Alvin Kamara is a better back going North/South than East/West (1 Viewer)

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He has the speed to hit edges when needed and thats great but Payton needs to use Alvin more conventionally and get Alvin to the 2nd level of the defense and let Alvin make his one step cuts at that point. Too much speed in the NFL to be going side to side all the damn time. There should be no run play difference of calling when either AK or Latavius is in the game. If Alvin is too brittle to take the conventional pounding of a RB, then Latavius needs to be the workhorse and then you bring in doses of Kamara post Murray pounding the rock.
 
Nobody looks good playing against a stacked line.

I'm liking the way Kamara looks. He appears recovered and has that spring back in his step. I just haven't seen him shrug the tackler off the dead leg the way we used to see.
 
Nobody looks good playing against a stacked line.

I'm liking the way Kamara looks. He appears recovered and has that spring back in his step. I just haven't seen him shrug the tackler off the dead leg the way we used to see.

Bingo.

Stacked line plus Tampa playing ultra-aggressive since they didn’t respect our deep passing game (Just like Minnesota last year). I’d expect us to take some shots moving forward because we need to soften up the fronts we’re facing or it will be tough sledding all year.
 
We HAVE to start spreading the ball around more effectively to see Kamara become the huge yardage player you're looking for. Keep in mind he had 3 TD's Sunday (the 3rd was still a td despite the crappy officials). Hard to argue that he wasn't a factor.
 
Kamara looks great. Nothing above means differently. I want to use kamara as efficiently as possible. Kamara's speed hitting holes going north is our biggest asset imo. Use speed to hit the holes and vision his cuts to adjust in the 2nd level. I just see us going to a different style of running when Murray comes in and i don't think it should be that different of a style going from AK to Murray.
 
Kamara looks great. Nothing above means differently. I want to use kamara as efficiently as possible. Kamara's speed hitting holes going north is our biggest asset imo. Use speed to hit the holes and vision his cuts to adjust in the 2nd level. I just see us going to a different style of running when Murray comes in and i don't think it should be that different of a style going from AK to Murray.

Yeah, I think it’s more a numbers issue than a north/south vs East/west issue. The way Minnesota played us last year and Tampa played us on Sunday, running East/west becomes 2nd and 12 whereas running north/south becomes 2nd and 9, lol. Not to mention, Easton isn’t going to get out quickly enough on those wide running plays, which is why we drafted Ruiz.

Kamara is great. But Walter Payton couldn’t run against the numbers he’s facing right now in close proximity. The offense has to change and Brees/Payton need to be willing to go downfield.
 
We HAVE to start spreading the ball around more effectively to see Kamara become the huge yardage player you're looking for. Keep in mind he had 3 TD's Sunday (the 3rd was still a td despite the crappy officials). Hard to argue that he wasn't a factor.
We need to get back to spreading the ball around period. Everybody seems to think when we were at our best we were just chunking the ball downfield every other play. We were at our best when the D was scared of our RBs. Those 8 or 9 minute scoring drives were killers. Imagine how good those teams would have been with strong defense.

Well we've got that now. This team should be able to beat anybody even without Michael Thomas. I don't understand why Payton doesn't use Murray more. I think if he and Kamara were splitting the duty more evenly that our running game would be more effective and it would loosen things up for our WRs and tight ends.

But I don't anything.
 
We need to get back to spreading the ball around period. Everybody seems to think when we were at our best we were just chunking the ball downfield every other play. We were at our best when the D was scared of our RBs. Those 8 or 9 minute scoring drives were killers. Imagine how good those teams would have been with strong defense.

Well we've got that now. This team should be able to beat anybody even without Michael Thomas. I don't understand why Payton doesn't use Murray more. I think if he and Kamara were splitting the duty more evenly that our running game would be more effective and it would loosen things up for our WRs and tight ends.

But I don't anything.

Sean got to a more balanced attack at RB in the 1st game of the season, but we weren't spreading the ball around much at all in the beginning, then started getting there more and more.

Murray had 15 carries against the bucs and Kamara had 12. That's really what we need to see every game.
That was an extremely stout run defense, so getting what we got was actually pretty impressive. We have to make other players a factor though. Teams will always bracket Thomas and key in on Kamara, we need to make them guess.

Some of that, unfortunately is being able to take the top off the defense from time to time and make them defend the whole field.
 
