Bryce Young reborn? What to watch for when Panthers visit Saints in first game of the season

Carolina visits New Orleans hoping to look like a much different team than they were at the end of last year.

CHARLOTTE, NC - SEPTEMBER 18: Bryce Young #9 of the Carolina Panthers looks into the distance after a football game against the New Orleans Saints at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina on Sep 18, 2023. / (Photo by David Jensen/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

Tomorrow afternoon the Carolina Panthers will finally kick off their 2024 schedule when they visit the New Orleans Saints at the Superdome. Thus will begin a new era of Carolina football, and hopefully one that will look much different than what fans have seen over the last several years.

There are legitimate reasons to be hopeful for improvement, though. Here are a few things we will be watching for in the Panthers' regular season debut.

The new and improved Bryce Young?

If the Panthers are going to break the pattern and get back to competing, the biggest change will have to come at the quarterback position, where Bryce Young is coming off a brutal rookie season. Young was clearly set up to fail in 2023, though - from atrocious pass protection to a lackluster wide receiver corps to having the offense changed on him three times in the offseason.

This year the Panthers have gone out of their way to fix all of those challenges. Rookie head coach Dave Canales appears to be a quarterback whisperer based on what he's done with Baker Mayfield and Geno Smith at his last two stops, and Carolina's wide receiver corps has been upgraded in a major way. We have seen signs of progress from Young, even if his preseason action was a very small sample size. Young also thrived in the joint practice against a tough New York Jets defense. If he's able to translate that success over to the regular season the Panthers' ceiling will rise a great deal.

The NFL's most expensive offensive line

Another way that the Panthers front office tried to improve the supporting cast around Young was by splurging in free agency to improve their offensive line. The two moves that matter most were signing Robert Hunt and Damien Lewis to massive contracts to takeover at the right and left guard positions, respectively. Hunt is one of the game's most-underrated guards and Lewis has earned high marks for his run blocking at Seattle. However, expectations are going to be very high for these two and this unit in general, because no other team in the NFL is spending more on their offensive line this year.

An underrated but shorthanded defense

On the other side of the ball Carolina has a capable defensive coordinator in Ejiro Evero, who got surprisingly good results last season given what he had to work with. The personnel is much the same at the key spots, with a few tweaks. The big changes here were on the edge, where Brian Burns was shipped off to the New York Giants and Jadeveon Clowney was signed to replace him. D.J. Wonnum is also now in the mix but he's starting the year on the PUP list. That makes an already-short edge rush rotation really thin. Evero may have to find ways to manufacture pressure against New Orleans.

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