Pro. Jake Delhomme

[snote]

Originally posted by cajun express
Let us be honest this will be the first time he goes in with at least a realitic chance.

i normally make it a practice to "always" be honest.. have done so for quite awhile..
following link i share learning one of my first lessons with "stretching the truth".. http://sportsnote.com/archive/this&that/lying.htm

i went back and looked at what i typed to Bruce.. and what he typed.. Bruce did not use the adjective "realistic".. (smiling)

[snote]

Originally posted by snote
curious ...i might hope that brandon takes the Indy offer vs signing on with the panthers..

smiles

[NewsCopy]

Delhomme product of Panthers' philosophy

It seems like a fair swap. New Orleans gets the Hornets. Charlotte gets Jake Delhomme.

Delhomme, a career back-up for the New Orleans Saints, is Carolina's latest Quarterback of the Future.

Some of you wanted Carolina to hire the other Jake, Jake Plummer, whom Denver inexplicably signed to a $40 million contract. But the Panthers have gone the famous free-agent route before. They once were so eager to be good, they abandoned any pretext of a plan to fling money at the famous.

They hired Reggie White, Chuck Smith and Sean Gilbert. But these rich and famous together contributed less than Mark Fields, the free-agent linebacker whom the Panthers stole last March for little more than $1 million.

The Panthers' new philosophy is to avoid falling so in love with a player they become desperate, have to have him, and as a result overspend.

Yet, if they don't love running back Stephen Davis, who arrived in Charlotte on Thursday afternoon, they really, really, really like him.

Carolina has many needs, among them quarterback, running back, receiver, cornerback and offensive line. They would be foolish to abandon their budget and common sense and hand $40 million to Plummer, who was flashy and inconsistent at Arizona, or Kordell Stewart, who was flashy and inconsistent in Pittsburgh.

Delhomme cost $4 million for two years. This could be the greatest Louisiana purchase since the Louisiana Purchase.

Why so cheap?

"I haven't done anything, basically," Delhomme says by telephone Thursday morning from his home outside Lafayette, La. "That's the truth. When I did start (six times in four seasons), I did what I was supposed to.

"But if I didn't think I could be a starting quarterback, I could have stayed in New Orleans, in my comfort zone, and made a good living as a back-up. I can be a starting quarterback."

The rest of the story

TOM SORENSEN
Charlotte Observer
tsorensen@charlotteobserver.com

[NewsCopy]

Q. Why did you pursue Delhomme and not some of the more experienced quarterbacks available?

"Of the hot names out there, he was probably the least known and least productive. But I tend to look at that as a positive, not a negative. I played against Jake Plummer, Charlie Batch, Kordell Stewart and you knew a lot about them. I studied Jake on tape and he did really well every time he went in. His negative was he never really got in that much. But Brett Favre never got in that much and Kurt Warner never got in that much. I don't profess to have all the answers. There's just something about the guy and he has a lot of the intangibles that I look for in a quarterback. The only real negative on (incumbent starter) Rodney (Peete) is that he's older. He played well. He's a very accurate passer. But his movement and his age ... he may or may not hold up. We need to get a younger version of Rodney and we think we did. Time will tell."

The rest of the story

[NewsCopy]

Catching up with ... Jake Delhomme

Outside of New Orleans, not many people knew about Jake Delhomme until a 1999 game on Christmas Eve against Dallas. Delhomme, getting a shot in Week 16 because the Saints had only won two games with Billy Joe Tolliver and Billy Joe Hobert, romped the Cowboys and helped the Saints to an improbable 31-24 win. In his first NFL game, Delhomme passed for two touchdowns and ran for another while completing 16 of 27 passes for 278 yards.

Delhomme bided his time as a backup behind Aaron Brooks, not seeing any action on the playing field in 2000 or 2001. Last season, he played in four games, completing only 8 of 10 passes. It wasn't until this offseason that another team had a chance to sign Delhomme, who became an unrestricted free agent after five years in New Orleans. On March 5, coach John Fox and the Carolina Panthers stepped up to the plate, signing Delhomme to a two-year deal.

While participating in Carolina's offseason conditioning drills, the Louisiana native spent some time with NFL.com talking movies, cajun food and life as an NFL quarterback.

You're in North Carolina now. Is that where you'll spend most of your offseason?

Delhomme: The majority of my offseason is spent back in Breaux Bridge, La. That's my hometown and where my permanent residency is at.

Is there anything we should know about Breaux Bridge?

Delhomme: It is the crawfish capital of the world, and we are also home to a former Miss USA, Ali Landry. She was the girl in those Dorito commercials.

Whoa! She's cute. Did you know her?

Delhomme: Yeah, I knew her growing up a little bit.

You didn't happen to date her, did you?

Delhomme: No, never did. We went to different high schools.

