We've had time to sit and think on it. Here's the good, the bad, and the ugly from the Saints' excruciating loss in Week 6:
Sunday saw the New Orleans Saints take another gut punch of a loss in a 25-19 defeat at home to the New England Patriots. The Saints moved the ball well through the air, but couldn't establish the run and managed four field goals and only one touchdown. They fell apart several times on defense and rebounded aggressively in the second half, only to fail again needing a stop with the game on the line.
A now 1-5 Saints team goes back to the drawing board yet again. There were some good things to build on, but even more that the team will hopefully learn from. Here's the good, bad, and ugly from the ninth New Orleans loss in their last ten regular season outings.
The Good: Spencer Rattler
Rattler played arguably the best game of his 13-game NFL career. He was a little off-target (high) on a few throws in the fourth quarter, but otherwise attacked the intermediate areas better than we've seen to this point and put balls in position for his receivers to make plays. Rattler completed 20 of 26 passes for 227 yards with four of those incompletions the result of drops.
Six of Rattler's completions for 98 of his yards went to Chris Olave. He led off the game with a 53-yard strike to Olave. While that was his longest of the game, Rattler is looking down the field with more confidence and hitting intermediate throws with much better accuracy. His weekly improvements all bit assures him the starting role through at least the mid-season point without question.
The Good: Pass protection
While Rattler did another nice job moving away from pressure, his line often gave him terrific protection. Both sacks of Rattler were the result of him holding onto the ball too long or the receivers not getting open. Tackles Taliese Fuaga and Kelvin Banks prevented New England edge rushers Harold Landry and K'Lavon Chaisson from making a major impact, often in one-on-one assignments. Guards Trevor Penning, Cesar Ruiz, and center Erik McCoy gave Rattler a clean sightline inside and allowed him to step up into a clean pocket. This is a group that's starting to come together nicely and allowing their quarterback to develop, though run blocking is another issue. (more on that in a moment)
The Good: Blake Grupe
It's nice to have Grupe in a positive column after so much negativity to start the year from him. After a miserable beginning, Grupe nailed all four of his field goal attempts of 34, 48, 38, and 54 yards. This also underscores the fact that the Saints continue to have trouble putting the ball in the end zone. However, at least Grupe looked back to his normal form and kept New Orleans within striking distance all afternoon.
The Bad: The running game
New Orleans rushed for just 73 yards, with their backs averaging a lowly 2.9 per carry. Alvin Kamara looked good as a receiver, but had only 31 yards on 10 attempts. Kendre Miller ran hard but had just 21 yards on 8 carries. The line needs to do a better job at both getting push off the line of scrimmage and opening up cutback lanes. New England has one of the better run defenses in the league, but the Saints had some success early on off-tackle plays behind Fuaga and Banks. Then, inexplicably, they stopped. That's on coaching and play-calling.
The Bad: Defense
New Orleans was helpless against Drake Maye and the Patriots passing attack most of the afternoon, but especially in the first half. Maye had been sacked 17 times coming into this game, but the Saints were unable to sustain pressure during the afternoon. They stiffened up significantly in the second half but were again unable to get off the field in key moments. New Orleans performed well against the run, to be fair, but regressed badly in defending the pass. Chase Young and Cameron Jordan both had some nice pressures on Maye, but this team must get better at finishing plays in opposing backfields.
The Ugly: Defensive backs, specifically
After appearing to turn the corner against the Giants and even against Buffalo the previous week, the New Orleans secondary took a major step back. Drake Maye looks like a future star, but the Saints made him look like a seasoned Hall of Famer in their prime. Maye completed 11 of 13 throws in the first half for 185 yards and 3 touchdowns, with another nullified by penalty. Patriots wideouts pulled in 13 of their 15 targets for 220 of Maye's 261 passing yards for the game. This included 10 catches for 192 yards to Kayshon Boutte, Demario Douglas, and Mack Hollins. Not exactly an elite trio of NFL wide receivers.
All of the New Orleans defensive backs were guilty of poor outings. Safety Jonas Sanker and cornerback Quincy Riley, both rookies, were repeatedly victimized by Maye and his wideouts. Kool-Aid McKinstry failed to make the plays on a few contested catches. Alontae Taylor and Justin Reid were each caught out of position on some key plays. The entire secondary was guilty of massive coverage breakdowns or failed to make tackles to minimize gains, all while giving up back-breaking completions on more than a few 3rd and long situations. This group will improve with reps and experience, but on this day was the unit arguably most responsible for a fifth loss in six outings for the Saints.
This article originally appeared on Saints Wire: The good, bad, and ugly from the Saints' Week 6 loss to Patriots
Category: Football
