Saints Hope To Correct Short-Yardage Rushing Woes from Within

Despite leading the NFL in points and yards, the New Orleans Saints had a significant offensive weakness in 2008. They struggled to pick up first downs in short-yardage situations, particularly when power running back Deuce McAllister was not on the field.

While they tried to fix their leaky defense in the offseason, the only significant move they made in the running game was releasing McAllister, whose damaged knees kept him from being an every-down back. They are gambling that holdovers Pierre Thomas and Reggie Bush will pick up the tough yards they weren’t able to get in crucial situations last season.

That liability might have cost the Saints a playoff spot, contributing to two excruciating losses in consecutive weeks after they beat the Tampa Bay Bucs to open the season. 

Trying to protect a 24-22 lead at Washington with a little more than four minutes left, they handed the ball to Thomas on 3rd-and-1 at their own 37-yard line. He hesitated, got caught from the backside, and was tackled for no gain.

A first down would have forced the Redskins to use their timeouts and put the Saints in position to run out the clock if they moved the chains one more time.

Instead, they punted. Santana Moss caught a 67-yard touchdown pass on the next play, and the Redskins won, 29-24.

A week later, the Saints faced a 3rd-and-1 at the Denver 24 with 2:19 left, trailing by a 34-32 score. They gave the ball to Thomas again, and he was dropped for a 1-yard loss.

With a first down, they could have milked the clock and attempted a chip-shot field goal in the final seconds. 

Instead, they settled for a 43-yard attempt by unreliable kicker Martin Gramatica at the two-minute warning. It went wide right.

Just like that, New Orleans was 1-2 instead of 3-0. The Saints never were more than a game over .500 the rest of the way.

Unless New Orleans signs a late, available free agent like Edgerrin James, an unlikely move at this point, the solution will have to come from within. The list of running backs on the summer roster includes Mike Bell, Lynell Hamilton and undrafted free agents P.J. Hill and Herb Donaldson, but Thomas and Bush are the only serious candidates.
 
Thomas is a better bet than Bush, who is stronger in open space than tight quarters.

Thomas says he has increased his weight from 215 pounds to 225. He averaged 4.8 yards a carry last season, a yard better than Bush. He should benefit from the experience he gained as a featured back for the first time, leading the Saints with 625 rushing yards.

He watched how McAllister picked a spot and plowed into the line to pick up first downs when Payton started using him more in the second half of the season.

As good as the offense is, the Saints cannot afford similar breakdowns this year. Payton lost so much confidence in short-yardage situations that he called for an end around to wide receiver Devery Henderson on 4th-and-1 from the Tampa Bay 30 on the first series of a November meeting between the teams.

Henderson was pushed out of bounds three yards behind the line of scrimmage. The Saints lost that game, too, 23-20.

Saints fans screamed for McAllister in short-yardage situations all year. Then they screamed at Payton when the plays failed while McAlister stood on the sideline.

If chants of “Deuuuuuce” are still reverberating around the Superdome this season, we’ll know the Saints should have upgraded at running back.

If McAllister’s name never gets mentioned, the offense will have solved its only trouble spot.

Saints’ Sean Payton Recovered From Early Setback

Former New York Giants coach Jim Fassel stripped brash, young offensive coordinator Sean Payton of his play-calling duties after the 2002 New York Giants scored 10 or fewer points in four of their first seven games.

With Fassel calling the shots, the Giants averaged 27 points, won seven of their nine games and scored 38 in a wild first-round playoff loss to the San Francisco 49ers. Although Payton kept his title, the scoring explosion pointed to him as the real goat rather than just the scapegoat for the slow start. 

Suffice it to say he recovered from the most embarrassing time of his coaching life pretty well. His career trajectory has gone straight up while Fassel’s has gone straight down.

Fassell has been fired twice, first by the Giants two weeks before the end of the 2003 season, then by the Baltimore Ravens in October of 2006 as offensive coordinator after his unit ranked 31st, 24th and 28th in two and a half years. He has been out of the league since then and reportedly will coach the Las Vegas franchise in the upstart UFL this fall.

