I am impressed... (1 Viewer)

ASaintFerLife

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I, along with many of you I am sure was worried about how things would shake out now about to start the regular season. We had a few good players injured and seemingly lacking depth in a few key areas.

I must say that in the last week many of those worries have been alleviated. We signed Brees to what seems like a very team friendly contract. We signed Evans who might can provide us with 1 or 2 more years as a top option for our line. As it stands, I see us right now having a formidable front line for offense & defense.

With Rankins going down that left a big gap at DE, we filled that spot with a quality player, Paul Kruger, who I think still has gas left in the tank and will make big plays for us.

It seems to me, and based off what I have read about Dennis Allen defensive style, that our defensive line is key to what he Really wants to do, and that is to play multiple safeties on the field to create chaos.

You cant play that style or look without your front 4 keeping a lid on the run game whilst possessing a decent pass rush.

IF we can make that work, I can see us play in many nickle formations, we have the run stopping ability, pass rush, and now we have safeties playing the line or stacking behind the outside receivers.

In my mind this can create a very hard defense to play against and to game plan against.

For me, my excitement level has jumped tenfold, I really wish we had another week to get a good chance to see how our new players come together, but as we all know, a trial by fire is what we will have.

Best of luck Saints.
 
Good post!

They really did the best they could to lay a solid foundation of youngsters and vets at key positions with what little space they had.

I think the plan all along was for this year to lay the foundation and set the tone for what will be a championship run next season.

We've done a lot of work to create a lot of cap room next offseason while still keeping our core guys and adding some much needed vet presence.

I expect us to have a winning record this year and carry that into next season where we light the league on fire after some key free agent signings.

I think of this year as 2008 which may or may not yield better results, and next offseason being similar to the 2009 offseason.

Acquiring guys like Fleener, Fairley and Laurinaitis this year will be huge payoffs for us. It's very similar to the Shockey/Vilma/Hargrove signings in 08-09.

My post pre-season prediction is 10-6 this year. I think we will overachieve for what we have on the roster and I think we will re-create the winning atmosphere that has been missing and carry it into next year.
 
Even before the Brees deal, I loved the offseason.

Signing low cost, high reward FAs like Fairley, JL, and Kruger is so much preferable to throwing money at guys like Browner.
 
This team is made up of players and coaches that know they have a lot to prove, this will be their motivation this season. Having said that, I love this offseason and the make up of this team.
 
Even before the Brees deal, I loved the offseason.

Signing low cost, high reward FAs like Fairley, JL, and Kruger is so much preferable to throwing money at guys like Browner.

See I even forgot about Kruger!

Loomis did some work this offseason.
 
I too have been very encouraged by the offseason. Generally speaking, I believe the Saints made a number of good, solid changes to the team, including quality FA and draft picks.

Having said that, I am tempering my excitement until we saw how this starts to plays out. Start out 0-2 or 1-3 again and people won't care about many of those moves. Can't blame them. Look at how quickly things turned for LSU within one week.

I would've liked to have seen the Saints play better in the preseason however, I also remember going into week 1 of the 2006 season in Cleveland with similar thoughts and being very pleasantly surprised at how good of a team we had.

I am 100% certain that our defense is vastly improved this year over the previous two years. No idea what that will actually mean in terms of wins and losses but even if it's middle-of-the-road, that may be good enough for Brees and Co to win enough games for the playoffs.

Having Armstead back is huge. I also think bringing Evans back may turn out to be one of the best decisions they made. Fingers crossed on the kicker.
 
I, along with many of you I am sure was worried about how things would shake out now about to start the regular season. We had a few good players injured and seemingly lacking depth in a few key areas.

I must say that in the last week many of those worries have been alleviated. We signed Brees to what seems like a very team friendly contract. We signed Evans who might can provide us with 1 or 2 more years as a top option for our line. As it stands, I see us right now having a formidable front line for offense & defense.

With Rankins going down that left a big gap at DE, we filled that spot with a quality player, Paul Kruger, who I think still has gas left in the tank and will make big plays for us.

It seems to me, and based off what I have read about Dennis Allen defensive style, that our defensive line is key to what he Really wants to do, and that is to play multiple safeties on the field to create chaos.

You cant play that style or look without your front 4 keeping a lid on the run game whilst possessing a decent pass rush.

IF we can make that work, I can see us play in many nickle formations, we have the run stopping ability, pass rush, and now we have safeties playing the line or stacking behind the outside receivers.

In my mind this can create a very hard defense to play against and to game plan against.

