Let’s be honest. Cam Newton‘s first career NFL game wasn’t suppose to go like this. He was suppose to struggle offensively with a new playbook and be confused with the difficult schemes that an NFL defense possesses. Yet someone forgot to tell Newton.

As the starting quarterback for Carolina, Newton had a surprising debut against Arizona, throwing for more than 400 yards. More importantly, Newton seemed poised and looked like a seasoned veteran instead of a rookie. Albeit the game was against the Cardinals, the fact remains that to throw for 400 plus yards in the National Football League is impressive no matter who you are playing. The only negative and you can’t blame it all on Newton is that the Panthers lost a game they probably should have won.

Most people who have said Newton will not be a good quarterback in the NFL aren’t eating their words yet. It was just one game, however, not one of the so called experts who said he would fail ever thought he would have a game like this. For the former Heisman Trophy winner, it’s important that he stays grounded. Understand that once NFL coaches get tape on you it becomes more challenging. If he mirrors his work ethic of the greats before him like Tom Brady, Peyton Manning and Drew Brees Newton will have no problem and be a headache for defensive coordinators.

Warren Moon, NFL Hall of Fame quarterback and mentor to Newton, was impressed with the rookie’s first game and gave his thoughts on the Victor and Matt Podcast on the 110SportsPodcast.com, “He had a pretty big day for a debut, probably the biggest debut for any rookie ever in the history of football in their first game. I don’t know where you go from here. The main thing you want to do as a new quarterback, it’s different than having a big game here or a big game there, is try to be consistent and not have those rollercoaster’s where you have one good week then a bad week followed by a couple of good weeks then another couple of bad weeks. You want to try to stay as consistent as you can. It doesn’t mean I expect him to throw for 400 hundred yards every week. You definitely want to keep your pass percentage up there, keep your touchdowns to interception ratio somewhere two to one or better and he can do that in his rookie season that’s a great accomplishment. Most rookies in this league that start throughout the season don’t have good numbers.”

It doesn’t get any easier for Newton and the Panthers as they welcome the defending Super Bowl champion Green Bay Packers. At this point early in the season the focus needs to be on growth and consistency. As Moon stated, “there are going to be ups and downs all season.” So far Newton has seemed to have done everything right. If he continues this path he will be successful. Then, Newton will be able to stand up and tell all the people that doubted him they were wrong and that he was something special.

– For the full interview with Warren Moon listen to Episode 120 on 110SportsPodcast.com.

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110SportsPodcast.com features a weekly sports podcast and daily blogging. Episodes include interviews, entertainment, comedy, insight and analysis.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 15th, 2011 at 2:15 am and is filed under Sports. Tags for this post: Cam Newton, Carolina Panthers, NFL, Warren Moon. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.