You've been cut three times in your career, but you're only on your second team. How did this happen?

Delhomme: I got cut my first year in New Orleans in 1997 -- I kind of knew I was going to, I was a "camp arm," so to speak. Then I got brought back to the practice squad later in the year. Then the next year, I was on the roster for the first six weeks and then the Saints picked up Kerry Collins. Well, I got cut and went right down to the practice squad. I never really left, but don't get me wrong, I took a really big pay cut.

The following year, 1999, I got cut again, had a bunch of different workouts and the Saints signed me back toward the latter part of the year. I started the last two games for them [one was the game against Dallas, the other was a loss at Carolina]. Ever since the Jim Haslett regime came in, I've been there until now.

What were some of the positives of being a backup in New Orleans?

The rest of the story

By Dave Richard
NFL.com

Special Thanks to Bil of the SportsNote for finding the article

[Rebel02]

Is there anything we should know about Breaux Bridge?

Delhomme: It is the crawfish capital of the world, and we are also home to a former Miss USA, Ali Landry. She was the girl in those Dorito commercials.

Whoa! She's cute. Did you know her?

Delhomme: Yeah, I knew her growing up a little bit.

You didn't happen to date her, did you?

Delhomme: No, never did. We went to different high schools.


Everyone knows that Jake went to the better high school. Yea, they had Ali, but the Rebels had Jake!!

[Cajun Express]

Everyone knows that Jake went to the better high school. Yea, they had Ali, but the Rebels had Jake!!

Talk about a win win for the great town of Breaux Bridge.

[RyChat]

We went to different high schools.

What a coincidence! This was the same reason I never dated Ali Landry, too!

[Pirogue]

May 3, 2003

By Brett Borden
Panthers.com

When Jake Delhomme came to the Carolina Panthers this offseason, he didn't come knowing he would start for his erstwhile division rivals. But he knew he had a chance. And that was enough to get him to leave home and start fresh somewhere else.

Delhomme got his first taste of life as a Panther when mini-camp began Friday. He has alternated snaps with fellow signal-callers Rodney Peete, Chris Weinke, and Randy Fasani. But the competition aspect can wait until training camp. Right now, Delhomme's focus is strictly on learning the ropes.

Panthers head coach John Fox likes what Jake Delhomme brings to his team. (AP Photo)

"The biggest thing I wanted to do was kind of get out here and see how things are run," said the Louisiana native Delhomme, who has spent the past five seasons on the sidelines with the New Orleans Saints. "I'm learning a new offense, so it's a little foreign to me, but overall it went pretty good.

"I'm still thinking a little bit coming out of the huddle about which play it is and where guys need to be lined up. I can't play my best until I say the play in the huddle and it pops up in my head, instead of when we're at the line getting ready to run it. It's the first step in a long journey. But it went well. It was fun."

After seeing Delhomme practice for the first time, Panthers head coach John Fox thought it went well, too.

"Jake has five years experience in the League," said Fox. "He did a good job as far as knowing his assignments, and I thought he threw the ball pretty accurately."

While Rodney Peete is the incumbent starter, Fox wants it to be known that competition will determine who plays on his team.

"I think everybody out here has a chance to be a starter. That is why we are out here. That is the one thing that I tell our players. We are going to play the best players, and they get a chance to set the depth chart themselves."

Whenever a player changes teams, inevitably he is asked to compare his current team with the former one. The way Delhomme sees it, though, this is basically his third team.

"New Orleans was almost like two different teams for me, with the (Mike) Ditka era and the (Jim) Haslett era. It was totally different. Right now, I'm just worried about what I need to do and trying to learn guys' names. So I haven't really had enough time to compare this to New Orleans."

Some of the other players who came to Carolina this offseason have remarked at how uptempo the practices are under head coach John Fox. Friday, for instance, the Panthers ran 75 plays in the morning practice.

"That's what I like," said Delhomme. "That's how it was in New Orleans. It was 'Let's get to work and correct it in the meeting room.' I think that's what you need. You've got a bunch of good guys on this team, and that's what I'm most impressed with. It's a bunch of high character guys. I'm not saying they didn't have that where I came from, but there is a difference here, and you can see it in the off-season workouts and you can see it carrying over onto the field."

Which is what Delhomme would like to do with his career. He feels he has watched from the sidelines long enough. The amount of knowledge he has picked up while doing so has been huge.

"The more you're around it, the more you learn," he said. "You learn something every day. I've learned something from all the quarterbacks I have been around. I've already learned something from Randy and Chris and Rodney. You just pick up little things, from players and from coaches and from watching film. You can always learn.

"I've been a backup for a while. I've been able to grow and see a lot of things. I think I'm ready. I'm not ready after today, but when it comes time in late August/early September, I'll be ready."

[Pirogue]