Underhill article: “Saints moves are telling us what they felt the real problem with the team was last season” (119 Viewers)

[SweetT]

Tell that to the backup journeyman signed a day before the game, whose job it is to contain Jalen Carter. “Hey don’t forget, it’s next man up”.

Eagles lost more important pieces that game and still won, but hey, who am I to make sense?!?!

We had every chance to win that game. No excuses

 

[SweetT]

Those four teams all got exposed too. The NFC North's three playoff teams went 12-0 against the AFC South and 11-1 against the NFC West which speaks more to how mediocre those divisions were. They're not even going 7-5 against the AFC North or NFC East. Texans couldn't cut it down the stretch. Steelers also struck out against the elite teams but they have Tomlin that helps them grind out 9-10 wins. Bucs...we know why.

31 teams get exposed on a yearly basis.
What is your point?

 

[Rexman100]

Eagles lost more important pieces that game and still won, but hey, who am I to make sense?!?!

We had every chance to win that game. No excuses

i do agree that we should've won.

 

[SweetT]

i do agree that we should've won.

Exactly. Like I said, after our 2-0 start, our team started making the same mistakes as the previous two years. Thats why I’m not sure we would’ve won more than 7 or 8 games. It was frustrating to watch. I also said that losing became infectious. 2 games to start a season doesn’t automatically cure that. It’s something that need to be rid of over the course of time.

 

[St. Widge]

Eagles lost more important pieces that game and still won, but hey, who am I to make sense?!?!

We had every chance to win that game. No excuses

We lost because of DA. But, who did the Eagles lose in that game? I don't recall anyone of serious significance but I'm probably forgetting something.

 

[SweetT]

We lost because of DA. But, who did the Eagles lose in that game? I don't recall anyone of serious significance but I'm probably forgetting something.

They lost their receivers. Had to rely on their TE who killed us. They lost a third player but i forgot who it was

 

[St.Dan]

They lost their receivers. Had to rely on their TE who killed us. They lost a third player but i forgot who it was

The players who remained healthy were quite better than the ones we still had healthy. Barkley and Goedert sure killed us. And if coaching can also count toward health, than we can say Sirianni and Moore were also healthy and fit like fiddles

 

[SoggyBottomBoy]

I don’t buy into the injuries excuse. It’s cool to say it, as a coping mechanism, but 4 out of the top 10 teams that lost the most points due to injuries, made the playoffs (Lions, Bucs, Steelers, and Texans). The main thing, when deciding if a team is good or not, is the depth chart. If your depth chart is underwhelming, then you are not a good team…….you are just a top heavy team. If you can’t build a competent roster, where guys can fill in, due to injuries, then you are lacking at assembling a roster. Good/great teams overcome obstacles. However, if I were to play the “injuries” game, then I would say we were going to be nothing more than an average team bc that was the ceiling that coach showed was his best. I only go by what facts have presented

It's actually more cool to say "injuries are just an excuse" and "every team has injuries." I buy a lot of what you're saying about lack of depth, but no team was overcoming the number of injuries we sustained. They may not have gone on a 7-game losing streak but their season would have been derailed. See S.F. Niners. Prior to the season the defending NFC champ Niners were the NFC gold standard along with the Lions. They were widely predicted to repeat their success - injuries derailed their season with no playoffs.

On the flip side, you're correct in that good teams and teams with depth are better equipped to overcome them. The Lions are a good example you mentioned. They were so good they were able to overcome their Dline being ravaged with injuries, until they couldn't - in the playoff loss to the Commanders, their offense kept pace as their defense was getting killed, but their stellar offense kept them alive. But their margin of error was very thin against top tier teams in the playoffs due to the injuries. Yes, they had a lot of turnovers in that game but due to pressing to try to keep up with the points their defense was surrendering.

Injuries was the main factor especially to key positions and the number of them. You're correct in that our rash of injuries exposed a thin team regarding depth. And either we just have terrible luck regarding injuries or we're doing something terribly wrong in preparation. I hope it's the latter and it gets corrected.

So, an inordinate amount of injuries, lack of depth and an inept, floundering head coach could not be overcome. One positive result that I know you're pleased with was the change in coaching. Even with all of the injuries, Rizzi KK got better play out of the patchwork team, so that's an indication that it was more than injuries.

That's why it baffles me how so many here can make definitive evaluations about the players on our team based on last year's play. We simply cannot not truly evaluate players from last year because of the extreme number of injuries. The most we can gleen is how well some of them reacted to such adverse conditions and showed some fight and determination.

 

[TruSaint]

We almost beat the Super Bowl champs. We’re not as bad as most on here think we are.

 

[SweetT]

It's actually more cool to say "injuries are just an excuse" and "every team has injuries." I buy a lot of what you're saying about lack of depth, but no team was overcoming the number of injuries we sustained. They may not have gone on a 7-game losing streak but their season would have been derailed. See S.F. Niners. Prior to the season the defending NFC champ Niners were the NFC gold standard along with the Lions. They were widely predicted to repeat their success - injuries derailed their season with no playoffs.