Payton, entering his fourth year as coach of the New Orleans Saints, is one of the most gifted quarterback tutors and daring play-callers in the NFL. He might be too daring at times – witness the botched reverse against the Tampa Bay Bucs that turned a late lead into a lousy loss two years ago – but the good far outweighs the bad.

Dallas signed Tony Romo as an undrafted rookie at Payton’s urging in 2003. The payoff: two Pro-Bowl appearances.

New Orleans signed free agent Drew Brees with Payton’s support three months after they hired him in 2006 even though Brees was coming off elbow surgery.

The payoff?

The Saints led the NFL in total offense and passing offense while finishing fifth in Payton’s first year.

They were fourth in total offense, third in passing and 12th in scoring in 2007.

Last year, they ranked first in all three categories even though running backs Reggie Bush and Deuce McAllister, wide receiver Marques Colston and tight end Jeremy Shockey missed significant time with injuries. Pierre Thomas, the Saints’ leading rusher, was an undrafted free agent. Lance Moore, their leading receiver, had 33 career catches entering the season and was considered a complementary player at best.

Brees was the only marquee guy who stayed healthy, but Payton’s offense didn’t miss a beat.

Payton, 45, cannot be classified as a protégé of any other coach. His pass-heavy, aggressive approach is nothing like the two men he considers his closest NFL mentors.

He learned how to coach offense in the NFL from Jon Gruden, the Philadelphia Eagles’ offensive coordinator in 1997 when he took his first NFL job there as QB coach.

He learned organizational skills from Parcells, who hired him in Dallas before the Giants could fire him at the end of 2002. 

Gruden’s offenses were conservative at Tampa Bay. Parcells’ offenses have been conservative almost everywhere.

Before his setback in New York, Payton made his name there. Fassel asked him to call the plays for the first time in a Dec. 5 game against the New York Jets when he was just the quarterbacks coach. The Giants exploded for 41 points and 490 yards.

They reached the Super Bowl in 2000 with Payton as offensive coordinator and play-caller. Under his guidance, quarterback Kerry Collins threw for a career-high 3,610 yards.

Then, suddenly, Payton was done as a play-caller for three years. He did not regain that duty until 2005, when Parcells named him passing game coordinator in Dallas.

He has total control of the offense in New Orleans. Although he does not get in the way of his assistants, it’s his show.

When former offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Doug Marrone accepted the Syracuse coaching job last December, Payton let him leave before the end of the season, and the staff operated shorthanded for the last two games.

No harm there since Payton is the de-facto coordinator. New Orleans scored 42 and 31 points.

Most of his assistants in New Orleans had limited NFL backgrounds when he hired them.

Running backs coach Brett Ingalls, wide receivers coach Curtis Johnson and tight ends coach Terry Malone became first-time NFL assistants in 2006.

New offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael, Jr. did not become a full NFL position coach until Payton hired him to work with the quarterbacks in 2006. 

Quarterbacks coach Joe Lombardi was at tiny Mercyhurst College from 2002-05.

Line coach Aaron Kromer, who held the same role with the Oakland Raiders when they played in the 2003 Super Bowl, is the only offensive assistant with real autonomy.

The makeup of the defensive staff, away from Payton’s expertise, is completely different.

New coordinator Gregg Williams, new line coach Bill Johnson (replacing Ed Orgeron, who left for a college job at Tennessee), linebackers coach Joe Vitt and secondary coach Dennis Allen have 64 years of NFL experience among them.

Williams’ experience could help him succeed where former defensive coordinator Gary Gibbs failed.

Gibbs, a first-time NFL coordinator, did not have the same credibility as Payton. 

Williams does.

His reference list includes legendary 46 defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan, who was with the Tennessee Titans in 1993 when Williams was special teams coach, Titans coach Jeff Fisher, whom he worked under from 1994 to 2000, and Joe Gibbs. Gibbs hired him to be defensive coordinator for the Washington Redskins in 2004 after his failed three-year stint as Buffalo Bills coach.

Williams, 50, chose New Orleans over Green Bay even though he and Payton did not know each other well. Williams wanted to coach along side a prolific offense. Payton wanted a proven winner.

