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Saints are working to cure coverage woes that sank them against the Vikings

BY NICK UNDERHILL

Monday’s performance came as a surprise.

Anyone who watched the team this summer or during the preseason couldn’t have imagined the first exposure to the Saints defense would be this bad. The coaches were surprised. And the players on the field certainly weren’t expecting the defense to have so much trouble getting organized and executing their coverages.

“We hadn’t shown any of that the whole camp. We just got to go back to doing what we were doing the week before,” safety Kenny Vaccaro said. “It’d be different if we were the whole camp, you saw that in the preseason games, going against the offense, but it didn’t show up.

“That’s why (defensive coordinator Dennis Allen) said I saw stuff on tape that I haven’t seen before. That’s why we’re just hoping we had a mental lapse and we move on.”

After a decent start to the game, things fell apart. The breaks in coverage came quickly and were damaging. There were at least four or five against the Vikings, with each one putting New Orleans in a deeper hole.

P.J. Williams surrendered a 44-yard reception when he took a false step toward the line of scrimmage on an all-out blitz and was beaten downfield. A breakdown in Cover 2 coverage between Vaccaro and De’Vante Harris led to a Stefon Diggs’ touchdown.


Saints are working to cure coverage woes that sank them against the Vikings | Saints | theadvocate.com

My review saw rookie growing pains.

My number #1 mumbling was "Lattimore misses another assignment on this play." Not hammering him. Lattimore is better in man not zone.

Discipline and maintaining assignment responsibility would go a long way to stopping the bleeding by the entire secondary.

Number 2 was Cover 2. This might explain #1. going #2 always leads to a #1 with rookies

If Breaux was healthy we would not be talking about this.

Not sure we can run a cover 2 with our DL. Saint's DL produced absolutely no pressure all night long. That was the games theme song for Bradford and the Vikes OL

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