, but after scoring 36 points per game over the past six weeks, the Panthers sure make it feel like they're going to go 16-0. Certainly, a trip to Atlanta and a home date with the Bucs don't appear to be major players in preventing the undefeated season.
And yet, though 16-0 has only been accomplished once before, the 2015 Panthers -- for one reason or another -- do not have the look of a historically great team. Surely, the non-traditional quarterback factors into that perception, as Cam Newton has complemented his 3,000 passing yards on 394 pass attempts with 480 rushing yards on 111 attempts. Likewise, the lack of a star receiver makes many observers question the team's firepower. Among wide receivers, Ted Ginn leads the Panthers with just 37 receptions and 645 yards.
In addition to the makeup of the Panthers, there is the undeniable truth that the NFL is in a down year across the board in terms of having viable championship contenders. With three weeks left in the season, there are 21 teams with losing records. Twenty-one! And of those 21, at least eight are guaranteed to finish with a sub-.500 record, and at least four more cannot finish better than .500. Obviously with 256 games in a season, some teams will win and some teams will lose, but the gap between the haves and have-nots seems as large as possible this year.
But that's a whole lot of seems and feels and not a whole lot of uses of "is" and "are." So, while accepting the limitations of comparisons across time and while acknowledging that the 2015 season is not yet over, let's try to take a slightly more analytical look to see how this year's Panthers stack up with the 2007 Patriots.
(And when we're done, we can discuss whether going 16-0 should really be something the Panthers want to do, given what we know about the '07 Patriots' fate.)
The League
As already mentioned, the NFL currently abounds with bottom feeders, and as a result, the record of Panthers opponents appears to be rather weak. As it stands now, just two of the Panthers' 13 wins have come against teams with .500 records or better (the 9-4 Packers and the 8-5 Seahawks). The combined record of Carolina opponents this year is 75-94. All three of the Panthers' remaining opponents are currently 6-7.
Just anecdotally, it feels as though the 2007 Patriots faced a tougher road, right?
Well, not entirely. The 2007 AFC East beyond the Patriots was dreadful, with the Dolphins, Jets and Bills combining to go 12-36, a winning percentage of .250. By comparison, the Panthers' divisional opponents are currently 17-22, a winning percentage of .436. So as bad as the NFC South may seem at the moment, the 2007 AFC East was worse -- almost doubly so.
Around the league in '07, it wasn't much better, as 15 teams finished the year with sub-.500 records. Eight of those teams resided in the AFC, and eight of the Patriots' 16 games came against sub-.500 teams.
It's worth noting, however, that the '07 Patriots did beat the 13-3 Cowboys, the 13-3 Colts, the 10-6 Giants, and the 10-6 Steelers, which as a whole represents a more impressive resume than Carolina's. The best wins possible for Carolina, if Green Bay and Seattle win their remaining three games, will come against teams that are 12-4 and 11-5.
But the nitty-gritty is this:
Combined record of 2015 Panthers opponents*: 75-94, .444 win percentage
Combined record of 2007 Patriots opponents: 120-136, .469 win percentage*with three weeks remaining
**repeat opponents' record counted twice
As for the general trends in the league, teams are unsurprisingly scoring a bit more now, averaging 22.9 points per game compared to 21.7 back in 2007. The '07 Patriots led the way with a record 589 points scored, or 36.8 per game, which was 134 more points than the second-highest scoring team, Dallas. The Panthers currently lead the NFL with 411 points, or 31.6 per game, with the Cardinals (31.2) and Patriots (30.9) not far behind. Overall, the average number of points scored per game in the NFL is 22.8.
Defensively, Carolina ranks fourth in points allowed with 243, or 18.7 per game. The league average for points allowed is 297, or 22.8 per game. Back in 2007, the Patriots also ranked fourth in points allowed, at 17.1 per game. The league average was 21.7 points allowed per game.
So, simply in measuring how much better the current Panthers and '07 Patriots are and were compared to the rest of the league, it looks like this:
2015 Panthers
Offense
Rank: 1st
Differential in PPG to league average: +8.8Defense
Rank: 4th
Differential in points allowed/game to league avg.: +4.12007 Patriots
Offense
Rank: 1st
Differential in PPG to league average: +15.1Defense
Rank: 4th
Differential in points allowed/game to league avg.: +4.6
By those measures, the Patriots were a more exceptional team compared to the rest of the league -- significantly so on offense (a touchdown per game compared to league average), and just slightly on defense (a half-point per game).
Roster
This is where the eye test and the casual memory function in many brains says that the comparison isn't even close. In this instance, the general feeling may be accurate -- at least offensively.
Tom Brady threw for 4,806 yards on 68.9 percent passing. He threw 50 touchdowns and eight interceptions. He also ran for two touchdowns.
Cam Newton is on pace to throw for 3,768 yards on 59.1 percent passing. He's on pace to throw 34 touchdowns and 12 interceptions.
