My exclusive interview with Ryan Lochte on why he moved to Charlotte

Ryan Lochte (left) and coach David Marsh pose for a picture after Lochte completed his first official swim workout in Charlotte Monday morning. Lochte, who has already won 11 Olympic medals, then gave me an exclusive interview about why the international swimming superstar was moving to Charlotte.

Ryan Lochte granted an exclusive interview with The Charlotte Observer Monday, which was his first interview since he moved to Charlotte last week.

I talked with Lochte one-on-one after his first practice under SwimMAC coach David Marsh at Queens University's sparkling new pool at the Levine Center. The plan is for Lochte to live in Charlotte for much of the next three years, training under Marsh and alongside his best friend, former N.C. State swimmer Cullen Jones, as they prepare for a run at the 2016 Olympics in Brazil. (Lochte will also maintain a residence in Florida, which is where he grew up and went to school. If you'd rather just see the photos, here is a slideshow by The Observer's Jeff Siner of Lochte's first practice).

Lochte, 29, is generally considered the best male swimmer in the world, and so this is a coup for Charlotte, SwimMAC Carolina and Marsh. An 11-time Olympic medalist, Lochte had based his training at the University of Florida under coach Gregg Troy for more than a decade.

"I was at a college town, at the University of Florida for so long," Lochte said Monday. "I love that place to death but I'm getting to a point in my life where I'm getting older and it's time for a change."

Lochte is also something of a sex symbol, and every time he has swum at Charlotte's UltraSwim meet over the past several years he has been greeted with screams from teenaged girls who sound like they are at a One Direction concert. He is so popular that he has more than a million Twitter followers, has come up with his own catchphrase ("Jeah"), dabbles in fashion design, enjoys a good party and starred in a reality TV show based on his life earlier this year (although it was not well reviewed and was short-lived).

Lochte said a number of things drew him to train in Charlotte -- not just Marsh and fellow Olympic gold medalist Jones, who calls Lochte "the best athlete in the world when it comes to swimming."

Said Lochte: "They host the UltraSwim here and I've been coming to this meet for eight, nine years straight, and I mean I love this city. I wanted to move to a city, but I didn't want to go to like to L.A. or New York where it was really big and just chaos. This is perfect.... And my best friend, Cullen Jones, he's here. I love it."

Lochte also said he will live alone for the first time in his life in Charlotte. He has gotten a place in the same complex where Jones lives, but just down the hall so he can have his own space, he said.

Marsh is known for his unique training methods, which emphasize quality of work over quantity and include a number of innovative approaches to dry-land training as well. Marsh did not actively recruit Lochte to come to Charlotte -- although Jones certainly did, the swimmer said -- but the coach was very happy to see Lochte dive into the Queens University pool for Lochte's first workout with SwimMAC's Team Elite Monday morning.

"It's almost like back when I was a graduate assistant at Auburn and Bo Jackson was running," Marsh said. "You'd hand him the ball in a game and everybody in the stadium would hold his breath. Ryan dove in the water today and the way he moves through the water, it is very special. He has a relationship with the water I'm not sure even he understands."

Lochte said he would not be training in other places (Australia had been rumored) and was committed to staying in Charlotte through the 2016 Olympics (although, again, he will continue to keep the Florida residence as well). He will be 32 by the time those are held. There would be only one reason why he would stop training in Charlotte earlier than that, he said.

Said Lochte: "I'll be here through 2016, unless something happens where I start doing really bad in the sport. Then I'll have to go back to where my swimming career started, back in Florida. But I don't plan on getting any slower -- 2016 is my biggest goal. I want to stick it out here and see what me and David Marsh can do."

Lochte said his usual swim practices at Florida -- where he became a worldwide force in swimming under Troy but was sometimes overshadowed by Michael Phelps -- constituted churning out thousands of yards per day. He said he wanted to become more of a sprinter under Marsh, who is known for coaching the shorter distances particularly well.

Said Lochte: "In my next swimming career, which started this morning, I want to train for some sprint events now.... I'm not done yet. I think there's a lot more I can accomplish in the sport of swimming. I want to take my swimming to a new [level], and I want to bring it here to Charlotte."

Lochte, Marsh and Jones after practice Monday. The friendship of Lochte and Jones was a big reason for Lochte's move to Charlotte, both swimmers say.

