Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Boy the Bolts really started respecting that play action passing game as it really opened things up again, even being down a few targets...

And that defense looked fresh at the end of the game...

You'd think an OL Coach would love to just line up and smash people in the mouth especially with teams like the Eagles, Falcons X2, and the 49ers on the schedule...

You've got Evans and Grubs with big money - Use Them!

We better find our way to playing physical football or this love fest is gonna be gone faster than Reese's PB Pumpkins at Ole Lady Boudreaux's House on Halloween!

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Two seperate people did the play calling last night...

x- first 3 qtrs
y- Last qtr

It was like night and day.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Low standards, I see. 53 yards on 21 rushes is somewhat on the non-existent end of a "rushing game"

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

I'm not concerned with the YPC. You have to make them respect the fact you want to run the ball regardless if you're gaining big chunks of yards. You can't utilize play action passes effectively if teams don't actually believe you're going to run the ball. You also aren't going to wear their defense down unless you're hitting them consistently throughout the game. So while the YPC looked terrible, it opened up plays downfield for our receivers and wore their defensive line down.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

I don't think he is talking the entire game, and maybe I am wrong? I thought he was referencing the 4rth quarter. You are right, we looked bad, bad, bad running the ball early. Things did pick up in the 4rth for us. We opened some holes and had some decent runs.

I have no idea if the team we saw last night, the one that started feeling it like they used to will show up again. We can only hope, and see what happens after the bye. I hope we find a way to run the ball because we sure need to.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

More than the yards was the attitude PT was running with. You could tell he WANTED that win bad...

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Yea I'm not seeing it.

21 rushes, 53 yards, 2.5 avg

Thats no different than last week, or the week before.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Something had been missing from the first 4 games and the 1st 3 quarters of last night's game.

"IT" showed up during the 4th quarter last night. (Still not sure what "IT" is though)...

The team played with a bit more and aggression - they appeared to "WANT" the "W" instead of just playing out the remainder of the clock.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

You know better than that..

Second 1/2 told a different story... Qtrs 1/2 were a recipe for 0-5.

Second 1/2 Thomas had 9 runs for 63 yards ave 7 YPC.

For the season.. it seems we are once again a second half team. Especially PT
Season PT Stats
1st half - 17 att 56 yards 3.3 YPC 1 TD
2nd half - 20 att 126 yards 6.3 YPC 3 TD

Most people are of the mind we abandon the run in the second half because we have been behind. We actually run and score better in the second half this season.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

If you run the damn ball then they have to put eight in the box. When they do that Drew is going to carve them up.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

So... with that being said...

Ingram needs to be on the field every play... Dont give him any touches. Use him as a decoy.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

C'mon, you should know better than that. His stats are skewed by the 48 yard run against Carolina. That was really the only game that separated PT and Ingram. Other than that they are nearly identical in the run game.

In fact, take away that one run and PT's averaging 4.11 yards per carry in the 2nd half this season.

Take away that game, and PT's averaging 3.3 yards per carry in 4 games.

Its not the RB thats the problem with our run game, its the blocking.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

We look bad running the ball because our running l plays are too predictable. If I can sit on my couch and tell my wife exactly what play is coming I promise you that the opposing D coordinator who has been watching film can do the same. I would say I could call 80% of our play just by looking at the formation. I am not just saying run or pass, I am saying exactly what the play is like dive, toss to sproles, screen, PA bomb over the top. Way too easy.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

If you are going to average a truncated (trimmed) mean then you must also remove the low... Not just the high.

Too many variables to lay blame on the 0-line by the stats of just one RB. Style, ability, and situational utilization play a part in that.

Team Ave for the season is 3.9 YPC (18th)
Texans are ave 3.7 YPC. (23rd)

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Well you're proving my point. Stats taken out of context are easily manipulated.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Well ya'll are both proving that you can make stats look any way you want to support whatever opinion you might have. All I know is, I can see what RB is our best just by using my eyes. PT has no quit in him. That dude had his helmet popped off, getting hit in the head and he was still fighting for yards. I'll take that!

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

I may get heckled for this suggestion, but what if we were to, in say the first half or beginning of the 3rd quarter, run the ball....


...three downs in a row.


We've never done it. At least I've never seen it (this season). We pass three downs in a row a lot, with good reason. But we never just give one RB the ball and let him do his thing. What about three doses of Ingram/PT that aren't all A/B gap runs, and that present some variety to the run game?

To me its sort of like bluffing at the poker table...if you bluff and the lose, and then show your bluff, well then the next time people are in a hand with you they have to account for the fact that you may be bluffing again, even when you may really have the best hand.

