SPARTANBURG, S.C. _ Mentoring is a tricky balance: You teach, advise, encourage, and eventually you get out of the way.
That is kind of what this Carolina Panthers training camp is about for linebacker Shaq Thompson. His mentor, Thomas Davis, is now a Los Angeles Charger. That leaves Thompson, entering his fifth NFL season, without a daily guide to his craft. But it also provides Thompson an unencumbered path to whatever he can be for the Panthers.
Thompson can no longer huddle with Davis at practice or in the locker room. That is not the same as being abandoned.
"I'm going to miss T.D. That's my guy since I got here," Thompson said after moving into the dorms at Wofford College on Wednesday. "I still talk to him, still get pointers from him.
"He's always going to be in my heart; he's my brother. But it's business and you have to move on from it. T.D. knows _ and we all know _ he will be missed."
