Rating: (0 votes - average)

New Orleans Saints Head Coach Sean Payton
Post-Practice Media Availability
Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Three years ago when your team went to Seattle for a playoff game, an upset occurred. Was your team surprised throughout that game of how it played out?

“No. I don’t think so. When you get in the postseason and you’re playing a game, you’re playing a good football team. When you have to travel in the postseason – winning on the road to begin with is difficult and challenging in our league. That game kind of early on went one way and then all of the sudden turned around the momentum and we weren’t able to overcome that. But I don’t think so.”

Everybody besides Keenan Lewis has missed a start in the secondary. Can you talk about these guys’ ability to adapt and fill in?

“Part of the 16 game schedule we’re playing is that attrition (occurs). Fortunately we have some depth there. We’ve got some experience in some young players. Losing a player like Kenny (Vaccaro) and the corners we lost – Jabari (Greer) and Patrick (Robinson), those are obviously things that you’d rather not have happen. I think that the amount of time on task that some of these guys have had that are veterans and some of the younger guys that have come in have been able to play (is beneficial). You take a guy like Corey (White), who’s starting the season maybe in a role that would be nickel, and here for the last however many weeks has been now starting outside. I don’t think it’s unusual for teams, you just hope that it’s always kept at a minimum.”

How do you get guys like Corey White ready to go? Someone who admits that he knows teams are coming after him because of how well Keenan has played.

“There’s a combination of things. You’re always looking at matchups, then you’re looking at your own scheme. You’re looking to change up the looks so it’s just not constant.”

Whenever you see or hear about the Marshawn Lynch run in that wild card game three years ago, do you still kind of wince a little bit or admire how great of a run it was?

“Listen, it was a tremendous run. That’s what’s great about the playoffs. You have the chance to do things that can be remembered for a long time. Usually it is accompanied with a win. I think that shoot, you watch it, you admire it and you look closely at wanted to make sure you prevent that from happening again.”

Read more: Sean Payton talks about facing Marshawn Lynch