The Panthers claimed Corey Bullock off of waivers on Monday and that led to the departure of another offensive lineman.
They announced that they have waived guard Chandler Zavala to make room for Bullock on the 53-man roster.
Zavala was a 2023 fourth-round pick and he started 14 of the 34 games he played for the Panthers over the last three seasons. He made five starts last season, but spent most of the year on injured reserve.
The Panthers also announced that they have signed WR David Moore, S Isaiah Simmons, G Jake Curhan, LB Cam Gill, WR Ja’seem Reed, CB Corey Thornton, OL Isaia Glass, CB DeVonta Smith, WR Casey Washington, DT Parker Petersen, RB Tre Tyus, and LB Maz Mwansa to their practice squad.
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The Panthers have added some depth to their offensive line.
Carolina has claimed Corey Bullock off waivers.
Bullock, 24, was waived by the Ravens over the weekend after spending his first two seasons with the club.
Last year, Bullock appeared in 16 games for Baltimore, with his time mainly spent on special teams. He was on the field for 55 special teams snaps and 13 offensive snaps last season.
Carolina will need to make a corresponding roster move after picking up Bullock.
The Panthers have set their initial 53-player roster.
They announced they waived cornerback DeCarlos Nicholson, cornerback Cam Miller, safety Demani Richardson, outside linebacker Isaiah Smith, linebacker Maz Mwansa, defensive tackle Parker Petersen, offensive lineman Isaia Glass, cornerback Devonta Smith, linebacker Maema Njongmeta, center Nick Samac, running back Tre Tyus, cornerback Corey Thornton, wide receiver Casey Washington, wide receiver Ja’seem Reed, linebacker Trevin Wallace and defensive tackle Jared Harrison-Hunte.
The Panthers also released 10 vested veterans, terminating the contracts of wide receiver David Moore, defensive tackle Elijah Garcia, offensive lineman Jake Curhan, cornerback Robert Rochell, safety Isaiah Simmons, outside linebacker Cam Gill, offensive lineman Ja’Tyre Carter, quarterback Kyle Trask, tight end James Mitchell and outside linebacker Jeremiah Moon.
Running back Trevor Etienne and linebacker Bam Martin-Scott went on injured reserve with designations to return.
Cornerback Tyrek Funderburk was waived with an injury designation.
The team also placed right tackle Taylor Moton on the reserve/non-football illness list, and left tackle Ikem Ekwonu and defensive tackle Tershawn Wharton on reserve/physically unable to perform list.
The Panthers traded a 2028 sixth-round pick to the Chargers for defensive tackle TeRah Edwards.
With those moves, the Panthers are at the 53-man limit, and can establish a practice squad on Monday.
The Panthers are acquiring a young defensive lineman.
Per Ian Rapoport of NFL Network, the Chargers are trading defensive tackle TeRah Edwards to the Panthers.
Carolina will send Los Angeles a 2028 sixth-round pick to complete the deal.
Edwards, 25, played his college ball at Illinois. He has not yet appeared in a regular-season game.
Edwards now adds some depth to a Carolina defensive unit that is led up front by Derrick Brown.
Veteran quarterback Kyle Trask is out in Carolina.
The Panthers cut Trask today, making him a free agent.
The move means the Panthers are set to go into 2026 with Bryce Young as the starter and Kenny Pickett as the backup. Haynes King, the undrafted rookie quarterback who played well in the preseason, would seem likely to go on waivers but return to the Panthers’ practice squad if he clears waivers.
Trask was a 2021 second-round pick of the Buccaneers who played only very sparingly in Tampa before getting cut at the end of the preseason in 2025. He was briefly on the Falcons’ practice squad last year, and now he’ll hope some team is interested in adding him to the practice squad again this year.
The Panthers are adding a veteran linebacker at the same time as they are cutting their roster down to 53 players.
According to multiple reports, they have agreed to terms with Bobby Okereke. Okereke was released by the Giants in March.
Okereke started all 46 games he played over three seasons with the NFC East club and had 385 tackles, 5.5 sacks, two interceptions and a fumble recovery. He moved to the Giants after spending four seasons with the Colts.
The Panthers have not made the signing official yet, but they did announce that they have waived defensive tackle Kyon Barrs, wide receiver Elijah Cooks, running back Miles Davis, offensive tackle tackle Ryan Hayes, defensive tackle Tywone Malone, tight end Caden Prieskorn, and wide receiver Roc Taylor. They also released wide receiver Dan Chisena off of injured reserve.
