Tetairoa McMillan Camp Update — August 31: First Name in the Six-Receiver Room
2026 NFL Season · Monday, Aug 31
Carolina's initial fifty-three kept six receivers, with Tetairoa McMillan listed first, per Darin Gantt at the team's site. The week's real news for him sits around the connection: Bryce Young's only live work of the window was a rough joint practice against Houston, and both starting tackles open the season on reserve lists.
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Carolina set its initial 53 Sunday, and the receiver room came out of it at six, with Tetairoa McMillan named first in the group Darin Gantt listed at the team's site: McMillan, Jalen Coker, Xavier Legette, Jimmy Horn Jr., Brycen Tremayne and John Metchie III. McMillan's spot was never the question — the news is what happened around him. Roc Taylor and Elijah Cooks were waived Saturday, per Josh Alper at Pro Football Talk; David Moore was released and Ja'seem Reed and Casey Washington waived Sunday, per Gantt; and all three of Moore, Reed and Washington landed on the practice squad Monday, per Anthony Rizzuti at Panthers Wire, who called Reed a surprise cut after a standout summer.
The week's harder story for McMillan is the connection he depends on. The only live work the starters got was the August 20-sixth joint practice against Houston, and per Zach Roberts at Panthers On SI, Bryce Young went nine of 17 there with two interceptions and seven sacks, while rookie right tackle Monroe Freeling gave up multiple pressures to Danielle Hunter and Will Anderson in the same session. McMillan is not named in Roberts's notes at all — the receiver who produced was Horn, on a well-covered leaping touchdown grab from Kenny Pickett to end the session. Then Sunday's cutdown made the protection picture official: left tackle Ikem Ekwonu opens on reserve/PUP with the torn patellar tendon from January's playoff loss to the Rams, and right tackle Taylor Moton on the non-football illness list with a blood clot — each out at least the first four games, with Freeling and Rasheed Walker the Week One tackles, per Gantt.
Our last episode said to watch McMillan's usage in the finale and whether his slot deployment kept appearing. Neither got an answer: Young and the starters were held out of Friday's game by mutual agreement of Dave Canales and DeMeco Ryans, per Kassidy Hill at the team's site, and no reporting in the window describes McMillan's alignment or usage at all. That is an open question, not an absence of production.
The thread, for anyone new to it: our June preview argued McMillan's ceiling is gated by Bryce Young's accuracy, and our last episode logged the good version — two red-zone touchdowns on Young throws at the Jacksonville joint practice. The mechanism still holds; the week just supplied the other side of it, one rough charted session behind a patchwork line. Same read, opposite evidence. We'll check back as Week One comes into focus.
_Data via nflverse._
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