saintsfan1976

Yep. We don't have a #2 corner. White, Bush, Robinson, Dixon, et al.... Second-tier players for the remainder of the season. This will truly be a roller coaster.

New Orleans Saints position spotlight: Secondary - ESPN

My take: It’s a neck-and-neck battle between the secondary and the defensive line for the Saints’ most disappointing position group so far this season. But the secondary has clearly undergone the most turmoil -- capped by Byrd’s season-ending knee injury in practice two weeks ago.

Byrd, who was expected to come in and take this rising secondary to another level, was struggling even before the injury. But he was hardly the only one as the Saints suffered through assignment breakdowns and missed tackles across the board. The Saints’ original No. 2 cornerback Robinson was benched during Week 2 (before returning as the nickel back after Byrd’s injury). His replacement, White, has been a bit of a roller-coaster ride with ups and downs since then. And fellow safety Vaccaro has been equally inconsistent, either because he was still dealing with soreness from last year’s broken ankle or because he was trying to do too much -- or both.

ESPN scouting Insider Matt Williamson’s take: “It’s been a nightmare. I think Lewis is turning into a great corner, on the positive side. But I never saw from Byrd what I saw in Buffalo, where he was a great ball hawk deep safety, played the ball in the air extremely well, baited quarterbacks, very few wasted steps. He didn’t show up at all. And maybe even more concerning, I thought Kenny Vaccaro was on the cusp of making the Pro Bowl. I don’t know if it’s injury-related, if he’s not all the way back, or he just doesn’t move as well as he used to, but he’s not doing anything well right now. Maybe the week off goes a long way [with Vaccaro]. And obviously the second corner’s a nightmare. They don’t have a second corner.”

Danno

Inconsistent? No, he's the worst starting safety in the entire NFL according to ProFootballFocus grades.

nola_swammi

I wonder how Malcolm Jenkins & Roman Harper are grading now?

Utah_Saint

Out of 142 safeties graded, Vaccaro is 142nd, Jenkins is 7th and Harper is 25th.

dizzle88

Wow.....

How did Malcolm miss so many tackles here and go to philly and be all pro?

Collectively he and harper have 6 times as many interceptions as our entire defense does

aldocella1

It's hard to imagine that our Rookie corners are worse than Corey White.

jeanpierre

Dennis Allen is available...

Rugby Saint II

That would be the one move to fix this ailing secondary. Loomis needs to make the phone call.

SaintsBro

If it were up to me, I'd hire Dennis Allen as a secondary coach IMMEDIATELY, shake his hand, wink at him across the table and then basically promise him first crack at the defensive coordinator position if Ryan screws things up ANY further. And I'd make Allen a "Mole" that reports to Loomis and Payton and Benson, on what the hell is happening in Ryan's defensive meetings and on his white boards. I don't trust Rob "ready to get weird" Ryan any further than I could throw him, at this point.

Payton has already gotten in trouble with being too hands-off, and giving the Defensive coordinator too much leeway, before -- with GW. In fact, the Saints coaches and organization have recently gotten in trouble with being too hands-off with the defensive staff TWICE, if you count Spags losing the team in the year Payton was out....this is probably on Vitt, too, since he is supposed to be Payton's right hand man.

Somebody needs to be following Rob Ryan to Miss Mae's after the games, taking notes on the meetings and copying his Powerpoint slides, or do whatever it takes to monitor him and his players. Right now I just don't trust the guy. Allen would be a huge improvement to bring him back, but the problems may be even bigger than that.

Utah_Saint

I don't know about Allen as a DC.

His only stint as a DC, 2011, his team finished 20th in yards allowed and 24th in points.
As a head coach, his defenses finished 18th in yards and 28th in points in 2012 and 22nd in yard and 29th in points in 2013.