Veteran running back Miles Sanders was arrested in Pennsylvania in June for driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
KDKA reports that court records show Sanders was arrested in Churchill Borough outside of Pittsburgh on June 8. Per the criminal complaint, an officer found Sanders “in and out of consciousness” while in the driver’s seat of a car in the middle of the road. Sanders failed a field sobriety test and tested positive for alcohol on a breath test. Marijuana was also found in the car.
“This is a private matter that has not even reached the preliminary hearing stage and there will be no further comment,” Sanders’s attorney Phil DiLucente said.
Sanders is a free agent after playing for the Cowboys last season. He worked out for the Raiders in July.
The Panthers offense got a chance to test itself against the Texans defense in a joint practice on Wednesday and the results were not good for the NFC South club.
Houston’s pass rushers Will Anderson and Danielle Hunter would have registered multiple sacks of Bryce Young had quarterbacks not been off limits during the workout and the pressure also led the quarterback to throw a couple of interceptions. The lack of protection put a spotlight on tackles Rasheed Walker and Monroe Freeling as they prepare to step into the shoes of the injured Ikem Ekwonu and Taylor Moton to start the season, but head coach Dave Canales said he wasn’t unhappy to see how things played out for his club.
“That’s exactly what we need to see,” Canales said, via the team’s website. “Monroe needs it. Rasheed needs it. When we dropped back today, we did little beyond Bryce extending and getting a couple of plays going. The rush was phenomenal. And that’s exactly the information we need to be able to regroup.”
Young admitted that it “sucks in the moment,” but also tried to share Canales’s push to put a positive spin on the rough performance by saying “we’re only going to be better from a day like this.” History says that’s not quite true as it could also turn out to be a sign of things to come, but the Panthers have time to work on cleaning things up before they aren’t able to blow the whistle ahead of their quarterback getting planted in the turf.
Bryce Young is the Panthers’ franchise quarterback right now. Whether he will remain the Panthers’ franchise quarterback for years to come depends on whether he and the team agree to a long-term contract extension. So far, that hasn’t happened.
In an interview with Stephen A. Smith, Panthers head coach Dave Canales was asked this question about Young: “Is he your franchise quarterback?”
Canales answered, “He is right now.”
Canales then went on to praise the way Young has developed, from a first overall pick who looked like he was in over his head as a rookie in 2023, to a struggling quarterback who got benched two games into his second season in 2024, to a player who led his team to the playoffs in 2025.
“He’s our guy. He’s our guy, and I love the trajectory that he’s on,” Canales said of Young. “And not just the stuff that he’s growing in, from just an operational standpoint, moving the offense, finding chemistry and all that, but it’s also just the critical moments. It’s those games, it’s the close games, it’s the one-score game at the end. Whether we’re up or down, I love having Bryce out there. I love that he stays cool, calm and collected and aggressive, and he attacks at the right time. So, all those things are pointing in the right direction.”
So why is Young only the franchise quarterback “right now”? Why haven’t the Panthers committed to him with a long-term contract extension?
Canales isn’t the person to answer those questions. Panthers General Manager Dan Morgan and Executive VP of Football Operations Brandt Tilis will handle negotiations on a second contract for Young.
“I’ll just let the rest of the stuff just sort itself out, with all the conversations with his whole group and party and our front office here with Dan and Brandt working that part out,” Canales said. “But for me, especially now not calling plays, I get to just enjoy this road, help him improve on a daily basis.”
The Panthers picked up Young’s fifth-year option, which means he is under contract through 2027, with a guaranteed salary of $25.9 million next season. But a true commitment to Young from the Panthers would mean a second contract guaranteeing him a lot more than $25.9 million, for a lot longer than the next two years. Right now, Young doesn’t have that.
Panthers running back Chuba Hubbard has been sidelined by a hamstring injury for the last couple of weeks, but the team is not concerned about his absence stretching into the regular season.
Hubbard has been doing rehab work during the team’s practices and believes he’d be ready to go if there were a regular season game this week. Head coach Dave Canales didn’t go that far, but did say that the team expects he’ll be back to face the Bears.
“I think he hit over 20 mph the other day in [return to play], but that’s in a controlled setting,” Canales said, via the team’s website. “And right now we didn’t want to put him back out there. He’s not ready for someone to pull on his jersey and have him pull through that. But he’s ahead of schedule. He’s doing a great job.”
Jonathon Brooks has gotten more work with Hubbard out of action, which has helped prepare him for the season after missing all of last year while recovering from a torn ACL. Both backs are expected to be part of the plans come September, although it remains to be seen just how Canales will break up the workload.
