With things going well for his new team over the last two weeks, Josh Norman is taking every chance he can get to let the Panthers know what's wrong with their squad.
Washington's got a better record (2-2) than Carolina (1-3) and the Panthers just got smoked by Julio Jones for 300 yards in a loss on Sunday. Norman was going to sit back and sip his tea and not worry about that game, but he couldn't help himself from saying something.
Namely that the Panthers approached Jones with a "disrespectful" game plan.
"Shoot, just disrespectful to line up a rook against that man like that, like he ain't the top wide receiver in the league," Norman told ESPN's Vaughn McClure.
Norman isn't technically accurate: most of Jones' production came against Bene Benwikere. According to Pro Football Focus, Jones caught seven of eight targets when covered by Benwikere, good for 173 yards and a score. Jones would add, per PFF, one catch for 43 yards against rookie Daryl Worley and three catches for 46 yards against rookie James Bradberry.
He lit everyone up. As Dan Quinn pointed out, it wasn't just Julio lining up in man coverage against rookies and beating them.
"Well, they weren't all as man-to-man on some of the big plays that he had," Quinn said. "Some were zones where he had a crossing route where he was able to outrun some guys [on the 75-yard TD]. He's such a unique player and different times and different coverages that go his way. Often times they might have had good coverage where he was able to go up and fight for it, but it was a really clear illustration of a really good competitor being at the very top of his game. I think that was the case [Sunday]."
Speaking on the "Dan LeBatard Show" on ESPN Radio, Norman tried to shy away from saying anything, but did add "you get what you pay for."
"Look man, I don't got anything for you, man" Norman said. "I really don't. I don't know what to say about it. Like I said the other day when they asked me, I'm just going to sip my tea. I mean, you get what you pay for. I don't know."
Also classic Norman -- try to not say anything but manage to say something anyway.
His idea of what the Panthers did against Julio doesn't really jive. But his team is doing pretty well, he's playing at a high level and the Panthers have serious problems on defense. That affords him the opportunity to speak publicly about their situation.