Blame the offense for this one -- Panthers get hammered in Arizona

You have to look closely, as I took this picture with an iPhone from my seat in Arizona, but this is Steve Smith's end-zone drop that set the tone for a bad day for the Panthers.

GLENDALE, Ariz. -- How many mistakes can one offense make?

The Panthers tried to answer the question Sunday as they lost, 22-6, to Arizona on Sunday. It was a contest that was ultimately defined by the way the Panthers' offense so badly mishandled the game as the team dropped to 1-3 while Cam Newton threw three interceptions and lost a fumble.

Start with the first drive, way back when Newton was as sharp as a cactus. He completed his first five passes in a row. Carolina got inside the Arizona 10, and Newton threw a sixth straight great pass -- this one to Steve Smith on a slant in the end zone.

It hit Smith in the hands -- and the 13-year veteran uncharacteristically dropped it.

So began the litany. Smith would drop the very next pass thrown to him, too. Brandon LaFell dropped a critical ball from Newton on a fourth-and-1 from the Arizona 15 that would have given Carolina a first down. Rookie Kenjon Barner dropped a pass later.

But there were offensive mistakes everywhere. The offensive line too often got blasted by the Cardinals, who had Newton uncomfortable for much of the game. Newton was wrong not to get the ball out on a third-and-5 at the Cardinals 30 -- the sack took the Panthers out of field-goal range -- but it would have been a moot point if the play had been blocked better. Same thing with the safety Newton took on another sack -- a critical two points as it allowed the Cardinals to basically put the game out of reach with a field goal with 3:38 that pushed their lead to 15-6.

Then there were Newton's two awful interceptions. One was an underthrow to Smith, which was gladly picked off by Patrick Peterson. The second came on the first play of the fourth quarter, when Newton tried to throw the same slant pass to Smith that had almost worked for a TD earlier. At that point, Carolina could have gone ahead 13-12 with a TD. But this time, Arizona linebacker Daryl Washington sniffed it out and one-handed an athletic interception before the ball got near Smith. And don't forget Newton's late fumble after yet another sack.

The Panther defense played plenty well enough to win this game, intercepting Carson Palmer three times and hurrying him much of the time. There could have been a fourth turnover, but Palmer was judged to be down before Charles Johnson ripped the ball out of his hands and scored.

Still, this one is on the offense. Arizona's point total was artificially high after being inflated by a late TD following a Newton fumble (his third turnover). If you can't score a touchdown in the NFL, you can't win. New Orleans hit the Cardinals up for 31 points a couple of weeks ago, and the Panthers can only score six?

I've seen this sort of Carolina game too often over all these years, and I'm sure you have too. It's why I picked against them in this game in the first place. Carolina has so often lost coming off a big win in a game against a mediocre opponent.

So now all those good feelings about beating the New York Giants have evaporated. Turns out everybody beats the Giants this year. The Panthers -- who led this game 6-3 at halftime and had outgained the Cardinals 259-118 at that point -- are 1-3. And all the old questions are about to resurface.

My Panther prediction and other game notes for Carolina at Arizona

.

OK, quick -- tell me the last time the Panthers were going into a game with a record above .500. You have to go back awhile -- to the playoffs following the 2008 season. The Panthers had just completed a 12-4 regular season and Arizona -- starring Kurt Warner and Larry Fitzgerald -- was coming to town for a playoff game. (The video above, by the way, contains 3 Observer writers' pick for this game).

That day went very sour, and there have been a lot of sour ones since. The Panthers have not been better than .500, even for a week, since Jake Delhomme threw five interceptions in that playoff game and wide receiver Fitzgerald burned the Panthers repeatedly.

Fitzgerald is still around, although most of the other key players and coaches from that day are gone. Now the Panthers (1-2) visit Arizona with a chance to get to .500. And since Carolina has no team on the October schedule with a winning record, the Panthers have a real chance to surpass that mark this month.

-- If the Cardinals don't help a lot on Greg Hardy crashing in from Carson Palmer's blind side, they are nuts. Hardy is coming off a three-sack game (although he has been sick this week) and the Cardinals just traded their left tackle and have stuck Bradley Sowell, a player they picked up only a month ago, into the starting lineup.

-- Arizona has an underrated defense, especially vs. the run. Did you check out Doug Martin's numbers last week? Tampa Bay's fine running back got the ball 27 times and only could gain 45 yards. DeAngelo Williams may find rough sledding vs. the Cardinals.

