hagan714

Saints report: Strategy and personnel
--TE Mark Campbell did not play in the season opener with the Indianapolis Colts because of a back injury. He had a second epidural this week in an attempt to calm down a disk problem.
--RCB Fred Thomas, a 12-year veteran who lost his starting job in training camp to Jason David, was a healthy inactive against the Colts.
--WR David Patten served as the third wide receiver behind starters Marques Colston and Devery Henderson on Thursday night. Patten caught two passes for 18 yards.
--DE Rob Ninkovich, who missed all five exhibition games with a sprained knee, was waived prior to the game with the Colts.
--QB Tyler Palko, an undrafted free agent who was cut on Sept. 1, was signed from the practice squad to take Ninkovich's roster spot.

REPORT CARD VS. COLTS


PASSING OFFENSE
F -- After leading the league in passing yards last season, everyone was expecting more from the Saints. But Drew Brees and the Saints struggled to get going against the Colts' defense. Brees hit on 28 of 41 passes, but finished with just 192 yards -- most that coming long after the outcome was decided. He threw two interceptions, with one returned 83 yards for a touchdown, and he lost a fumble while being sacked. His passer rating of 58.2 was the worst of his 19-game career with the Saints. Tight end Eric Johnson led the team in receptions and yards with eight catches for 57 yards and the Colts held wideouts Marques Colston and Devery Henderson to a combined nine receptions for 81 yards.
RUSHING OFFENSE
D -- The Saints averaged 4.1 yards a carry in picking up 106 yards on 26 attempts, but their main weapons -- Deuce McAllister and Reggie Bush, hardly scared the Colts. McAllister had 38 yards on 10 attempts and Bush gained 38 on 12 carries, averaging 3.8 and 3.2 yards, respectively. Most of their yards came between the tackles as the Colts' defense did a good job of pursuing the ball on sweeps and stretch plays, refusing to allow McAllister and Bush to cut back into the seams.
PASS DEFENSE
F -- Peyton Manning, Reggie Wayne and Marvin Harrison had a field day in making the Saints defensive backs look bad most of the night. Manning was 18-of-30 for 288 yards with three TDs and a long throw of 45 yards. He was not sacked and compiled a passer rating of 125.4. Wayne caught seven passes for 115 yards with TDs of 28 and 45 yards, while Harrison had four receptions for 83 yards and a 27-yard TD. When Manning wasn't abusing the Saints cornerbacks, especially former teammate Jason David, he was finding tight end Dallas Clark running free. He had two catches for 48 yards.
RUSH DEFENSE
F -- The Saints had trouble stopping the run a year ago and their problems continued Thursday night. Joseph Addai rushed for 118 yards on 23 carries with one TD and had seven runs of seven yards or more. He had bursts of 8, 8, 10, 12 and 15 yards, as the Saints had trouble getting a good shot at him. Backup Kenton Keith added 32 yards on five carries as the Colts pounded the Saints for 29 carries, gaining 164 yards and averaging 5.7 yards per attempt.
SPECIAL TEAMS
B-minus -- This was the highlight of the night for the Saints even though Olindo Mare missed his first field-goal attempt, a 52-yarder, with his new team. He later kicked a 34-yarder to give the Saints their only lead at 10-7 in the second quarter. Punter Steve Weatherford had a big night with five kicks for a 48.4 gross average and a net average of 42.6. He also dropped two punts inside the 20. Lance Moore returned one punt for 30 yards and averaged 21.7 yards on three kickoff returns. The Saints had decent coverage on punts and kickoffs, allowing 9.7 yards per punt return and 22.0 yards on kickoffs.
COACHING
C -- It's hard to blame the coaching staff for this one. When the Saints offense struggles, the entire team is going to struggle. No matter what Sean Payton tried to get his explosive offense on track, it didn't work as the Colts played aggressively on defense and flew to the football every chance they had. They also did a solid job of covering the Saints receivers and not giving them any room to catch the ball.

Team Reports | NFL Football at CBSSports.com

"We may have lost the game, but you'll be hurting tomorrow." Doug Atkins

sac-a-lait

John Madden said it several times during the game--You run your way out of the Tampa 2/Cover 2 Defense. If you can't run on the Cover2/Tampa2, you end up like the Saints did with 4 Yards per pass after abandoning the run.