By the middle of the 2nd quarter, the Bucs had realized something in the Saints offensive formation that was queuing them of a quick outside pitch or screen to Kamara, even Taysom Hill once. I've rewatched the game 4 times now. After mid 2nd quarter, Brees would pitch and there were 3-4 Bucs quickly penetrating our backfield blocking all angles of escape. The Bucs knew when this play was coming and they defended it perfectly. The Bucs also have the defensive speed and physicality to implement this. Not all teams do. But they knew when we were running these plays and they stopped them, usually for a loss.
 
There are 3 parts to this

#1 Alvin has always looked better when facing light boxes ie 6man boxes on Nickel downs. Ingram dealt with the heavier boxes and was the better runner so until the Saints can get back to forcing those #'s he'll likely see a decrease in his ypc

#2 With respects to a 3-4 defense you attack the edges in gameplanning. You don't rush into the teeth of a 3-4 which is right up the middle. Granted TB does have speed at the LB position it still doesn't negate that it's simply how you attack that style of D because if you do capture the edge it can turn into a big run.

#3 Alvin is much better as an outside zone runner that can pick his spot ie continue with the flow or stick his foot in the ground and get into one of the inside gaps.


With all that being said Alvin's explosiveness is def back. On that final TD that was called back the way he slow played David and then burst around the corner was vintage Kamara. That burst was simply not there last year.
 
There are 3 parts to this

#1 Alvin has always looked better when facing light boxes ie 6man boxes on Nickel downs. Ingram dealt with the heavier boxes and was the better runner so until the Saints can get back to forcing those #'s he'll likely see a decrease in his ypc
Interesting take, do you have some numbers to illustrate this? I've not seen charting vs men in the box that backs this up.

I do know that for their Saints careers, Kamara (58%) is actually well above the team average (53%) and Ingram's average rushing success (52%) in first downs, which is typically where you don't see nickel defense (broad generalisation but it suits the comparison of their relative performance). NFL average was just 47%.

Anecdotally I've not seen Kamara do better or worse than the typical back versus a stacked box. Hence why I'd like to see the numbers.

#2 With respects to a 3-4 defense you attack the edges in gameplanning. You don't rush into the teeth of a 3-4 which is right up the middle. Granted TB does have speed at the LB position it still doesn't negate that it's simply how you attack that style of D because if you do capture the edge it can turn into a big run.

Inside zone (which the Saints run predominantly rather than OZ) versus a 3-4 typically matches up really, really well. That's not a play looking to hit the edge.

Of course, generalisation again (by both of us).

#3 Alvin is much better as an outside zone runner that can pick his spot ie continue with the flow or stick his foot in the ground and get into one of the inside gaps.

I think you've just described almost any zone run, inside or outside. And I've seen a lot more IZ than OZ from the Saints over the past several years.

Again this could be anecdotal, but the numbers I do have show greater rushing success behind the centre (a typical IZ cut back) than any other gap, plus Kamara's greatest number of explosive plays consistently come between the tackles (usually to the offense's right).
With all that being said Alvin's explosiveness is def back. On that final TD that was called back the way he slow played David and then burst around the corner was vintage Kamara. That burst was simply not there last year.

Agree with this, very pleased after how hard TB defended the run vs AK and LD's performance throughout.
 
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There are 3 parts to this

#1 Alvin has always looked better when facing light boxes ie 6man boxes on Nickel downs. Ingram dealt with the heavier boxes and was the better runner so until the Saints can get back to forcing those #'s he'll likely see a decrease in his ypc

#2 With respects to a 3-4 defense you attack the edges in gameplanning. You don't rush into the teeth of a 3-4 which is right up the middle. Granted TB does have speed at the LB position it still doesn't negate that it's simply how you attack that style of D because if you do capture the edge it can turn into a big run.

#3 Alvin is much better as an outside zone runner that can pick his spot ie continue with the flow or stick his foot in the ground and get into one of the inside gaps.


With all that being said Alvin's explosiveness is def back. On that final TD that was called back the way he slow played David and then burst around the corner was vintage Kamara. That burst was simply not there last year.

I hope we get back to running the outside zone with him more this year out of singleback formations. He absolutely thrived in those runs his rookie year.
 
I want to see Brees complete the basic easy throws like he always does and be near 70%. I want the o-line to not let 2+ defenders free into the backfield. After I see that, if we still have problems, we can nitpick further.
 

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