With our running game, it's a little stagnant in that everyone figures there's no way the Saints will run the ball two downs in a row, much less three. Is it illogical? Well, yeah. But that's why they call it 'unpredictability,' because nobody would figure we would do something like that. Thoughts?

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Well yeah, you gotta "commit" to the running game, and we came closer against SD than we usually do. No doubt you gotta use it enough to set up the play-action, but I'm still not convinced we're gonna fool anyone into deciding we're a running team.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Now you are talking about convincing people?

The majority of the USA was not convinced we were any good 5 minutes after we won the Super Bowl.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

I guess I wasn't thinking along the lines of convincing a people that we are a 'running' team, because with Brees on our side there's no way anybody would ever think that.

I was thinking more along the lines of creating nagging doubts in the minds of defensive coaches and MLBs, in that, if they see us go 'run heavy' a couple times, then they have to think about it being a potential option every time we set up with a RB in the backfield.

Like those end-arounds Payton would call (and that actually surfaced once last night). Many times they were at the weirdest moments in the game, when I never would've thought that could be a potential play call, and to me, in hindsight that's what makes it so brilliant, because it forces DCs and MLBs to consider it when they are deciding on coverage packages

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Well...sorry for the tl;dr here

but I have been kinda watching how people this year are saying up in New England, there's this whole thing going on up there this year, like OMG THE PATRIOTS ARE SUDDENLY A RUNNING TEAM, LOOK AT THE PATRIOTS RUN THE BALL, JUST WHEN THE WHOLE LEAGUE GOES "PASS HAPPY" THE PATRIOTS START RUNNING THE ROCK AGAIN, THE GENIUS OF BELLICHICK, HE'S DONE IT AGAIN, etc. etc. Like this is a story line that is about to happen, or is happening.

And I find myself wondering if Payton might have had something like that in mind, up his sleeve, when he re-upped Pierre's contract and brought Ingram and then Grubbs in. As an evolution to Payton's game, or the NEXT thing the Saints were gonna do, once Drew was locked in long-term and had broken every passing record in sight.

Like, once people adjusted their defenses to our ABSURDLY PROLIFIC passing attack, Payton was gonna hit them with the change up -- suddenly the Saints morph and become a power running team, heavy running, with the ever-present threat of pass...change it up over a period of years so that we don't disappear like the Greatest Show On Turf did, once people figured their passing game out they were finished.

But then I feel like maybe Payton didn't get to implement this idea before he left, so he just sorta tabled the whole thing until next year. I dunno, this is all just a pet theory of mine.

Because Payton and Bellichick are extremely similar mentally, the whole chess match part of it, and they have the same approach to innovations in the game (for example, they seem to have simultaneously invented the concept of the freakishly tall and super human tight end, at the same exact moment). They think alike. And Bellichick is running all over these defenses that are freaked out about Brady and the Patriots passing attack right now.

It just seems so weird to me when Ingram is in there, the same damn play over and over and over. It looks like a completely different TEAM, when Ingram comes in, and then it turns back into the Saints again when he comes out. I can't quite believe that THAT is what Payton had in mind. Maybe it was what he wanted, but it just seems so unfinished or work-in-progress to me. I dunno.

Something in my gut makes me think this is related to Payton not being here. Like the team was about to morph into something different this year, but is now frozen in late last year's playbook.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

EXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXACTLY!!!!

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Did you guys see the breakdown of %'s of run plays on first through fourth downs during the game? PREDICTABLE MUCH?

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Had three key calls go our way as well.

You could argue they had more impact than the run game.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

Usually, for whatever reason, the running stat that counts the most is attempts. This stat pretty much holds true most of the time.

Examples of this seasons rushing attempts:

Week 1 - Redskins 43 Saints 10
Week 2 - Panthers 41 Saints 27
Week 3 - Chiefs 45 Saints 19
Week 4 - Packers 25 Saints 19
Week 5 - Saints 21 Chargers 18

Doesn't always work out that the team with the most rushing attempts wins the game, but historically, it is a very decent indicator.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

I wasn't impressed at all with the running game, but I do agree with other posters that you still have to run often enough to give reasonable doubt in the opposing defense's mind. The play calling was so lopsided in the first few games, it was a joke.

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

I'm going to let you in on the secret to Sean Payton's Genius...


Mutiple, multiple formations with multiple, multiple plays and reads out of those formations eliminate the oppositions' defenses from anticipating what the Saints will do - that's the big advantage...

Problem is that we haven't had as much success with the run and playaction pass because our current tackles can't run block worth a schiott to open up those 8-20 yard gash runs so we haven't had balanced play calling...

Re: Saints Find Cure For Losing - Running Game
 

That is not a function of Run = Winning, its a function of leading = running to burn clock and maintain possession.

normally