CHARLOTTE — When the Panthers were in the midst of a five-hour flight back from the Bay Area on Monday night (and into Tuesday morning), somewhere between the initial shock of a lost game that felt within their grasp, grappling with what the defeat meant for their season, making sense of the number of injuries to defensive starters in the game, and trying to catch some inadequate sleep, Mike Jackson had a heart-to-heart with himself.

He knew Jaycee Horn was probably not going to play in the Week 13 matchup against the top-seeded Rams. Concussion protocol on a short week was more than likely going to sideline the Pro Bowler (which it did). And with Corey Thornton out for the season with a broken fibula, the field was going to tilt. Jackson was going to have to play the boundary more

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