Column: Ryan Kalil modestly does his job of helping the Carolina Panthers stay unbeaten

He’s not as recognizable as Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton, linebacker Luke Kuechly, or Coach Ron Rivera.

Ryan Kalil can walk around Charlotte in relative anonymity.

“For the most part I just look like a large man with a beard,” said Kalil, a Pro Bowl center who’s in his ninth season with the team. “I like to keep it that way.”

That quiet life is just fine by Kalil, a father of three and the only remaining active player from USC’s 2007 draft class. He and his college sweetheart, Natalie, have carved out a life that’s on one hand fantastically comfortable and, for Ryan, creakingly uncomfortable.

“You’re reminded of how violent this game is when you wake up on Monday and feel like you’ve been in a car wreck,” said Kalil, 30. “Especially when you get older, you just feel so terrible, and it really takes the entire week just to get back to some kind of normalness.”

No such luxury this week. The Panthers put their unblemished record to the test Thursday at Dallas, where the Cowboys are reinvigorated by the return of quarterback Tony Romo. Most of Kalil’s family will be in Texas for the game, all but his younger brother, Matt, the left tackle for the Minnesota Vikings, who are playing Atlanta on Sunday.

Even though the Cowboys had lost seven in a row before beating Miami on Sunday in Romo’s return, and the Panthers have won 14 consecutive regular-season games dating to last season, Las Vegas oddsmakers made Carolina a two-point underdog to begin the week.

“It’s a little disrespectful, I guess,” Rivera told reporters. “But apparently they know something we don’t.”

Actually, it fits the Panthers’ narrative perfectly. They are the afterthought, the franchise everyone has overlooked, especially since star receiver Kelvin Benjamin went down in training camp to a season-ending knee injury.

In a sense, the Panthers are like Kalil — big guys, many of them with beards, who are frequently overlooked, yet do their jobs exceedingly well. They are the NFC’s only undefeated team, with 10-0 New England their counterpart in the AFC.

Although Newton is among the league’s most recognizable players, and thrives in the spotlight, Carolina is not a team loaded with household names. There are certainly some — Kuechly is on track for another defensive player-of-the-year award; cornerback Josh Norman is a skyrocketing star — but there is a distinct lunch-pail feel to this franchise.

“Our team is built on guys like Ryan,” said tight end Greg Olsen, who leads the Panthers with 48 receptions and six touchdowns. “It’s built on really talented players that you may not have heard of. But just because you may not recognize them, they’re some of the most elite players in the entire league. We’re built on guys who are about the team, not the accolades, the recognition, the articles, the rankings, or any of that.”

In keeping with that ethos, the team’s motto this season is “Keep Pounding,” a mantra that honors late Carolina linebacker and assistant coach Sam Mills, who famously used that phrase in a motivational speech to the team before a playoff game against Dallas during the 2003 season.

“We’re really focused on what we do, we really believe in our approach,” Olsen said. “We believe that even in tough times, we’re going to find our way through it.”

Never was that more evident than in Week 6 game at Seattle, when the Panthers overcame a nine-point deficit with two 80-yard touchdown drives late in the fourth quarter. With 32 seconds left, Newton found Olsen with a 26-yard touchdown pass — taking advantage of a communications breakdown in the Seahawks’ “Legion of Boom” secondary — and the Panthers came away with a 27-23 victory.

For the football world it was validation that the Panthers were real, an accomplishment far more weighty than Carolina’s first four victories over Jacksonville, Houston, New Orleans (with Luke McCown at quarterback instead of Drew Brees), and Tampa Bay.

The buzz started to build around Newton as a most-valuable-player candidate, talk that has gathered steam by the week during the last five games.

Sunday, Newton threw five touchdown passes in a 44-16 rout of Washington, all coming inside the Redskins’ 20-yard line. That brought his season total to 15 scoring passes without an interception in the red zone.

Newton has always used his ability to run, but he does so selectively rather than constantly tucking the ball and heading upfield. Of his 86 carries for 382 yards, 39.5% of them have been for first downs or touchdowns. To put that in perspective, Newton has made first downs on an NFL-best 40.9% of his runs since entering the league in 2011; the next-closest player in that category is Kansas City running back Jamaal Charles at 25.0%.

“From the outside looking in, people want to associate Cam with that stereotypical running-style quarterback,” Kalil said. “The reason is because most of his big highlights when he’s running and flipping and doing all that kind of stuff are the plays people see on ESPN over and over again.

“But if you really look at his plays over the course of his career, he’s predominantly been a passing quarterback. He’s been incredibly good. … He wants to be that traditional passing quarterback, and fortunately for him he’s so athletic that he can extend a play if something breaks down.”

And Kalil has been there throughout, pushing open holes, fending off pass rushers, and being both a participant and witness to history — even though a lot of the action is happening when his back is turned.

sam.farmer@latimes.com

Twitter: @LATimesfarmer