For me, my excitement level has jumped tenfold, I really wish we had another week to get a good chance to see how our new players come together, but as we all know, a trial by fire is what we will have.

Best of luck Saints.

I agree w almost everything you said except the part about our Oline.

I still think that's our weakest link and that our passing and running game will struggle bc of that. Kelemete, Evans, and Strief are below average compared to the rest of the league. Unger and Armstead have been great, and Peat has promise, but thete are huge question marks on the Oline.

I think we are better now on the line than we were to start the preseason, but I still see it as a weakness. Idk why so many think Evans is a good option for the next year or two either. We wouldn't have cut him and then looked at other players if we thought he'd be that good for us for the foreseeable future.
 
I agree w almost everything you said except the part about our Oline.

I still think that's our weakest link and that our passing and running game will struggle bc of that. Kelemete, Evans, and Strief are below average compared to the rest of the league. Unger and Armstead have been great, and Peat has promise, but thete are huge question marks on the Oline.

I think we are better now on the line than we were to start the preseason, but I still see it as a weakness. Idk why so many think Evans is a good option for the next year or two either. We wouldn't have cut him and then looked at other players if we thought he'd be that good for us for the foreseeable future.

If I am not mistaken Evans dealt with injury problems the last year we had him, it was his back I think. Perhaps he is fully rehabbed and can contribute.

If so, then our Oline bodes much better starting this year off.
 
I agree w almost everything you said except the part about our Oline.

I still think that's our weakest link and that our passing and running game will struggle bc of that. Kelemete, Evans, and Strief are below average compared to the rest of the league. Unger and Armstead have been great, and Peat has promise, but thete are huge question marks on the Oline.

I think we are better now on the line than we were to start the preseason, but I still see it as a weakness. Idk why so many think Evans is a good option for the next year or two either. We wouldn't have cut him and then looked at other players if we thought he'd be that good for us for the foreseeable future.

Not trying to rain on any parades here, but what have you seen out of Peat besides him being a 1st round pick? He has been moved all over the line, and it seems like they are shoehorning him into the LG position and hoping for the best.

That being said, an average Jahri Evans is a huge improvement over the 2 XFL guards that would've played RG. I kinda figured, and posted, early in the preseason that Evans would be back. I just expected it quarter to mid season. Now we just have to pray that they don't let Khalil Mack dictate the game.
 
Now we just have to pray that they don't let Khalil Mack dictate the game.


No way DA allows their best defensive player to run wild. He will be doubled, chipped, cut, hit, held, leg whipped, fish-hooked, cursed, eye gouged, and generally frustrated.
 
I agree w almost everything you said except the part about our Oline.

I still think that's our weakest link and that our passing and running game will struggle bc of that. Kelemete, Evans, and Strief are below average compared to the rest of the league. Unger and Armstead have been great, and Peat has promise, but thete are huge question marks on the Oline.

I think we are better now on the line than we were to start the preseason, but I still see it as a weakness. Idk why so many think Evans is a good option for the next year or two either. We wouldn't have cut him and then looked at other players if we thought he'd be that good for us for the foreseeable future.

They let Evans go because he was still getting paid top 5 money for his position and I believe he wasn't healthy enough to pass a physical at the time. He was re-signed at a much lower number after bouncing around a few other teams. Those teams wouldn't have even bothered signing him as a camp body if he couldn't at least still play. He might not have been able to beat out THEIR starters, but it hasn't looked like that is going to be a problem here.
 
If I am not mistaken Evans dealt with injury problems the last year we had him, it was his back I think. Perhaps he is fully rehabbed and can contribute.

If so, then our Oline bodes much better starting this year off.

You are right about the back injury last season and the season before I think he played trough a knee injury. I too am optimistic about our offense and defense going into the game this Sunday. I am impressed with the way we went after FA's this year. We brought in some solid FA's, without making a big splash.
 
Even before the Brees deal, I loved the offseason.

Signing low cost, high reward FAs like Fairley, JL, and Kruger is so much preferable to throwing money at guys like Browner.

I would include C. Robertson in that bunch of low cost/high reward signings.
 
Even before the Brees deal, I loved the offseason.

Signing low cost, high reward FAs like Fairley, JL, and Kruger is so much preferable to throwing money at guys like Browner.

Be honest, this board was overjoyed with the Browner signing last offseason. It's easy to say things about Browner now, but could very well be saying things like that about someone we signed this offeason next year. Let's just hope we won't.
 

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