Glad this game happened. (1 Viewer)

[kizzy821]

A lack of focus can creep into teams/people, especially when things are going so smoothly for them. You do hear about it in other professions all the time when it's serious enough to hear about, it's part of what keeps your local news agencies employed. The thing is unless you're involved in those professions you're not generally going to hear about what caused that happening, just that it happened.

Yeah you hear about people losing focus, slipping up, slacking off, etc. But is it the exact same people every 10 -12 months for infinity? Probably not because they wouldn't still have a job. I think it's something unique to sports.

You can take a two week vacation from your job, not practice it at all and come back without needing to review tape of what your duties consist of. A surgeon doesn't have to cut someone open every week to stay fresh. A teacher can take a 3 month break over summer without having to go to Teacher Camp before the new year starts.

It's every single year. They underestimate their opponent. Have a wack game plan. Come out with no fire. However you want to describe it. Every single season they need a wake up call or a reminder to stay focused. That's like needing to be hit upside the head with a brick once a year to remember that it hurts. Makes no sense to me.

 

[blackadder]

I expected this game to happen either at TB where we tend to struggle or on Thanksgiving at ATL (Thursday night games tend to be weird and sloppy).

I can understand why Payton went pass-happy at the start b/c ATL had the 31st pass defense in the league and Trufant was out. And on our first drive, we stormed down the field only to stall on 3rd and goal because AK tripped and fell on his route. But by the 2nd half, he should've had the same epiphany he had vs. JAX and realized pass-pass-pass wasn't working and we needed to create balance. And it was 13-9 at the end of the 3Q so you can't pull the "oh we were so far behind we couldn't afford to run the ball" argument.

Historically, even the best Payton/Brees teams have laid eggs of varying sizes against bad teams (2006 vs. WAS, 2009 vs. TB, 2011 vs. the Rams, 2017 vs. TB, 2018 vs. TB). Hopefully, this is just one of those games and it's reasonable to think we'll recover and win the division. But I think many of us will be at least a little uneasy until we see the team get another W.

Belichek almost never lays eggs. The eggs come in part from doubling down on bad game plans.

 

[Drew Beers]

Rationalizing is fun. No one is glad this game happened.

My man

 

[Saintslfc13]

Yeah you hear about people losing focus, slipping up, slacking off, etc. But is it the exact same people every 10 -12 months for infinity? Probably not because they wouldn't still have a job. I think it's something unique to sports.

You can take a two week vacation from your job, not practice it at all and come back without needing to review tape of what your duties consist of. A surgeon doesn't have to cut someone open every week to stay fresh. A teacher can take a 3 month break over summer without having to go to Teacher Camp before the new year starts.

It's every single year. They underestimate their opponent. Have a wack game plan. Come out with no fire. However you want to describe it. Every single season they need a wake up call or a reminder to stay focused. That's like needing to be hit upside the head with a brick once a year to remember that it hurts. Makes no sense to me.

Again I’m not totally disagreeing with you but to counter your point. There’s only a finite number of people that are talented enough and athletic enough to play professional sports. In the NFL specifically when you factor in salary cap implications. Teams gotta put up with things like that.

 

[Winter]

Rationalizing is fun. No one is glad this game happened.

Of course I'm not whole-heartedly glad this game turned out the way it did. You are right, none of us are. The fact that it did happen is evidence, to me, that it needed to happen. It's unfortunate. I'd like to think we've learned to not need these types of games. Maybe it's inevitable. Either way, I'm glad this game happened now, at this point in the season. I remain confident in this team and don't see the end of the world like many others are today.

 

[FGE413]

Interesting trivia from last year: the Pats' 5 losses were all to non-playoff teams, including a blowout loss to TEN and a 16 point loss to DET.

Belichek almost never lays eggs. The eggs come in part from doubling down on bad game plans.

 

[birdog]

Beating the Saints is very simple, actually.....

STOP the run, and push the LOS into Brees's face!

Success always follows...

 

[Super]

Beating the Saints is very simple, actually.....

STOP the run, and push the LOS into Brees's face!

Success always follows...

Pretty much works with all teams.

 

[wayne5w]

Beating the Saints is very simple, actually.....

STOP the run, and push the LOS into Brees's face!

Success always follows...

Did you se Seahags/Whiners last night? That's exactly what the Seahags did.

 

[birdog]

Pretty much works with all teams.

..especially with the Saints...

 

[BarBar]

If they still look like crap this weekend I will be very concerned. For now, I am not. That was an entire team breaking down and losing focus. I think they took a couple weeks off and assumed they would easily beat the Falcons without putting in the work of a normal week. I think they won't make that mistake again.