-- I think the Panthers will need Cam Newton to move the ball through the air to win. Mike Glennon threw 42 times last week in Tampa's 13-10 loss to Arizona and didn't complete a single pass over 20 yards. Newton will have to do a lot better than that, and should given his predisposition the past two games for throwing the deep ball to Ted Ginn Jr.

-- With the Panthers relatively healthy, rested and coming off the most lopsided victory in their team's history -- a 38-0 win over the New York Giants -- this game would seem to set up for a Carolina victory. But after watching the Panthers since 1995, I have seen this sort of game disintegrate too many times. I have picked them to win all three times this season and missed twice -- so I'm 1-2 picking them in 2013. here comes my first anti-Panther pick of the season. Arizona 23, Carolina 20. Watch the video above, however, to see that Panther beat writers Joseph Person and Jonathan Jones both disagree with me -- they are picking the Panthers to win.

Beason traded for a pennies on the dollar price

This picture, during happier times, came during a Charlotte Observer photo shoot in Jon Beason's heyday for Carolina.

Jon Beason -- traded for a late-round draft choice?! Shipped out for a pennies on the dollar price?!

It has happened, the Panthers have confirmed -- Beason will go to the New York Giants for a late-round draft choice (what year and what draft choice has not been announced). The linebacker and former first-round draft choice (2007) has passed his physical, though, and is with the Giants.

This would have seemed inconceivable a little more than two years ago. In 2011, Beason was a cornerstone of the Panthers -- a three-time Pro Bowler already. He was Luke Kuechly before Luke Kuechly. Few blinked when general manager Marty Hurney signed him to a five-year, $51.5-million contract extension.

But now.... the sad truth is that the Panthers have been better on defense the past two years when Beason is not playing. Once Kuechly switched to middle linebacker early in the 2012 season following Beason's latest injury, they got better. Once Chase Blackburn was inserted into the starting lineup against the New York Giants in the Panthers' third game and Beason benched, the Panthers got way better, shutting out the Giants, 38-0.

Ironically, it is the 0-4 Giants who then wanted Beason, and the Panthers who were so ready to part ways with him that they will take what would have seemed like a completely lowball offer not that long ago. Not anymore, though -- that GM Dave Gettleman got anything for Beason is a bit of a surprise. Coach Ron Rivera confirmed the trade Friday afternoon, saying Beason talked to him Thursday and said he wanted to be a starter. Gettleman has yet to speak to the media about it.

In the first two games of 2013, Beason was a shadow of his former self, especially in pass coverage. He struggled to find his old speed. He missed tackles.

A torn Achilles in 2011 and knee and shoulder issues in 2012 had limited him to just five games in the 2011 and 2012 seasons, and it was obvious that the knee in particular still gave Beason problems. The shoulder didn't bother him anymore -- he did make a few good stops filling holes in run defense -- but a linebacker without the ability to run is a compromised linebacker. Beason still wanted to start and wasn't happy at all that he got only one snap against the Giants, but it was hard to see the Panthers doing it any differently at that point.

As Beason, 28, told a group of us reporters in August: “The wings are never an issue. It’s the wheels that get you.”

The deal will give Carolina some salary-cap relief, but not that much given that Beason's contract (newly restructured -- he had taken a substantial pay cut already) was going to void after the 2013 season anyway. Beason had been marginalized already -- no longer a team captain and turned into a parttime player.

I will miss No.52 -- always a standup guy in the locker room.

But I also understand why Carolina traded him. He no longer was doing the team much good on the field. In a bottom-line business, Beason -- really through no fault of his own, except that his body let him down -- no longer was producing. I imagine he understands this move, too. Good luck to him in New York.

More on Ryan Lochte moving to Charlotte

Ryan Lochte in the pink briefs he sported for much of the 2013 UltraSwim meet in Charlotte in May. Lochte's swim cap read "Jeah," his own personal catchphrase.

International swimming superstar Ryan Lochte is just about to land in Charlotte for his training, as I reported in Thursday's Charlotte Observer. The picture above, taken in May in Charlotte by our excellent photographer Jeff Siner as Lochte prepared for one of his events in the UltraSwim, gives a hint as to why Lochte is popular in particular with the ladies and has more than a million followers on Twitter.

