Every player has their weaknesses, some technical and others attitudinal. Cam Newton knows which one was his while he was a quarterback with the Auburn Tigers in college. He had a terrible attitude, and he was a terrible teammate at the time. This is something that continued during his first years in the NFL, and Newton struggled with changing it.
Speaking this Thursday on Johnny Manziel’s “Glory Daze” podcast, Cam Newton spoke about his attitude towards teammates at the time:
“I was a great player and knew that. Everybody knew that. I was a terrible teammate. You know what I’m saying? Because when you look at my tenure, number one, I was at the University of Florida for two years, was not the guy there. I go to junior college, where I was the guy there, but I was only there for 365 days. Fast forward go to Auburn, the impact was undeniable, but I was only there for a year.” (25:30)
“I wasn’t used to having sustainability and knowing how to build.”
Newton went on to explain that he didn’t interact a lot with his teammates at the time because he didn’t expect to be with them for a long time. He explained that it worked as a defense mechanism and that he didn’t have the tools to express his emotions to his teammates back then. He also highlighted that in a locker room full of overachievers, that kind of attitude wasn’t well received.
How did Cam Newton do in college and as a rookie in the NFL?
Regardless of how hard a time he had being a reliable teammate during college and then adapting to the NFL, it was undeniable that he was successful. In college, he was a national champion in 2010 and a junior national champion in 2009. In the 2010 season, he won the Heisman Trophy, Maxwell Award, Walter Camp Award, Manning Award, and Davey O’Brien Award.
When he reached the NFL in 2011, as the first overall pick of that year’s draft, he also had a superlative rookie year. He was that year’s NFL Offensive Rookie of the Year. Eventually, he managed to adapt to the pros, being the NFL’s 2015 Most Valuable Player and Offensive Player of the Year. That year, he took the North Carolina Panthers to the Super Bowl, where they fell to a Denver Broncos team led by Peyton Manning. However, the big one will always elude him. He never again reached the Super Bowl.
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