Special Teams Weakness

darstep · 07-28-2011, 06:45 AM

Could be that one of the youngster undrafted guys can fill the KR/PR roll for special teams. I kind of have a hard time firing the coach when the 11 guys that "should" stay in their lanes and make tackles, don't stay in their lanes and make tackles. Or when the return guy starts hitting the brakes rather than hitting a seam and turning it on. It comes down to fundamental blocking and tackling. At the pro level, its just a matter of putting guys out there who get the job done.

SaintsBro · 07-28-2011, 09:19 AM

Originally Posted by darstep

I kind of have a hard time firing the coach when the 11 guys that "should" stay in their lanes and make tackles, don't stay in their lanes and make tackles. Or when the return guy starts hitting the brakes rather than hitting a seam and turning it on. It comes down to fundamental blocking and tackling. At the pro level, its just a matter of putting guys out there who get the job done.

It is the job of the Special Teams coach to make sure the players do or don't do all of those things. If we are putting guys out there who don't know how to get the job done, or can't get the job done, then that is the fault of the special teams coach for not coaching them properly on what to do. If it's just "putting guys out there who get the job done" then why do we even have a special teams coach at all. If it's all on the players, then why do we have any coaches for that matter.

The guys we have on special teams are for the most part, good to excellent athletes and comparable or better than any other team in the league; it's how they perform due to poor coaching and bad decisions that is the problem. For example, kicking off short to Seattle, giving them such good field position, was a very very bad decision on either Payton or McMahon's part, and it changed the entire momentum of that game -- it got Seattle back in the game right when we were going great guns early in the game. The Saints were literally on the verge of running away with it in the first and second quarter, until those deliberately short kickoffs let the Seahawks put together short drives, get scores, and changed the whole tone of the game completely. Special teams.

07-28-2011, 09:19 AM	#2
SaintsBro Site Donor Join Date: Sep 2010 Location: in line with my ridiculous CLEAR PLASTIC BAG Posts: 3,650 Blog Entries: 3	Originally Posted by darstep I kind of have a hard time firing the coach when the 11 guys that "should" stay in their lanes and make tackles, don't stay in their lanes and make tackles. Or when the return guy starts hitting the brakes rather than hitting a seam and turning it on. It comes down to fundamental blocking and tackling. At the pro level, its just a matter of putting guys out there who get the job done. It is the job of the Special Teams coach to make sure the players do or don't do all of those things. If we are putting guys out there who don't know how to get the job done, or can't get the job done, then that is the fault of the special teams coach for not coaching them properly on what to do. If it's just "putting guys out there who get the job done" then why do we even have a special teams coach at all. If it's all on the players, then why do we have any coaches for that matter. The guys we have on special teams are for the most part, good to excellent athletes and comparable or better than any other team in the league; it's how they perform due to poor coaching and bad decisions that is the problem. For example, kicking off short to Seattle, giving them such good field position, was a very very bad decision on either Payton or McMahon's part, and it changed the entire momentum of that game -- it got Seattle back in the game right when we were going great guns early in the game. The Saints were literally on the verge of running away with it in the first and second quarter, until those deliberately short kickoffs let the Seahawks put together short drives, get scores, and changed the whole tone of the game completely. Special teams.

07-28-2011, 06:45 AM	#1
darstep SaintSince67 Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: PortCity Posts: 2,044	Could be that one of the youngster undrafted guys can fill the KR/PR roll for special teams. I kind of have a hard time firing the coach when the 11 guys that "should" stay in their lanes and make tackles, don't stay in their lanes and make tackles. Or when the return guy starts hitting the brakes rather than hitting a seam and turning it on. It comes down to fundamental blocking and tackling. At the pro level, its just a matter of putting guys out there who get the job done.