Newton, obviously, has done significantly more damage with his legs this year than Brady has in the past 10 years. Newton's rushed 111 times for 480 yards and seven touchdowns, a feat that '07 Brady obviously could not have accomplished. Newton's passing numbers also come despite a dearth of receiving options, which speaks volumes about Newton but not much about the quality of talent on the Carolina roster, which is what this discussion is about.
Nevertheless, the quarterback of the '07 Patriots accounted for 52 touchdowns and eight interceptions, while Newton is likely to produce 43 touchdowns (passing and rushing combined) and 12 interceptions. The end result is an '07 Patriots team that scored 589 points and a Panthers team that is on pace to score 506 points.
Elsewhere on offense, the Patriots were loaded with talent. Randy Moss caught 98 passes for 1,493 yards and 23 touchdowns. Wes Welker caught 112 balls for 1,175 yards and eight touchdowns. On the current Panthers, you could combine the numbers of top wide receivers Ted Ginn and Jerricho Cotchery, and you'd still only get 66 receptions for 1,037 yards and 10 touchdowns.
The Panthers have the advantage at running back, where Jonathan Stewart is on pace for a 1,000-yard season (if he can recover from his foot sprain). He already has six rushing touchdowns, which matches Laurence Maroney's output in 2007, when Maroney ran for 835 yards.
The scales also tilt to the Panthers' side at tight end, as Greg Olsen has been Newton's saving grace all year. Olsen has 65 receptions for 969 yards and six touchdowns. In '07, Ben Watson caught 36 passes for 389 yards and six touchdowns.
Defensively, in terms of playmakers, the very slight edge goes to Carolina. The Panthers already have intercepted more passes and forced more fumbles than the '07 Patriots, and with three games remaining, they'll need just six sacks to match the '07 Patriots' total.
The Panthers boast All-Pro talent at middle linebacker with Luke Kuechly, at defensive tackle with Kawann Short, and at cornerback with Josh Norman. Linebacker Thomas Davis also isn't far out of that picture. But the '07 Patriots quietly boasted two AP first-team All-Pros (Asante Samuel, Mike Vrabel) and one second-teamer (Vince Wilfork). Ty Warren was a PFWA first-team All-Pro as well. In the top-tier talent department on defense, the '07 Patriots are still on a comparable level with the current Panthers.
The Verdict
As with anything in sports, and especially with comparisons of teams playing in different years, there can be no definitive declaration that one team is better than another. We see enough upsets on a weekly basis in the NFL to know that any such statement would ultimately prove futile if the two teams were to somehow meet in a time-warping fantasy matchup on a neutral site. After all, the 2007 Patriots were better than the 2007 Giants, weren't they?
But, in terms of opponents' winning percentage, points scored and points allowed compared to league average, and elite offensive talent, the 2007 Patriots were a superior team. In terms of dynamic defensive talent, it's either the Panthers by a hair or it's a wash, depending on how badly you want to fight about the nuances of each impact player's particular skill-set.
So in this case, it seems as though the "feels" and "seems" and "looks likes" were proven to be correct. Yet as evidenced by the numbers, the gap may not be as wide as some observers may have previously thought. Plus, if the Panthers win their next three games by the 21-point average by which they've won over the past five weeks, and if their opponents can win more than they lose in the final three weeks, the final numbers could be even closer.
But, as the members of the 2007 Patriots can attest, that 16-0 record didn't turn out to be good for much beyond an ugly, lonely banner in the corner of the stadium, a banner with about seven years of shelf life before it had to be mercifully put out of its misery. Whether it was the weight of being perfect that led to the Patriots going from 36.8 points per game in the regular season to just 22 points per game in the playoffs can be debated. Surely, the weather in the first two games and the inescapable pass rush in the Super Bowl played large factors. But nevertheless, the Patriots looked to simply be out of gas by the time they made it to the Super Bowl.
Now, that does not mean the Panthers would be better off if they drop one of their remaining three games. Losing a game on purpose rarely brings about extraordinarily positive results (see the 2009 Colts pulling Peyton Manning in the third quarter in Week 16 of an undefeated season, or see the 2005 Patriots losing the Doug Flutie drop-kick game to set up ideal playoff positioning, for two quick examples).
What's more important for the Panthers is to manage health up and down the roster and ensure that when they host a playoff game in the divisional round, their confidence and readiness is as high as possible. A loss this week or in the final two weeks cannot guarantee that ... but it could serve as an instructional teaching moment that they are indeed fallible. That's a lesson that the '07 Patriots might have needed, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the Panthers need it too.
Regardless of the firepower of the current Panthers vs. the '07 Patriots, the Panthers can eliminate any and all debate by winning the one game in February that matters much more to history than a few midseason victories over sub-.500 teams. The Panthers still have a chance to raise a much better banner than what the 2007 Patriots got. With or without a 16-0 regular-season record, if the Panthers can lift a Lombardi, that's where the comparison will ultimately end.
Short of that, the Patriots' claim to fame as the "best" 16-0 team, for whatever it might be worth, appears to be safe.
Read more from Michael Hurley by clicking here. You can email him or find him on Twitter @michaelFhurley.