I still am in shock that we couldn't run on one of the worst run defenses in the NFL, but it is almost wearing off and I will be better in a few days.

Euphoria

Yeah I think some people don't take into account also that just maybe we were out played by a better team.

BIGEASY504

We will always be out played if we don’t do what we do and that is to run the ball. Madden hit it on head and that is how you beat the cover 2/tampa 2 (don’t matter the order)

TheDeuce

We abandoned the running game last year in the NFC Championship game, and we abandoned the running the game last week. Payton is a great offensive coach, especially when it comes to the passing game, but when is he going to realize that you have to stick to the game plan and stick with the run? If you can run the ball in this league, you can win. And if you have Deuce and Reggie, and our offensive line, you should be able to run the ball. 10 rushes for Deuce McAllister is not nearly enough, nor is 12 for Reggie. Terrible play calling in my opinion.

TPankey

I totally agree with the last poster; terrible play calling AND POOR, POOR game planning. You don't try and get too fancy against the light-ass Colts defense. You simply power run down hill. And when you've got the best down hill runner in the league in Deuce, and you try and run sweeps against a speedy defense, you deseerve to lose for nnot game planning right. On the defensive side too. You don't try and play the Colts with their base three wideout/one runnung back formation with a 4-3 defense. The Saints linbackers are good, but not so good that they should be trying to pass-cover the field. Hell, that's why the Colts were having as much success running the ball as they were, too, because the Saints linebackers (3) were beginnning to get so woriied about pass coverage, that the Red Sea started opening up. And that wasn't even with a lead blocker or a full back or another half back back their for the Colts. If they wanted the linebackers to be that involved in the game then they shouda went with four linebackers (3-4) with multiple blitze packages from every direction to get Peyton off-balance like the Steelers did when they beat them. Bad game planning on the coaches. The coaches lost this game not the players. I totally disagree with the original poster. The Saints coaches get a big fat F!

admin

I'm calling Complete BS on this. Remember the Colts were on their heels until half time guys. I don't think they were so jolly and excited about that in the locker room. The Colts played the second half with the confidence of a Super Bowl winner, period.

My question is this: will each of you change your opinion if the Saints cream their next 2 opponents?

As for the Houston sportswriter, anyone who really thinks the Saints are DEAD LAST in the NFL needs to have their head examined or doesn't know crap about football. It's pretty par for the course for a lot of Texas (but not all) which takes pride in dissing anything from New Orleans.

If you think after 1 game that the Saints are a terrible team or were terribly coached this last game then you need to take a second look at your thinking. The Saints did lose to the best team in the NFL correct?

Has anyone heard of losing to a team with a little more talent and skill?

[B]New Avatar and Signature Pic sizes coming soon...[/B]

TPankey

I don't know which game you were watching, but the Colts certainly weren't on their heels till half time. The score may have been even, but the Saints were steadily losing ground throughout the game, and then the Colts came out in the second half and took advantage of the poor defensive formations the Saints were still lining up across from them. And your the admin.? Yes they came out and played with more confidence in the second half. I wonder why? They realized by that time that the Saints were going to keep trying to play a 4-3 defense against their three wideout set. Hopefully the coaches see their poor game planning and make the right adjustments.

admin

Ok TPankey what are your predictions on the season? What's the final record going to be?

Now you need to stick with that the whole way, right?

As for the last game, I don't know what game you were watching but I didn't see the Colts march all over the place in the first half. The Saints fell out of the game in the third quarter and beyond, but I didn't see the look of domination in the Colts eyes at halftime.

My question is how is the 4-3 a poor defensive formation? Describe exactly what the Saints should have done to stop the Colts- I want to hear formations and descriptions and who you would put in the game against which players. And yes I do administer the board.

[B]New Avatar and Signature Pic sizes coming soon...[/B]

TheDeuce

Will I change my opinion of what? That they abandoned the running attack, AGAIN, in a game against a very good opponent? No, I won't change my opinion on that, because that's what happened on Thursday. The Colts do not have a good defense, but we made them look damn good. Why is that? Because the coaching staff called a sh**** game and our players didn't execute. We only ran the ball 10 times with Deuce against a mediocre front seven of the Colts. That's inexcusable in my opinion. Now, am I still going to be 100% behind this team? Absolutely, I just hope that they change their strategy, because when you have the best running back tandem in the league, you use them. You don't keep throwing it to, IMO, a questionable group of receivers.