"The Lull"
 

Serious question here. Does it look to YOU like this year's team routinely comes out in the first quarter looking like one of the greatest football teams EVER ASSEMBLED, then seems to take a nap in most of the second and third, only to wake up startled in the 4th, and then has to pull some magic pixie dust out of their collective offensive/defensive backsides to win the game at the last possible moment?

Last year it was like, we owned the 4th quarter. At the end of the 3rd quarter, whatever the score, I could turn to my friends and say, "who plays lights out in the 4th, fellas?" and they'd all smile knowingly. You could FEEL the defense ratcheting it up all through the game, you could SMELL the greatness of the offense percolating like coffee.

This year, it's like we own the FIRST quarter, maybe a two minute drill before the half, and not much else. Then the last four minutes of the 4th, we will suddenly look SCARY GOOD again, but it's entirely nerve wracking, gut-wrenching, and sometimes tremendously unpleasant to sit through. Even when we win!

What are you folks seeing. What are your impressions. I want to know what people think about WHY this year's games all sorta look like this, with the LULL in them, where the other team hangs around or claws their way back in. It has to be something more complicated than just "Payton takes his foot off the gas" because I dunno. Is he really taking his foot off the gas? That just doesn't seem like something he would do in the second quarter... I think it has to be something else, or a combination of things, but I don't quite know what that IT is.

Thoughts? Theories? Ideas?

There was a stat yesterday that said that we're the number 1 first possession team.

Our opponents shift into "nothing to lose" mode. They start taking chances. Going for it on 4th down. They start playing over their heads. It speaks to the greatness of the Saints' that they have been able to fight off these attacks and still pull out a win.

TOTALLY RIGHT ON

Totally agree. You can tell teams really get up to play the Saints this year. Nobody called trick plays on us last year and without PT and Bush it simplified things for defenses quite a bit. But the Dallas and Bengals game you can tell that fight is still there. As far as Saints seasons go this is actually a very good one. Nothing can top last year but another SB win and they are still on track to do just that just not as pretty as last season.

We don't have that killer instinct in my opinion. Once we have the lead, we stop attacking and do a little more ball control. We need to punch them in the throat when they're down... not let them catch up. As soon as it gets close, we start playing more uptempo and score at will. Play aggressive football 4 quarters long... keep the pedal to the medal.

Sometimes we look asleep at the wheel. We should be blowing teams away and it seems like we get lucky to get the win.

I agree with this.

Thought it was just me, but once we start we need to finish it and finish it quickly and early. These fourth quarter games are causing too much stress. The other teams might have talent and definitely have nothing to lose, but we have better talent and much more to lose. :twisted: