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CHARLOTTE — Playing for the Carolina Panthers is a job and no longer an adventure. And as anyone in this distressed workforce knows, it's not a bad time to polish up your resume.

Privately, every player on the team understands that the roster is likely to look a lot different next summer than it will Sunday night when Carolina hosts the Minnesota Vikings. And they also know that this game will be the most important job fair of the year for them. Every prospective employer in the National Football League will be watching.

With that in mind, no one from the head coach down is thinking beyond Sunday night at 8:20, when "Football Night in America" showcases the Panthers vs. Brett Favre.

"We're not done," coach John Fox said after practice Wednesday. "We'll save all the evaluations. We kind of are where we are."

The Panthers are 5-8, technically not eliminated but clinging to math more than football when it comes to their postseason chances. That means different things to different people. For some, it's an opportunity for a personal showcase. With the injuries continuing, Carolina will once again alter its lineup this week after 13 different starting defensive lineups in 13 weeks and now a fourth straight week of offensive changes.

Geoff Schwartz, who was inserted into the New England game last week when right tackle Jeff Otah was injured, now finds himself an NFL starter for the first time in his brief career.

"Any opportunity you get in this league, you have to take advantage of it no matter when it comes," Schwartz said. "You have to be ready for it, and I think I am."

The final four games of the regular season have loomed since the league schedules were released last spring. No one could've predicted what all Carolina has been through with injuries that began in the first minutes of training camp when run-stopping tackle Maake Kemoeatu was lost for the season with a torn right Achilles' tendon. He predicted Wednesday, however, that he and everyone else would be back at 100 percent by training camp.

But Kemoeatu and his teammates know not everyone will be back. That might even be true of Fox, who said he was too busy getting his depleted roster ready for Minnesota to worry about anything else.

"There's not much you can do about it other than work with the guys you have to get better," he said. "Right now, that's our focus, trying to do the best we can in the matchup with the Minnesota Vikings. Anything that has to be done down the road or in the offseason, that's for a later date."

Jeff King stood in the locker room afterward as the players filed in and out of the showers and the training room, some limping around Kemoeatu, who was pushing himself around on a cart designed to keep weight off his injured right leg. He said the reality of the moment is Sunday's game will be seen by everyone in the league, and each player understands the unspoken meaning of that. King is one of the few who will gladly speak his mind.

"Any time you get a chance to start in this league you have a chance to put yourself on tape," the Carolina tight end said. "That's your resume. Every game is on tape, and that tape isn't locked in a vault and nobody ever sees it. That's your reputation. That's what's in the back of my mind every week, not only for myself and my teammates. Somebody out there is watching. When the time comes, hopefully what you put out is important to yourself and the Panthers and other people around the league."

It's a brutal business, and Carolina is getting the brunt of the brutality this year. Fox has tried to joke about it and stay even tempered throughout the season, but he knew all along the final four weeks of the year had the potential to be crushing. What started last week against New England, the Panthers' third loss in four weeks, continues Sunday night against 11-2 Minnesota. Carolina will then end the season at the New York Giants and at home against the New Orleans Saints, who are 13-0 right now.

With the injuries mounting and players playing themselves into and out of the Panthers' plans, each game from here out will be a season in and of itself. And nobody's feeling sorry for Carolina now any more than they did two years ago when the same thing happened.

The team survived 2007 and somehow stayed intact. That probably won't happen this time.

"For whatever reason, every other year it seems we get whacked," Fox said. "This has been one of those years. Nobody comes to rescue you. Nobody wants to hear about it. You just have to plug in the next guy and keep swinging the sword."

The sword keeps swinging in Carolina, and the job becomes more hazardous with each passing week.

Contact Ed Hardin at 373-7069 or ed.hardin@news-record.com