On the flip side, you're correct in that good teams and teams with depth are better equipped to overcome them. The Lions are a good example you mentioned. They were so good they were able to overcome their Dline being ravaged with injuries, until they couldn't - in the playoff loss to the Commanders, their offense kept pace as their defense was getting killed, but their stellar offense kept them alive. But their margin of error was very thin against top tier teams in the playoffs due to the injuries. Yes, they had a lot of turnovers in that game but due to pressing to try to keep up with the points their defense was surrendering.

Injuries was the main factor especially to key positions and the number of them. You're correct in that our rash of injuries exposed a thin team regarding depth. And either we just have terrible luck regarding injuries or we're doing something terribly wrong in preparation. I hope it's the latter and it gets corrected.

So, an inordinate amount of injuries, lack of depth and an inept, floundering head coach could not be overcome. One positive result that I know you're pleased with was the change in coaching. Even with all of the injuries, Rizzi KK got better play out of the patchwork team, so that's an indication that it was more than injuries.

That's why it baffles me how so many here can make definitive evaluations about the players on our team based on last year's play. We simply cannot not truly evaluate players from last year because of the extreme number of injuries. The most we can gleen is how well some of them reacted to such adverse conditions and showed some fight and determination.

So with all of that, we were not a good team despite injuries. I had this debate with one of my employees. My points are:

Everyone has a job to do. Not just the players, but the entire staff. Every coach needs to on their game, coaching every single player. The strength and conditioning coach, needs to be getting the players ready for a rigorous season. They also need to make sure that those players are recovering properly. The diet and nutrition staff needs to make sure that our players are provided with all of the healthy foods, to replenish their bodies. The HC needs to make sure that all of the staff is doing their job. He needs to bring it all together during the week and gameday. He also decides what systems he wants and correctly identify talent for starting spots and depth. The GM gives the HC what he needs to build his team. The team that executes all of this, is typically the team that wins it all. No one told DA to run with just Jazzy J and Rattler. No one told him to only rely on two good WRs and question marks behind them. I literally said before the season “if one of our WRs gets injured, then we are screwed”, but everyone told me that KK’s system only used 2 WRs and the rest blockers etc etc.
No one told DA to continue not focus on the offensive side of the ball. He thought his defense would’ve held up for another year. Shouldn’t make assumptions like that.

Our team, in hindsight, was not going to be competitive bc we had way more questions than answers.

Point blank, it was not just injuries. It was a jambalaya of stuff that we were lacking and it didn’t take long for it to surface. I remember when McCoy went down. 98% of this board was on melt level orange. All the sky is falling, we are screwed yada yada. Now, if most of yall saw and felt that way bc of one singular injury, then that means yall had zero confidence that our team could weather the storm. That my friends, proves that we were not a good team. If you can’t at least have some confidence during injuries, then your team is not good.

 

[St. Widge]

Point blank, it was not just injuries. It was a jambalaya of stuff that we were lacking and it didn’t take long for it to surface. I remember when McCoy went down. 98% of this board was on melt level orange. All the sky is falling, we are screwed yada yada. Now, if most of yall saw and felt that way bc of one singular injury, then that means yall had zero confidence that our team could weather the storm. That my friends, proves that we were not a good team. If you can’t at least have some confidence during injuries, then your team is not good.

There really was zero excuse for the offense falling apart with the McCoy injury alone. Yes, Carter is a monster, but you have to have a plan if McCoy goes down whether that's just a better backup or a tweak to the blocking scheme. And, it got worse when Ruiz went down which is also inexcusable from both a lack of depth and lack of ability to tweak the blocking to at least make it adequate. I might forgive it if it was just in the games where each went down, but it went on for weeks without anything done to help it. They did not go to a short passing game or do any of the many things that a good staff should be able to do. Maybe it was that the depth really sucked that bad, but I find it hard to believe they didn't at least have serviceable guys to step in with the right plan. And if they didn't it's an even more obvious flaw in the building of the team.

Hopefully they fix those depth issues this year

I do get that it's a lot of injuries to deal with concentrated on the OL and at WR, and it made it impossible to be a good offense or even an average offense, but I still think they should have done better and they clearly should have had better depth to at least still put an NFL offense on the field. What we put on the field at that point just wasn't an NFL offense and it wasn't fair to throw Rattler out there with that group and expect him to win or even look okay.

But if those gus stay healthy this year, or even if more of them stay healthy this year, I think we see a better looking offense on the field this year. But, we need to add a starting LG, some more depth on the IOL, a true X WR, and a complete TE that can also do work in the passing game.

 

[Mr. Sparkle]

The problem I have is that the folks on Airline tellling us we have a good roster are the same people who insisted that we had a great coaching staff under DA.

But if the new staff is OK with the hand they've been dealt, that makes me feel better, for sure. But I put zero faith in what the front office says or believes any more.

 

[Clintonrebel]

We almost beat the Super Bowl champs. We’re not as bad as most on here think we are.

Agree, but they got better and we got worse after that. And yes, injuries were some of it, but not all of it. We need to get younger.