A sales executive with 30 years of experience, Edwin Shoffner serves as the president of Mattress by Appointment, a firm with more than 200 licensed locations in the United States. Outside of his professional life, Edwin Shoffner is an avid sports fan who holds season tickets to Bank of America Stadium, home of the NFL’s Carolina Panthers.
Since their nearly undefeated 2015 season and subsequent heartbreaking Super Bowl loss to the Denver Broncos, the Panthers have not quite managed to regain that same sense of unstoppable momentum that earned them the attention of sports journalists nationwide that year. However, as asserted in an October 2018 article in the Washington Post, the Panthers’ star quarterback Cam Newton is putting up numbers in yardage, completion percentage, touchdowns, and rushing yards comparable to those he demonstrated in Carolina’s championship season. Why, then, is Newton’s name left off of experts’ lists of the best 2018 quarterbacks?
Some journalists suggest that Newton is overlooked due to the fact that he hasn’t put up the passing numbers of contemporaries like record-breaking New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees, or lacks the precise, familiar passing style of players like the Green Bay Packers’ Aaron Rodgers. But what Newton may lack in panache, he more than makes up for in his effectiveness and willingness to run the ball himself, rather than relying almost exclusively on plays that call for the quarterback to pass from the pocket.
This ability is something that Newton is known for league-wide, and he himself has called it a “curse, but in more ways [a] gift.” The Panthers are currently ranked second in the AFC and maintain 20-1 odds of earning a spot in Super Bowl LII. With Newton leading, no one in football should be surprised to see the Panthers make an appearance.
Since their nearly undefeated 2015 season and subsequent heartbreaking Super Bowl loss to the Denver Broncos, the Panthers have not quite managed to regain that same sense of unstoppable momentum that earned them the attention of sports journalists nationwide that year. However, as asserted in an October 2018 article in the Washington Post, the Panthers’ star quarterback Cam Newton is putting up numbers in yardage, completion percentage, touchdowns, and rushing yards comparable to those he demonstrated in Carolina’s championship season. Why, then, is Newton’s name left off of experts’ lists of the best 2018 quarterbacks?
Some journalists suggest that Newton is overlooked due to the fact that he hasn’t put up the passing numbers of contemporaries like record-breaking New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees, or lacks the precise, familiar passing style of players like the Green Bay Packers’ Aaron Rodgers. But what Newton may lack in panache, he more than makes up for in his effectiveness and willingness to run the ball himself, rather than relying almost exclusively on plays that call for the quarterback to pass from the pocket.
This ability is something that Newton is known for league-wide, and he himself has called it a “curse, but in more ways [a] gift.” The Panthers are currently ranked second in the AFC and maintain 20-1 odds of earning a spot in Super Bowl LII. With Newton leading, no one in football should be surprised to see the Panthers make an appearance.
