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Cam Newton has been the No. 1 playmaker for his team for a very, very long time. He's been the guy the Panthers have turned to in nearly every situation since he entered the league back in 2011, and the same thing was true when he was at Auburn before entering the league. Being the guy his team has relied on for so long eventually wore Newton's body down, though, and he had to undergo shoulder surgery earlier this offseason. 

Now that he's been cleared to resume throwing activities, Cam acknowledged to the Panthers' official website that he knows he occasionally needs to let somebody else make the plays, as much as doing so might go against his nature. 

"The thing I have to realize is my job is not necessarily to always be the playmaker," Newton said. "I have to give other people opportunities to make plays. That's the hardest thing about maturation, especially for me. 

"So having more comfort in trusting the guys around me is the biggest thing. Trust and knowing my job is giving everybody a chance and letting them do their job as well."

Luckily for Cam, the Panthers just added a couple versatile playmakers to diversify their offense moving forward. For most of Newton's career, the Panthers have relied on big-bodied pass-catchers (and Steve Smith, who was 5-foot-9 but played like he was 6-foot-6) and didn't necessarily have many "space" players. That changed when they drafted Christian McCaffrey and Curtis Samuel with their first two picks this year. McCaffrey is a running back that runs routes and catches passes like a wide receiver and Samuel is a wide receiver that can take the ball out of the backfield like a running back. Their presence will allow the Panthers to stretch the field horizontally while Greg Olsen, Kelvin Benjamin (if he loses weight) and the rest of the receivers stretch it vertically. 

Still, merely getting them the ball and letting them do their thing might be a bit of a transition for Cam, who is used to being the guy that makes the play. "There has never been a time when I've been on a team -- I don't care if I'm playing softball -- where I haven't been looked upon to be that guy," he said. "And it's hard when it's 14-10, we need a touchdown, it's third-and-2, you're looking at coach, you get the play call, and it's like, 'Come on!' It's no different than LeBron, Kobe, Jordan or even Brady. My biggest gift in a certain respect is a curse, too."

Cam seems indestructible because he's a monster playmaker inside that Superman body, but eventually everybody gets some wear and tear -- no matter how physically chiseled they are. If he wants to be able to keep using his gifts over the long haul, releasing some of the pressure of making every play is a great way to ensure that can happen.