AP

As the Panthers wrapped up minicamp Thursday, workers next to their practice field stitched together the fabric which will soon become the roof of their practice bubble.

While the weather in Charlotte makes such a facility something less than an absolute necessity, the fact it took until their 25th season and second owner to arrive makes the bubble a symbol of the new era of the Panthers.

Things are different under owner David Tepper than they were under Jerry Richardson, and the line between wants and needs is easier to cross.

“It can be analytics, it can be just the way you’re thinking, it’s process management, it’s not being afraid to make mistakes,” Tepper said this week, via Erik Spanberg of the Charlotte Business Journal. “There was probably a culture afraid to make mistakes there [under the previous owner]. Sometimes you have to make a mistake to do great things — you can’t be afraid of making mistakes.”

Tepper paid $2.275 billion for the team just over a year ago, and while he’s stuck with the statue of Richardson, many other things are barely familiar. The Panthers just brokered a deal for a new practice facility across the state line in South Carolina, which will be part of a huge development project. Tepper’s not doing this purely for civic reasons, or he wouldn’t have worked the state for $115 million in tax breaks and a $40 million highway interchange. But he does view it as part of a larger strategy which can help his new region.

That emphasis also extends beyond facilities. The Panthers just signed six-time Pro Bowler Gerald McCoy, and while they’ve made a few aggressive forays into free agency in the past, this was a late run designed to address a specific need, and it’s easy to view it as another sign of new management.

Richardson made his money in restaurants, and ran his football team like a mom-and-pop business. Tepper has brought in a new business-side management team designed to maximize their brand — including ideas such as live-streaming a minicamp practice featuring Cam Newton‘s first visible throws after shoulder surgery, which the traditional media wasn’t allowed to show live. But Tepper also wants an MLS team (since he already paid for a stadium), and has talked about bringing more concerts and events to Bank of America Stadium.

“I think the Panthers’ culture was very rigid before, afraid to make mistakes, keep things very tight,” Tepper said. “Look, from a regional standpoint, I think the previous management would probably be happy having eight football games there a year and nothing else. The place is beautiful, by the way, but there’s people involved. You want inclusiveness [by having other events]. I think inclusiveness, openness, is probably a much bigger difference there culturally [than before].”

Of course, Tepper’s still in his honeymoon, and has a low bar to clear since Richardson sold the team in disgrace after allegations of workplace misconduct including sexual and racial harassment.

Regardless, things are different now, and all you needed to realize it was seeing McCoy walk off the field Thursday, steps away from a bubble that’s about to blow up the way Tepper hopes the team’s profile does.