2C
SPORTS/triie Cliatlotte $oKt
Thursday, January 15, 2003
Fiery Fox turns Panthers into winners
Continued from page 1C
At his very first Panthers
minicamp, Fox stood up and
challenged his team’s tough
ness.
“He basically came in and
said, ‘I don’t know how tough
you guys are,”’ safety Mike
Minter said. “He didn’t pull
any punches on that, and it’s
hard when a man has his
toughness questioned. But
he laid it all out there and
told us whoever survived
training camp would be
around to turn this team
into a winner.”
It was quite a change. Fox’s
predecessor, George Seifert,
was laid-back and had few
close relationships with
players. Fox is a screamer
and a sideline pacer who
wants to get to know each
and every member of the
team.
Under Seifert, the
Panthers rarely worked out
in full pads. Fox prefers con
tact drills.
“The biggest surprise was
his bluntness. A lot of coach
es sugarcoat stuff, but Foxy
just said it like it was with
out pulling any punches,”
defensive tackle Brentson
Buckner said. “If you weren’t
doing a good job, he told you
and told you how you had to
do it the next time — or else.”
The changes paid off
immediately: The Panthers
opened the 2002 season 3-0.
There were still some
tweaks to be made, though,
and Carolina slipped into an
eight-game losing streak.
But the Panthers of old
would have packed it in from
there. With Fox’s leadership.
they rallied to a 7-9 finish.
Fox and general manager
Marty Humey went to work
in the offseason, bringing in
a powerful running back to
carry the offensive load
(Stephen Davis) and gam
bling on a no-name quarter
back to add a little fire (Jake
Delhomme). Both players
worked out wonderfully for
the Panthers, as have all of
Fox’s draft picks.
Although selecting defen
sive end Julius Peppers with
the No. 2 overall pick in the
2002 draft seemed like a no-
brainer, the pick was ques
tioned by those who thought
Peppers didn’t fit Carolina’s
immediate needs. And tak
ing offensive lineman Jordan
Gross in the first round in
2003 didn’t exactly make a
huge splash, but Fox went
with his instinct. Peppers
and Gross have been
anchors for the lines.
As is his style. Fox plays
dovra the significance of his
personnel decisions.
“We’re trying to locate the
best human talent available,
just like the other 31 teams
in the National Football
League,” he said. “It’s kind of
our lifeblood, it’s a lot of hard
work, and we’ve been fortu
nate.”
Fox’s bland persona off the
field is a far cry from his
excitable identity on it. He
spends game days yelling at
his players after mistakes or
running in celebration after
a big play.
Then, once the game is
over, he quiets dovra.
Clearly, his approach
works.
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McNabb meets expectations in Philly
Continued from page 1C
hardly needed it. His thumb
hurt so bad, he had trouble
gripping the ball.
Expectations in Philly were
already at fever pitch.
“I was trying to be too per
fect, to be so precise that it
was taking me away from
my game,” McNabb recalled
Sunday night. “I needed to
just go out there and play
reckless football.”
Great quarterbacks don’t
always put up great num
bers. They just win. McNabb
does that with his arm, but
even more with his legs,
heart and head. He
shrugged off questions about
an apology. “What’s ‘I’m
sorry going to do?” McNabb
said at a news conference a
few days after Limbaugh’s
remarks, then responded the
way he knew best.
He worked harder, studied
film longer, and the Eagles
won 10 of their next 11
games. Before Sundays
kickoff, with the Packers and
Brett Favre in tovra for the
playoffs, McNabb stayed on
the high road. “The only sat
isfaction that I have,”
McNabb said, “is winning.”
For most of the game
against Green Bay, it looked
beyond his reach. From the
sideline, he watched Favre, a
quarterback who already
had everything he wanted —
a Super Bowl ring and a Hall
of Fame career — about to
steal the rest. Climbing back
from a 14-0 deficit, the
Eagles trailed 17-14 with
1:12 left in regulation, and
one final shot to get it back.
The Packers had sacks on
five of the previous eight
dovras, but when McNabb
broke the huddle this time,
that wasn’t the kind of pres
sure he was worried about.
