Panthers P Michael Palardy tears ACL

The Panthers will make a change at punter this season. They have placed Michael Palardy on their reserve/non-football injury list. This will end his season.

This comes after Palardy, Carolina’s punter since 2016, suffered a torn ACL while training independently this summer, Tom Pelissero of NFL.com tweets. The tear is in Palardy’s left leg, his kicking leg. While the five-year veteran hoped to kick through this, Pelissero adds surgery is now on tap.

Palardy has been the Panthers’ full-time punter since the start of the 2017 season. The franchise signed him in 2016, when he kicked in seven games for the then-defending NFC champions. Palardy has twice averaged 46 yards per punt, doing so in 2017 and ’19. He ranked 13th in this category last season.

The Panthers may well add a veteran leg to compete with rookie UDFA Joseph Charlton, who operated as South Carolina’s punter for the past three seasons.