CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Carolina Panthers general manager Dave Gettleman obviously is not afraid to make the tough decisions.

In the span of a year he has decided to release the team’s all-time leading receiver (Steve Smith) and rusher (DeAngelo Williams). He has opted to dump two popular players at the expense of his own popularity, not that he cares about being popular.

Gettleman is a football guy.

Panthers GM Dave Gettleman has made some unpopular decisions, but the team also has made the playoffs in consecutive seasons. Brian Spurlock/USA TODAY Sports

He’s also a businessman.

You need both to succeed in the NFL, particularly in an era when managing the salary cap is as important as evaluating talent. Gettleman has done well at both.

In two years Gettleman has taken the Panthers from $16 million over the cap to an expected $15 million under the cap heading into free agency that begins on March 10. He has had two successful drafts, particularly his second in which four of the six players selected were starting at the end of the 2014 season.

Has he rubbed a few people the wrong way? Definitely. Smith said he was “stabbed in the back’’ after being released.

Former left tackle Jordan Gross admittedly he didn’t like Gettleman much initially after being asked to restructure his contract to ultimately make 2013 his last season. But as he got to know Gettleman, he admittedly grew to like him.

Gettleman probably will make a few more enemies if the Panthers don’t re-sign defensive end Greg Hardy, and they aren’t expected to. He might tick off a few in his own locker room who have lobbied to keep Hardy since his domestic violence charges were dropped.

That Gettleman told reporters at the combine he hasn’t spoken to Hardy since the 2013 Pro Bowl selection was placed on the commissioner’s exempt list in September and has little contact with Hardy’s agent is telling.

Hardy shouldn’t be surprised by anything Gettleman does based on what he told me last year during a trip to ESPN headquarters in Bristol, Connecticut.

“When I went there as a rookie, that's all everybody told me about, that it's a real family organization because that's how Jerry Richardson runs it,’’ he said at the time. “Gettleman coming in with a money-first attitude ticked everybody off, man.

“So he kind of changed the face of the organization to 'It is a business, and once business is settled we can be a family.’]’

Again, Gettleman doesn’t make decisions to be popular. He doesn’t make decisions based on emotion or loyalty. He makes them for the long-term success of the organization. He makes them to win.

It’s hard to argue with his results.

The Panthers have made the playoffs in consecutive years since Gettleman arrived, and that's a first time in team history.

Not all of the success can be credited to Gettleman. Key players such as quarterback Cam Newton and middle linebacker Luke Kuechly were drafted by former general manager Marty Hurney.

But Gettleman has put the team in position to keep those players without mortgaging the future. He has done so by making tough decisions .

“As I’ve stated many times, all decisions I make will be in the long-term best interest of the Carolina Panthers,’’ Gettleman said last year after releasing Smith. “Decisions, either popular or unpopular, have to be made for the greater good and it is imperative to take an unemotional global view.

"... When Mr. Richardson hired me, I promised him that my goal would be to leave the Panthers in a better position than when I came. All my efforts are in that vein.’’