In particular, Lochte attracts the teenaged girl set. If you can imagine the screams from a "One Direction" concert reverberating inside a swimming venue, that's the way it is every time Lochte approaches the starting blocks.

Nevertheless, he will have a lot less attention in Charlotte than he did in Gainesville, Fla., where he has kept his home base for the past decade or so. It is hard for Lochte to go anywhere in Gainesville without attracting a mob. Once Lochte starts training in Charlotte -- and he will mostly be in the gorgeous new pool at Queens -- and the initial excitement about his move dies down, this will be all about whether Lochte can get his body ready for one more run at the Olympics. The tweets from people who have already seen him on Queens campus, checking out the facilities, will seem a little less breathless after awhile (maybe).

Lochte has 11 Olympic medals already (five of them gold). At 29, he is older than Michael Phelps, but Phelps has already retired (at least for now) and Lochte is gunning for the 2016 Olympics in Rio.

Lochte also dabbles in fashion design, partying, catchphrases and reality shows. He had a short-lived reality show earlier this year based on his life (it drew disappointing ratings) and called "What Would Ryan Lochte Do?"

It turns out he would move to Charlotte, where his very close friend Cullen Jones resides. Although at one point Lochte sounded like he was going to dabble in training in a lot of different places, including Australia, now it sounds more like Charlotte will be a semi-permanent base for him.

Jones and head SwimMAC coach David Marsh haven't spoken about Lochte's imminent decision, but it's clear both have to be enormous factors in this move. Marsh is an internationally recognized coach whose innovative training methods and signature style -- quality of work over quantity -- has to appeal to Lochte at this stage in his career. Marsh trains an elite group of swimmers whose latest incarnation could even surpass the 2012 roster, which placed five swimmers into the London Olympics. Jones has made the Olympics in both 2008 and '12 working under Marsh.

Lochte ponders a reporter's question at the UltraSwim in Charlotte in May 2013.

Cop with fumble fingers drops two home run balls from same batter in same game

Bucky Goodale (above) is a Mooresville police officer and has been for seven years. He's also a big Atlanta Braves fan, a former outfielder for Pfeiffer and a man whose family was so deeply immersed in baseball that he was named for former New York Yankee Bucky Dent.

On Aug.17th, he had a chance to catch two Jason Heyward home run balls in Atlanta -- in the very same game! -- and dropped both, breaking two ribs in the process. Luckily, he has a sense of humor about it all. Watch the video above and/or read this column for more details. This YouTube video also shows some of the original fumbles courtesy of Fox Sports South.

70 years ago, a baseball milestone for Shelby and McKee

As the baseball playoffs gear up, pause with me for a moment to remember one of the most unusual stories among local baseball players that this area has ever seen.

Roger McKee was just 17 years old in 1943 and hadn't been out of Shelby High long when he started for the first and only time of his major-league career for the Philadelphia Phillies.

It was Oct.3, 1943 -- 70 years ago, in the middle of World War II. McKee pitched a complete game in an 11-3 Phillies victory over Pittsburgh. McKee scattered five hits in a game that only took an hour and 48 minutes. Here's the boxscore.

With that win, McKee became the youngest pitcher to ever win a game in major-league baseball’s post-1900 “modern era,” eclipsing Bob Feller and many others by winning his first game at the age of 17 years and 17 days. The fact that McKee’s father, a textile mill worker from Shelby, named him for baseball hall of famer Rogers Hornsby adds to the tale. (Most people drop the "s" and just call him Roger now).

McKee would throw his arm out the next year during an unseasonably cold spring training in Delaware. He would never start another game in the big leagues. His fifth and final major-league appearance came on his 18th birthday -- he ended his major-league pitching career with a 1-0 record and 5.87 ERA. Also a good hitter, he bounced around the minors for another 13 years (including one stint with the old Charlotte Hornets baseball team) as a first baseman and outfielder.

After that, McKee returned home to Shelby. He and his wife Denice have now been married 68 years. For 30 of those years, he worked as a postal carrier for the U.S. Postal Service. McKee is now 87 years old and, although he doesn't get around well, enjoys reading and watching sports on TV.

One other note: when McKee pitched and won his lone major-league start 70 years ago, he was a six-foot lefthander who "barely cast a shadow," as he tells it. His weight? It was 130 pounds.

Photo: Shelby's Roger McKee as he looked 70 years ago while pitching for the Philadelphia Phillies.