SAN FRANCISCO — It was not all that long ago Jon Beason was the face of the Panthers’ defense, the hard-charging, ball-seeking middle linebacker who never, ever missed a game or, it seemed, a tackle.
From 2007 through the 2010 season, when you thought of the Panthers, you thought of Beason, a leader on the field and a wonderful representative off it.
He was there before Ron Rivera was a head coach, before Cam Newton was an MVP-favorite quarterback, before Luke Kuechly was an all-everything linebacker.