Realizing the Packers were
playing prevent defense, he
watched Freddie Mitchell
make his way dovra the cen
ter of the field, then purpose
ly threw the pass just short
of where Green Bay defend
ers Bhawoh Jue and Darren
Sharper were about to con
verge on Mitchell.
“I just tried to get into a
position where Freddie could
compete for it,” McNabb
said.
But Mitchell knew better.
“If he would have put it up
ahead of me,” the receiver
said, “I would have got
crushed.”
Instead, Mitchell wound
up with a 28-yard comple
tion, his first catch of the day.
Philadelphia eventually tied
it with a field goal, then won
in overtime after Favre’s
uncharacteristically pan
icked throw led to an inter
ception and a McNabb-
orchestrated drive that kick
er David Akers ended v^dth a
31-yard field goal.
“Great players,” Packers
coach Mike Sherman said,
“make great plays.”
McNabb had plenty of
those in his past, but without
this one, none of those would
have mattered. The playoffs
are different, because each
round raises the stakes.
Rams quarterback Marc
Bulger was 18-4 as a starter
in regular-season games
when his coach, Mike Martz,
turned cautious in the final
minutes of regulation in
Saturday’s playoff game
against the Panthers and
opted to kick the tying field
goal instead of going for the
win.
Eagles coach Andy Reid
didn’t have an option at
fourth-and-26, but he knew
what the stakes were.
McNabb is the team’s high
est-paid, highest-profile star.
If the Eagles lost confidence
in him, there was no Kurt
Warner waiting in the
wings, no way to start over
again next season.
All the talk about destiny
playing a role in the Packers-
Eagles games was directed
toward the Green Bay side
and Favre, who had engi
neered three straight vrais
since his father died just
before Christmas. But this
time, nothing was going to
stop McNabb — not all the
criticism before and after
Limbaugh, not the injuries
that weakened the Eagles all
season, not even fourth-and-
26.
“We don’t need fate,”
Mitchell explained, calling
McNabb’s number. ‘We have
‘5.”’
Jim Litke is a national
sports columnist for The
Associated Press. Write to
him at jlitke@ap.org
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Winning vibe turns entire
city into Panther nation
Continued from page 1C
If this sounds familiar, well, it should.
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who won last
year’s Super Bowl, played the
very same way. The year
before that, the New England
Patriots employed that style
to win it all. And the year
before that, the Baltimore
Ravens muscled their way -
mentally and physically - to
the Super Bowl crovra.
Every once in a while, a
finesse team, like St. Louis,
sneaks in and wins it all. But
the winning blueprint for
years and years has been tough, nasty foot
ball.
These are your Carolina Panthers.
Sure, they could really use star running
Foster
back Stephen Davis this weekend. Who
couldn’t use a player of Davis’ capabilities?
But should Davis not be able to play because
of the quadriceps injury he suffered in last
week’s victoiy over St. Louis, the Panthers
will be just fine with DeShaun Foster filling
in.
That’s the thing about these Panthers: All
season long, they kept finding ways to get the
job done when so many people - including this
columnist - thought they didn’t have enough
to go to the Super Bowl.
Well, they do.
So go ahead, open your eyes. Open them
wide and take everything in while you’re
uptown this weekend.
I hear victory champagne doesn’t bum all
that much.
E-mail Post sports sports columnist C. Jemal
Horton at seejemalwrite@aol.com.
You know us
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and our passion.
You know us ;
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Mother Jones to run at Milrose
Marion Jones will return
to the track next month at
the Millrose Games, her first
event since taking a year off
to have a baby.
Jones, who won five
medals in the 2000
Olympics, is set to run the 60
metem at the indoor event
held in Madison Square
Garden on Feb. 6.
This will be her first meet
since 2002, when she won
the U.S. title in the 100 and
200, and the 100 in the
World Cup to complete the
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first undefeated season of
her career. She had a baby
boy last June with boyfriend
and fellow sprinter Tim
Montgomery, who is not
scheduled to compete at the
Millrose Games.
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