Steve Young's first comments: New Orleans defense is too bad to threaten the Packers. (1 Viewer)

[Domeination]

I'd love to disagree with Young on this, but I can't. Our defense is uninspiring, to say the least. No one on the D line can get to the QB, our blitzes don't generate a lot of pressure either, and we lack playmakers on the back end. I will add that Robinson played poorly last night. He's a first round draft pick in his second season, so it's frustrating to see him playing 10 yards of the LOS and giving up inside position repeatedly, and he whiffed at least twice when he had to tackle a WR in space. Porter did a much better job of tackling. We'll make it to the playoffs and have the offense to win a first-round game, but at some point we're going to need our D to make stops against an elite offense.

 

[AceTW]

You know what....

I think there are people on this board/in this fanbase who, every year, look for reasons for this team to fail. If they can't find one, they make one up based on some ANNOUNCER'S quote or any other innocuous reason they can justify to themselves.

The only reason I can think of as to why people do this, is that if/when the Saints lose they want to be able to say to everyone, "I told you they'd lose, and you crucified me for it."


Sad.. Just sad.

 

[birdog]

I haven't read the whole tread, but the D wasn't that bad overall.....just a few components of it.

Like PRob getting molested all night long. That was bad. Then there was that blown coverage on Cruz.....resulting in a TD. That was on MJ. Up front the lack of pressure resulted in Eli throwing for over 400 yds.

The bright spot was the stopping of the Giants runnig game. That was good all night long. Is not much, but its a start.We can build on that, and try to find ways to manufacture some extra pressur with our 4 down linemen.

We don't need to play great on defense right now....just keep getting better, even if at snail's pace...

 

[Domeination]

You know what....

I think there are people on this board/in this fanbase who, every year, look for reasons for this team to fail. If they can't find one, they make one up based on some ANNOUNCER'S quote or any other innocuous reason they can justify to themselves.

The only reason I can think of as to why people do this, is that if/when the Saints lose they want to be able to say to everyone, "I told you they'd lose, and you crucified me for it."


Sad.. Just sad.

This is a stretch. Only fans who care about the team would bother enough to talk about the D's struggles. We all saw the D's problems in the last playoff game with Seattle and were hoping for significant improvement, especially after the offseason acquisitions the team made on that side of the ball. The D remains a work in progress. Many of the same posters who criticize the D have praised other aspects of the team. We have some guys on D who are playing lights out, like Greer and Dunbar, but there are issues on D that need to be corrected if we want to go deep in the playoffs. There's a reason that a football-knowledgeable guy like Young said what he said, and we ought to be able to have a rational discussion about it without the attempt to label posters who see his point as traitors who want the team to fail. That's just silly.

 

[MamaRoux]

I haven't read the whole tread, but the D wasn't that bad overall.....just a few components of it.

Like PRob getting molested all night long. That was bad. Then there was that blown coverage on Cruz.....resulting in a TD. That was on MJ. Up front the lack of pressure resulted in Eli throwing for over 400 yds.

The bright spot was the stopping of the Giants runnig game. That was good all night long. Is not much, but its a start.We can build on that, and try to find ways to manufacture some extra pressur with our 4 down linemen.

We don't need to play great on defense right now....just keep getting better, even if at snail's pace...

I disagree on the wieght of our Run Stoppiing improvement! IMHO, while we haven't gotten to the QB as we Fans would like, there has been consistent pressure AND with rushing three and four! When we did bring "heat" last night it did force poor throws! Then, the rushing "D" did VERY WELL! Unless you just replay that "Mack Truck" of an RB crushing poor Roman Harper and a few others on that one drive, I'd say Our guys have improved a great deal since the days of last year and some early games this year. The work they are putting in is reflected in that ability. It may be the cause of our Safties biting down hard at times but the results have been consistently improving though we have given up the deep pass due to this "adjustment" but not enough now to where we're in real trouble. I thought we were really hurting but Franklin and Rogers seem to be plugging that middle, everyone else strings those runs out, for the most part and our LB'ers are helping BIG TIME in shutting the doors!

All in all Folks, I'm tickled at our play, the refs hurt us last night a couple of times (which I hope evens out even more these last bunch of games) and IMHO, These SAINTS look every bit as dangerous as '09 but without the gaudy Defensive #'s! Listen there was a time we'd be slapping our Mamas at the thought of 8-3 , 11 games in!!!!! Let's not lose sight of a huge victory over a team on the schnide but still it's The N.Y. Giants who had a ton of steam just a few weeks ago! This is no fluke WIN for Our SAINTS so let's give them the credit on both sides of the ball the deserve, Child Please! That Int. by Herring got the "D" so pumped early, they HAD to rise up!
GEAUX SAINTS GEAUX !!!!!!!!! WEAR THE BLACK AND GOLD PROUDLY FANS! This is a GREAT SEASON and we're IMPROVING!

 

[Sophandros]

190 of their yards came in the fourth quarter, when the game was in hand and we were playing prevent or had a blown coverage.

It was 35-10 going into the final period.

 

[Sophandros]

This is a stretch. Only fans who care about the team would bother enough to talk about the D's struggles. We all saw the D's problems in the last playoff game with Seattle and were hoping for significant improvement, especially after the offseason acquisitions the team made on that side of the ball. The D remains a work in progress. Many of the same posters who criticize the D have praised other aspects of the team. We have some guys on D who are playing lights out, like Greer and Dunbar, but there are issues on D that need to be corrected if we want to go deep in the playoffs. There's a reason that a football-knowledgeable guy like Young said what he said, and we ought to be able to have a rational discussion about it without the attempt to label posters who see his point as traitors who want the team to fail. That's just silly.

