Panthers head coach Dave Canales post-season press conference By Isaiah Vasquez
There was a deadline looming, a huge trade up in the air, a former Pro Bowl receiver mostly unaware that he should be bracing for bad news — and a Carolina Panthers second-year head coach who was absolutely spent.
Not physically spent. But emotionally so.
Dave Canales had always wanted to be in this chair, as the head coach of an NFL team. He never needed to say such a thing out loud. You could always tell. He’s a guy who warms up with his players before each practice, vibes to music that thumps individual drills along, conceals a smile when scrimmage intensity boils over into mild skirmishes. He’s unrelentingly, enviably and authentically positive — to the point that makes those who meet him wonder aloud: Is he always like that?
And yet on this particular day, last Tuesday, with the NFL roster deadline an hour or so away, Canales was something he rarely was: He was tired. He’d spent the day cutting players from the roster he’d poured into all camp, and he still had a massive move to go. He settled into his seat next to Panthers general manager Dan Morgan and across from receiver Hunter Renfrow, and he prepared to tell the 2021 Pro Bowler, the guy who came out of his year-long retirement to play for the Panthers this summer, that he wasn’t making the team.
“It was actually Dan and I, we sat together to talk to Hunter because we understood who this guy is and who he was before and what he could be again,” Canales told The Charlotte Observer. “And we wanted to be a part of that story. But we also wanted to try to do the right thing for the Panthers — what we thought was right.”
Canales paused.
“I look back, and I just think about what a hard conversation that was for all of us, for Hunter, for Dan and I,” he said.
Carolina Panthers head coach Dave Canales walks around the field watching players run through stretching drills during the team’s rookie minicamp practice on May 9, 2025. JEFF SINER jsiner@charlotteobserver.com
The 44-year-old head coach painted this picture after practice Monday afternoon: six days after the meeting, two days after Renfrow rejoined the team thanks to a stunning turn of serendipity, six days before the Panthers opened their season against the Jacksonville Jaguars in Florida. And yet what lingers from the meeting today is less about what resulted from it and more of what made such a conversation difficult for Canales.
It’s not hard for him to explain.
“The only model that I’ve seen work for me is to find a personal connection, to hear what their goals are, to hear what their vision is, and their dream,” Canales said.
And that’s great, no doubt. But finding personal connections to all the 90-plus guys who filter through an NFL spring and summer eventually takes a toll. It makes cut-down day uniquely difficult.
And yet:
“In my time in the NFL, the more time you spend on somebody, the harder it is when they’re no longer here,” Canales said. “And I’ve always just believed that it’s worth it.
“It’s worth the hard conversations. It’s worth the loss. … You gotta work through those things. But I just think it’s worth it.”
Carolina Panthers head coach Dave Canales smiles and greets passers-by as he walks to the team’s training camp practice on Wednesday, July 23, 2025. JEFF SINER jsiner@charlotteobserver.com
Such connections were worth it as a junior varsity coach at his Carson High School alma mater in Southern California. They were worth it as a 16-year coach in the NFL, a career that took him from lower-level assistant to offensive coordinator to head coach.
Knowing that making such an effort is worth it is “rare,” his players say. It’s what separates him from many other coaches.
And yet, it’s what connects him to the coach he’s always striven to be.
Carolina Panthers head coach Dave Canales smiles as he talks with fans on his walk to the team’s OTA practice on May 27, 2025. JEFF SINER jsiner@charlotteobserver.com
Dave Canales and the head coach he learned so much from
It was the first day of training camp, and Carolina Panthers players were filing into their seats in the auditorium just outside their locker room in Bank of America Stadium. A video released by Panthers.com showed that there was a palpable, chattery first-day-of-school energy. Canales felt it, too.
The head coach kicked off his second offseason with a presentation of his philosophies. He pointed to a corner of the room where a banner stands tall and reads: “OUR STYLE: Effort. Enthusiasm. Toughness. Smart. Finish.”
“This play style right here,” Canales said. “Look, there are 31 other buildings —“
He turned around.
