Our defense looks AWFUL!!!

are saving it for the Cowboys. We can always hope for another New England shut down. I wish our front line could get pressure by themselves and I wish we had faster line backers, but we got what we got. Any way I’m hoping for a better defense next week against the Cowboys.

But at least we have 5 weeks before our first playoff game. Maybe we could look for a kicker, too.

We’re playing with a banged up secondary and the secondary was a problem for the Saints last season. Porter should be back soon and I think we see how much we miss him in some of these games. The defense actually did okay but the offense nearly coughed this game up. You can talk about a missed pass interference call early in the first half that probably robbed us of six. Instead, we settled for three. The final offensive drive was a nightmare that could and should have been avoided.

What I didn’t like:
1) Hartley missed an extra point. He was money in Washington and with the rest of his kicks. That missed extra point changed the dynamics of the game, but it didn’t cost the Saints the game.
2) The fake field goal call was stupid because if failed. Sean Payton got away with the gamble because Jonathan Vilma came up big on defense again and stopped the Falcons on 4 and 2. It’s safe to say that Mark Brunell is not the QB I want in a situation like that (but you need your backup there because Brees as the holder raises an eyebrow). The catch was nearly in bound and I’ll have to watch the game film again to analyze what went wrong on the failed fourth down conversion.
3) The Saints defense had a lot of trouble putting pressure on Redman. Redman had all day to hit his receivers at times and the cornerback blitz play was heavily botched. Sharper was burned on that play and Jenkins easily scored the touchdown. We were fortunate that another pass to Jenkins earlier in the game was overthrown because the defense got burned on that play.

Here’s what I liked:
1) Reggie Bush had a great game today. He did fumble the ball, but he redeemed himself. He had two receiving touchdowns in the game and he also made other big plays. The fumble is a knock against him because that fumble was all on him. He needs to keep control of the ball when it’s handed to him. It’s good that he quickly recovered it because that could have been a disaster.
2) Jonathan Vilma won this game for the Saints. He had two huge plays on defense. One of them was an interception that helped the Saints burn more time off the clock as they attempted to put together a scoring drive. He then stuffed the run on 4 and 2 to halt the final drive by Atlanta.
3) Drew Brees had a three touchdown game.
4) Pierre Thomas looked good in the rushing game.

Jenkins is young he hasnt got the knack of covering down pat yet
Gay is exactly what i thought he was and that aint good
Charles Gratnt is fat and lazy and always out of place time to sit him and put hargrove in his place
Vilma was the only linebacker on the field today that looked like he had a clue and he was caught out of place at times
We missed tackles and Greg Williams was out coached
If we dont get better on defense undefeated doesnt mean nothing if we meet the Vikes who looked good today beating a much better bengals team

we’ll be fine.

Jabari Greer and Tracy Porter can hold their own out there all alone if we bring a blitz. Malcolm Jenkins and Randal Gay can’t. I think GW had to keep that in mind with his game planning. I’ve noticed that GW likes to bring the blitz when field position is in his favor, and if it backfires then go a little more conservative when we get backed up. Today that lead to giving up a lot of yards, but with the exception of the long TD to Jenkins it only cost us field goals. It also lead to a few decent plays on the defensive side. Their 4th quarter drive was simply a case of them picking us apart. And what happened to Darren Sharper? Even he looked bad in man coverage today. I think Charles Grant is proving he is the most overpaid player on the team.

I think the offense looked fine. We didn’t run spectacularly, but 3.6 YPC for Thomas, and 5.5 YPC for Bush isn’t too shabby. We were using the short passes to the RBs very effectively, and those are pretty much just the same as runs. Brees looked sharp as usual.

And one last thing, Troy Aikman sucks. I can’t even begin to list how wrong he was about every single thing he said today. Not even just opinion stuff, but the simple rules of football. Can Fox lure Gruden away from ESPN or something? Cause this commentary just keeps getting worse.

23 points is really not that bad. Our team tends to score a lot so it’s not unusual for our D to have to face a lot of plays. Yes, I will admit it wasn’t an awesome performance, but we won against a good team. A team that knows us and plays us tough. It was a game we were supposed to win and we did- a sign of a good team. We are missing 3 defensive starters who are very important and have several additional defensive players who are limited in practice.
It wasn’t that long ago Fujita was our defensive captain and maybe our best defensive player. We miss him.

It will all fall into place- we are 2 games up on the closest team having home field advantage throughout. That’s huge. We have a first round bye- maybe more huge. And, all our players we have been waiting on should be back within a few weeks- Porter, Greer, Fujita, Moore, Bell, etc. We have a full back (that we need) that hopefully will get familiar with our offensive system, and Anthony Waters will fit in with a few games experience. We are okay and will be better. We won a tough game on the road. Reggie looked good which is a plus- nobody wants to deal with all our weapons. Moore will be back soon. And, everyone knows we will be better with our 2 best corners back and Mc Kenzie will shine as our nickel. Gay can play nickel and dime. Jenkins too. That will be awesome and it will be soon.

