Offensive line fix may not mean many new names

There’s also a clump of young players who got varying degrees of time last year who offer some promise.

First among those is Brady Christensen, who could play left tackle. But if they find one of those in the draft, Christensen would likely slide inside to guard. Regardless, they view him as a starter.

Panthers head coach Matt Rhule admitted at the Combine that he was torn about how Christensen was used last year. He started six games, bouncing from side to side and from tackle to guard and back, before settling in at left tackle late.

“I may well should have stepped up say, ”Hey, let’s play him earlier,'” Rhule said. “But I do think playing him slow allowed him to play really well at the end of the year. And so there was some benefit to it. But you know, in some ways, I wonder if we should have done it better.”

Rhule also said the offense under new coordinator Ben McAdoo would be a little more physical up front, with more “downhill” running. That suits larger players such as Deonte Brown (6-foot-4, 335 pounds) and Michael Jordan (6-foot-6, 315 pounds), the kind of young players new line coach James Campen has had success grooming in the past. His lines in Green Bay seldom featured first-round picks (and it’s obviously easier when you have a star quarterback), but he developed a number of mid-round picks into solid starters, if not stars.

That can’t be the only method, however. They need to find at least a couple of upgrades in free agency and the draft.

Regardless of what happens at any other position, that’s what the Panthers need to accomplish. And even though they’ll likely be active next week in terms of gauging the market, they don’t have to make the biggest splash to make a significant improvement.