“Well, 30 other play styles.” He smiled. “Because I stole this from Pete. But I believe in it. I believe in it.”
Carolina Panthers head coach Dave Canales congratulates linebacker DJ Johnson (52) as he comes off the field during a 2024 game at Bank of America Stadium. Bob Donnan USA TODAY NETWORK
In every corner of the Panthers’ organization, you can see Pete Carroll’s fingerprints. Carroll is the 73-year-old head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders. He met Canales when he was at the University of Southern California, and, intrigued by his work ethic and energy, let him fly under his wing to the Seattle Seahawks, where Canales spent the next 14 seasons. Canales loved Carroll and the way he coached, with a toughness as old as time wrapped in humanistic, mindful, new-age papering.
And once Canales got his own team, he vowed that he’d run it like Carroll’s. Such a vow has come true. You can see it in the letters on the wall. In the belief he offers to undrafted free agents. In the valuing of special teams. The Panthers have three permanent captains on their 2025 squad — quarterback Bryce Young, defensive lineman Derrick Brown and long snapper JJ Jansen — and then a rotational one that gets rewarded week to week, as well as a “scout team captain.” Such a ceremony is meant to acknowledge those who deserve it that particular week, to give the overlooked a way to be seen. He learned that from Carroll, too.
Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll celebrates with players after an extra point against the San Francisco 49ers during a 2021 game at Lumen Field. Joe Nicholson USA TODAY NETWORK
“David paid attention to what we were doing throughout,” Carroll said of Canales earlier this week. And yes, Carroll calls him David, not Dave. “And he grew in our organization and our mentality and culture and all of that.”
Ask the player who was drafted by Carroll and has been with Canales at every stop he’s been thereafter — David Moore — and he’ll tell you that Canales is a younger version of Carroll: Equally optimistic, equally “rare” in his approach.
Moore was drafted by the Seahawks in 2017 and immediately was getting one-on-one attention not only with Canales, but Carroll, too. He felt what it was like to have “a coach that believes in you, who wants you to find your best every day.” He thought it was like this everywhere.
“Until I had to leave,” Moore said, flashing a wry smile. He left the Seahawks in 2021 — actually signing a deal with the Panthers before spending that season on various practice squads and then ultimately playing four games combined with Denver and Green Bay.
Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll greets quarterback Russell Wilson following a fourth quarter touchdown against the Los Angeles Chargers in 2018 at CenturyLink Field. Joe Nicholson USA TODAY NETWORK
“And then when I left, I got smacked right in the face knowing dang well that is not how it is around the league,” Moore continued. “And they warned us. There were a couple of guys when I was in Seattle who came in from other teams who kind of told us, ‘Hey, y’all better cherish this because it ain’t like this everywhere else.’ I didn’t know what they were talking about until I left.”
Now Moore, 30, is back with Canales, the coach he’d prefer to play for over anyone else. Now he’s the elder statesman telling his teammates what he didn’t believe as a rookie.
“You don’t have this everywhere else,” Moore said. “Players as well. In this locker room, all the players connect. … It’s tough in other places, depending on where you go.”
Panthers wide receiver David Moore pumps his helmet in the air as he dances between drills during training camp on July 24, 2025. Melissa Melvin-Rodriguez mrodriguez@charlotteobserver.com
Dave Canales compared to another Panthers legend
Take a survey of the rest of the Panthers’ locker room, and similar words crop up. Bryce Young calls Canales’ positivity infectious. Cornerback Jaycee Horn considers his head coach “a great leader” who’s “the same guy every day.” Even players who’ve only known Canales for a few months sing his praises. Renfrow, for instance, said Canales has an “optimism that people envy” — and that Canales “speaks life into people.”
These are all characteristics people have said about Carroll over the years.
But there’s another coach Canales drew a comparison to recently. Let Luke Kuechly explain for himself.
“He reminds me a little bit of Ron,” Kuechly told The Charlotte Observer. The Pro Football Hall of Fame finalist was referring to Ron Rivera, the winningest head coach in Panthers history, whose impact in many ways still looms large over this franchise, this city.