Except that the defense is playing well right now. You're going to give up yards late in the game when you have a huge lead.

Through three quarters, our defense gave up 10 points.

 

[Patrick_WhoDatFan]

Way too many comments to look over but i can say just like others did. Our DEF is better than GB DEF. We can beat them anywhere at anytime!! I hate Steve Young and his lousy comments.

 

[Domeination]

Except that the defense is playing well right now.

Sorry, but I don't think they're playing well. I think our offense dominated last night and took the Giants out of the game by the end of the second quarter. We would have been in some trouble if our offense had struggled. In short, our best defense last night was our offense. Our defense hasn't been terrible, but it's not playing well. We aren't making enough big plays, and we give up a ton of yardage. I realize that some of that's by design, but the big plays that we're supposed to be making in such a soft scheme aren't happening consistently. And we have yet to see anyone in our front 7 dominate. Again, there's a reason Young said what he said. By the way, Gruden's comments about our D were not all that positive. It is what it is.

 

[jbourque]

I think our secondary played bad, everyone else seemed to play well. I remember great plays by Humber, Herring, Will Smith etc. I thought we tackled well against the run. If you have elite receivers like Cruz & Hicks you attack our secondary, Eli made the throws.

I don't think Stafford can consistently make those throws so next week should be a boost. But, Steve Young's right, Aaron Rodgers would carve this defense up.

 

[BreesusSaves]

Dear Mr. Young,

32/49. 419 yards. 3 touchdowns. 0 interceptions.

Signed,
Guy who is drooling at the thought of playing Green Bay's defense again.

 

[CoolBrees1]

Trust me...Green Bay's defense isn't making anyone quake in their boots either...

 

[tenordas]

Steve Young does not have a point. Frankly, Steve Young didn't get it.

The Saints' defense completely shut down the GiAnts' running game. They had zip for rushing yards. 73 yards and 3.3/carry, with a long carry of only 9 yards. In the first half, they only reached the red zone once, and came away with only a field goal to show for it. For a team that wants to run the ball down the opposition's throat and dictate to the defense from that, that is called shutting them down.

Did Eli throw for 406 yards? Yes, he did, because that's all we gave him, and the majority of those yards came in dink and dunk plays against a defense playing deep prevent. Big deal. He also had an INT and for all the passes completed in a row, only managed a 101.9 rating for the game. That's not a bad rating, but one would expect something a lot higher from someone throwing for more than 400 yards. That just tells you that most of those yards didn't matter.

Did the defense give up three TDs in the second half? Yes, they did. Let's break those down:
TD #1 - Aided by an extremely questionable "unnecessary roughness" call and not one but two no-calls, one for holding Cam Jordan by the TE who then caught the ball for a first down, then later by the same TE who did not get called for pushing off Roman Harper for another first down catch. Both of those should have been called and set up third and very long which likely would have ended the drive. This TD cannot be laid on the defense. They made the plays to stop them but the refs kept the drive going.

TD #2 - A blown coverage. This one is squarely on the defense, but I think every team does this once a season. Someone blew the assignment on Cruz and he scored on a long TD. However, I don't expect to see anyone doing that again the rest of the year. Our coaches and players are too smart and thorough to let a repeat of that mistake occur, IMHO. I'm willing to call that play an anomaly.

TD #3 - Garbage time. This was the equivalent of an empty net goal in hockey. The defense was playing deep prevent and Eli dinked and dunked down the field. When you're ahead by 25 points, it doesn't matter if you let the other team run 5 minutes off the clock coming down the field to score a TD. In fact, it's actually what you want because they have no chance of catching up like that. Again, big deal.



So, am I afraid of Aaron Rodgers and the Packers offense? Of course, any sane person is. However, Young's assertion that our defense is no good was short-sighted and frankly not paying attention to what they accomplished. So shut up, Steve. We'll be ready for Rodgers and our game plan will be different. We won't be concentrating on taking away the run like we did against the GiAnts because the Packers can't run the ball anyway. GW knows that and will plan accordingly.

Will the Packers score on us? Yes, but we will score on them, plenty. Will they be able to score enough to keep up with our offense? There's the crux of the biscuit. Don't count on it, Steve, because the Saints' defense is better than they were in week one; and if the Saints are able to get ahead, look for some serious pressure being applied by GW. Cam Jordan is coming into his own and Will Smith can still give LTs and QBs big headaches. Our defensive line isn't the Purple People Eaters or the Steel Curtain, but they have started to generate a decent pass rush that didn't exist in week one.

I'm nervous, yes, but I'm looking forward to the rematch. I think your assertion of Rodgers salivating to play our "D" is misplaced. He won't find the sledding anywhere near as easy as you think he will IMHO.

 

[SAINTS 12]

How good do you have to be when the score Is 35-10 with the whole 4th quater left to play in the game?

 

[BoNcHiE]

Yeah, but if we face them again it will be cold out there. Our wr's have a really hard time with their footing in those environments. I'm really not sure why but they just fall all over the place.

In that case I like our running game much more then theirs.

I've been hard on the defense this year. Very hard. But what I saw last night wasn't bad defense. It was horrible officiating mixed with us giving up underneath routes in the 4th because we were up so much.

We stuffed the run as well, which would be the key against GB in a bad weather game.