“I mean, we had a lot of we had a lot of good players too, and have a good system that that we had guys that knew how to play the right way,” Smith said. “Shockey knew how to play. Greg Olsen, myself, and then you add Cam and his athleticism, all that stuff, man. So it was, at times, simple. And then, at times, it would be off because we didn’t have an offseason either. So it was a chemistry roller coaster.
“You lack all the time together because of the lockout, right? Because of the inability to get a playbook, the inability to have traditional offseason workouts, and then everybody’s new. That’s tough. So you had moments where it looked like it was great. And then we had moments where we looked like we hadn’t been together very long.
“So that’s the emotional roller coaster, right? Well, the chemistry roller coaster.”
Smith and Newton might have never been close friends, but the chance to put one of the game’s top wide receivers with a dual threat like Newton created unlimited possibilities. The personalities were a thing Rivera and Hurney had to manage (and it took plenty of work), but the talent made it worth the chemistry experiment.
In 2010, Smith had his worst healthy season, with just 46 catches for 554 and two touchdowns, as part of the league’s worst offense.
In 2011, he rebounded immediately, with 79 catches for 1,394 yards and seven touchdowns.
Having a quarterback, as it turned out, helped.
And the immediate results Newton delivered teased at what he’d provide in years to come.
The Panthers were still a work in progress on defense (things would get better the next year when linebacker Luke Kuechly arrived in the first round, another jackpot for Hurney), but in those first two games of Newton’s career, they gained 477 yards against the Cardinals, and 475 the next week against the Packers.
Newton threw for 422 yards and two touchdowns against the Cardinals. Smith caught both of them, part of his eight catches for 178 yards. He might not have been certain of his future in Charlotte, but he was reborn.
The next week against the Packers, Newton threw for 432 and a touchdown but also threw three picks. This thing was going to swing wildly at first, but things were different. There was, as Gross mentioned, a spark that was evident.
“Chud’s offense was there to be explosive,” Jansen said. “And a lot of big chunk plays. I still don’t think it was tailored for Cam’s best attributes. But when you go the first two games and throw for 850 yards and set the rookie…
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