“Just in the sense of how he treats the guys,” Kuechly continued. “The guys love him. I think he has a ton of fun. He’s very positive. But he’s in charge. And I think at the end of the day, you can be that dude. You can be nice. You can be this, you can be that. But you gotta be in charge. And he’s definitely that.”
Carolina Panthers head coach Ron Rivera and Seattle Seahawks head coach Pete Carroll talk at midfield during warmups prior to playing a 2012 game at Bank of America Stadium. David T. Foster III dtfoster@charlotteobserver.com
And being in charge isn’t always easy. Canales learned that early.
Two games in, the then-first-year head coach decided to bench quarterback and former No. 1 overall pick Bryce Young in favor of veteran Andy Dalton. Such a move drew scrutiny from nearly everyone in the sports zeitgeist, from current NFL players to LeBron James. Once Young returned to the starting spot thanks to a Dalton injury, the relationship between Young and Canales needed time to heal, to be repaired. And it appears it has. Canales said at the NFL Combine that “a mutual respect” had blossomed between the two after “going through something really challenging and coming out on the other end together” — and such a connection has only grown in training camp and the preseason.
There were other challenges during Canales’ debut season as a football coach. On the field, plenty of questions cropped up as they tend to do during a 5-12 season — particularly one in which the Panthers were 3-11 come late December. Detractors wondered if the unending positivity was beneficial in the locker room, if the optimism was starting to ring hollow. The defense gave up the most points in NFL history and gave up the third-most rushing yards in league history. Other players besides Young got benched. There were difficult conversations to be had after the season, too, including the ones that led to kicker Eddy Piñeiro and longtime linebacker Shaq Thompson leaving to test free agency.
Canales was an open, kind, happy coach who cared about his players, critics had to admit. In the same breath, they might’ve added: But if it doesn’t yield wins, does it matter?
To the Panthers front office, there were no expectations in Year 1. And in 2025, there isn’t much use in looking back on 2024.
“Sometimes you have to make hard decisions,” Dan Morgan said in a news conference during training camp. “And he made a hard decision (in benching Young). We are where we are now. We’re not looking back. We’re looking forward. And we’re excited about the future.”
Carolina Panthers coach Dave Canales speaks during February’s NFL Scouting Combine at the Indiana Convention Center. Kirby Lee USA TODAY NETWORK
Pete Carroll observed Dave Canales ‘stay true’
Such challenges make someone who they are, Canales would say. It makes a team what it is.
Sounds like someone he knows well, doesn’t it?
There’s a reason for that, Carroll said.
“He never fought the process,” Carroll said of Canales. “It was always drawing from the process, and he became an articulate defender and presenter and proponent of what we were doing.
“It was obvious. And so he goes into that job with structure and philosophy and an outlook and a vision for what he wanted to create. And he’s a good enough communicator that he could make sense of it.”
Seattle Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson and head coach Pete Carroll embrace after a 2019 game against the Minnesota Vikings at CenturyLink Field. The Seahawks defeated the Vikings 37-30. Kirby Lee USA TODAY NETWORK
Carroll said he was a close observer of Canales last season and “listened to him talk to his team throughout the year.”
“I heard him stay on point, stay true,” Carroll added.
Carroll heard a consistent voice in Canales, the same one that still uses words like “possibilities” and “dreams.” The same guy who has people questioning how far his optimism can go, and how far that optimism can take the Panthers.
Panthers head coach Dave Canales awaits the coronation ceremony before Charlotte FC’s home opening match against Atlanta United on March 1, 2025, at Bank of America Stadium. Melissa Melvin-Rodriguez mrodriguez@charlotteobserver.com
Pose such a question to Canales himself — how far can you take the Panthers? — and he might answer it the same way he talks to the 89th and 90th players on the training camp roster every summer. It’s the kind of question that makes him as rare as his mentor.
“I ask (every player), ‘What’s your dream?’” Canales said.
He paused, as if he’s accepting their answer.
“OK,” he continued. “Now where are we at today in regards to achieving that dream, so you can take those small, incremental steps?
“And how can we get you further than you ever thought you could?”