Banged-up secondary, thin at OLB, I got that. But we have all the pieces in place at the D-line! All we’re missing is Kendrick Clancy, and he was losing the starting job to Ayodele when he was healthy. Charles Grant sucks. Got it. But what about Ellis? Or Smith? Or Hargrove or McCray? None of these guys played with any force the past two weeks. They’re getting run on, they’re giving five seconds to Chris-F**king-Redman. When the hell did all of this happen?! These are the same guys that have manhandled other, better QB’s all year. Even when they didn’t rack up sacks, they at least sped up the figurative clock.

Gregg Williams, god bless him, is trying to call from the same playbook he was using when he had professional cornerbacks and linebackers playing, so maybe it just doesn’t work because of the new(old) personnel, but we can’t get pressure on Atlanta’s backup QB? They were down a lineman, and another guy was coming off injury! It’s not going to get any easier! Alright, there’s still Tampa, but you get my point.

I just can’t wrap my mind around how this defense is the same group that played the Giants, or the Jets, or the Pats, or the Eagles. What really bugs me is watching this pass defense drop in rank each week, back to-or-below(!?!?!?!)- last year’s ranking. I know, it’ll all get better once the quintessential rookie and professional dime back are riding the pine, but, you know, how does the relatively healthy almost-all-1st-round-pick D-line NOT step it up to take a little pressure off the depleted units? And in fact, how do they get WORSE?! Letting 2nd and 3rd string RB’s on beaten teams run freely, and get zero sacks and allow a ridiculous, career-day inducing level of comfort to Jason “No Coach Wants Me” Campbell and Chris “I Was An Insurance Salesman Last Year, You Know” Redman?!

Ridiculous. Ricockulous. Somebody, please, for the love of god, step it up!

relax guys, we’re winning. No, it’s not pretty but look how many of our great players are injured. Despite all of the bad we still have enough Mojo left to pull out a win.. Imagine if eveyone were healthy? We be unbeatable this year. Hey, so far we are. Who Dat !!!!

“You cant win um all”, which implies it cant be done. Well, my Saints have won um all and I am amazed any way they get um.

The D-Line looks horrendous. The offense needs to play more consistent. I live here in the DC area, attended the game and left early because I was so frustrated at our “elite” team. I knew going in that Atlanta and Washington would be tough games but that is no reason for our offense to look pathetic.
On another note, what is perhaps very disturbing is the lukewarm, I’m-happy-to-get-the-win today Sean Payton. That is a change in attitude from the we-have-a lot-to-work-on Sean Payton when we were doing better earlier in the year.

We had a game that was not great. We are undefeated, we have a HUGE target on our backs, we are playing lousy teams……These are things I read, along with WOW or D is lousy…..In the end we won the game it was not pretty but we played to win and we won! Our D players are getting healthy, Porter practiced on Friday for the first time in 5 WEEKS so he will probably be a go against Tampa Bay. Jenkins will get it fixed he is a solid player all around dont count em out yet yall, lets see how he does these next few weeks. The O is on point our D is sliding ST is doing there part minus the kicker problems…….we have a 1st round BYE strategies will change……….

WHO DAT, Geaux Saints, Bless you Boys!!!

This is the NFL. These guys get paid MILLIONS of dollars to find a way to be competitive. Even the bad teams are good. You seem to not realize that. KC beat the defending World Champions. Minnesota got beat twice. The Texans only lost to the Colts by a field goal! There is a fine line betwen victory and defeat. But at the end of Sunday you either won or lost.

GW can’t blitz like he wants to because he doesn’t have Porter, Greer and Fujita. He has gone a little vanilla out of necessity. And, if you haven’t noticed, he goes vanilla on the games that are not the “Big” games. He saves some things for the teams like the Patriots and Eagles and of course Dallas. Haven’t we risen to the occasion every time we needed to? Have some faith!! Have some confidence!! Stop worrying every time our margin of victory is small. Teams gear up for us. It’s good for us. It tests us. It prepares us for the playoffs. WE have an excellent team. You can’t expect them, however, to rout every team. Other teams have entire staffs that are paid and obsessed with finding a way to not let that happen.

how much can you expect from these three guys? I think they did great everything considered. A lot of other guys are playing banged up also.

Yeah, they played loose at times, they played bad at times, BUT THEY WON. I guess most of ya’ll doomsayers just became Saints fans this year.
Hell when they went 12-4 with Mora, they had a great defense and a listless offense, now they have a GREAT offense, and decent defense, and you wanna cry like a bunch of babies. Remember when we played the “Prevent” defense, and lost alot of games we should have won, could have won, if only we had played “Prevent” offense instead.
They are winning WITH ALOT OF INJURIES and everyone becomes an expert coach.
I think they are just fine, GIVE ’EM A BREAK!!!!!!!!!!! RAZOOOO DA cowgals!!!!!!!

held Atlanta to 89 yards rushing- that’s very good.
held Tony Gonzalez, best TE of all time, to 50 yds.
kept Jenkins and White from having a field day (only 5 total catches between them)
Finneran had only 2 receptions

If I told you before the game we would have limited those 4 receivers that well and only gave up only 89 yards rushing
everyone would have said “must have been a blowout.” The defense should and will play better, but cmon give them a break. Statistically they did good. Need to replace Grant.

I was playing with my daughter while I was watching the game and I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. We were making play doh characters and each time the Falcons would score I would make a red play doh man and tell my daughter to “smash it” LOL