The brash young coach has grown up.

Same Old Story? Saints Will Be on Cusp of Playoffs in 2009

The New Orleans Saints have wasted two years of quarterback Drew Brees’ prime.

After missing the playoffs for the second consecutive season since Brees led them to the NFC Championship game, they fired defensive coordinator Gary Gibbs, replaced him with the highly respected Gregg Williams, and revamped their suspect secondary.

The changes should make them good enough to return to the postseason, but it’s hardly a slam dunk. The offense needs to be just as explosive as last year, when Brees nearly set the NFL single-season passing record and New Orleans led the league in yards and points. The defense, still no juggernaut, needs to come up big in critical moments.

The pass defense, which ranked 23rd last year, will make or break the Saints’ season.

Last year, the defensive backs came up empty too many times, even when they were in perfect position. Case in point: Carolina receiver Steve Smith’s 39-yard catch of a jump ball in tight double coverage near the end of regulation in the season finale. That play, which never should have happened, helped the Panthers kick a field goal with one second left after New Orleans had rallied from a 30-10 deficit to go ahead 31-30.

The off-season changes came quickly. 

The Saints cut starting safeties Josh Bullocks and Kevin Kaesviharn and picked up 11-year NFL starter Darren Sharper from the Minnesota Vikings. They also signed Pierson Prioleau, a veteran safety who played for Williams in Buffalo, Washington and Jacksonville. They join Usama Young, who will switch to free safety from corner-back, and Roman Harper.

Sharper, a four-time Pro Bowl selection, is on the downside of his career, but the Saints don’t need a world-beater. They just need a guy who won’t get beaten by seemingly everyone in the world. 

The Saints’ top three corner-backs should be free-agent pickup Jabari Greer, who returned two interceptions for touchdowns for the Buffalo Bills last season; Tracy Porter, who started the first five games as a rookie before being sidelined with a dislocated right wrist; and rookie Malcolm Jenkins, the No. 14 pick in the draft. All are potential upgrades, but they are unproven in New Orleans.

The key to a turnaround may not be the new players, but the new guy coaching them. Williams, a nine-year coordinator and three-year head coach, brings better credentials than Gibbs, who never had run an NFL defense when Saints coach Sean Payton hired him.

Williams’ defenses have ranked 10th or better five times in the last nine years and have finished third or higher three times—once each during his stops at Tennessee, Buffalo and Washington. The Saints finished in the bottom 10 defensively the past two seasons.

Williams should coax more production out of highly paid ends Charles Grant and Will Smith, who combined for six sacks last season. The Saints were 22nd in the NFL with 28 sacks, exposing their undermanned secondary.

If the pass rush and coverage improve even marginally, the Saints will make a run at the playoffs. They were closer than their 8-8 record indicated last season, losing five games by three points or fewer and scoring 70 more points than they allowed.

They re-signed their two key unrestricted free agents—linebacker Jonathan Vilma and offensive tackle Jon Stinchcomb.

Their kicking game, which cost them two games early in the year, improved dramatically when midseason pickup Garrett Hartley connected on all 13 of his field goal attempts.

They will miss the power running of Deuce McAllister, but his bad knees reduced him to a short-yardage specialist. A healthy Reggie Bush and the underrated Pierre Thomas, who averaged 4.8 yards a carry last season, can hold their own in a pass-first offense.

The Saints have no shot, though, if the passing game falls off even a little bit. New Orleans was No. 1 in offense primarily because of Brees’ brilliance. He was named NFL Offensive Player of the Year after throwing for 5,069 yards—15 shy of former Miami Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino’s record total in 1984. Brees camouflaged the flaws in an average receiving corps with his pinpoint delivery and terrific decision-making.

The receivers, not the running backs, are the Saints’ most significant concern on offense. They struggled to get consistent separation, leading to Brees’ high interception total (17) as he tried to force the ball into tight coverage.

Marques Colston, who missed five games after injuring his left thumb in the season opener, dropped numerous passes when he returned. He finished with a career-low 47 catches.

Lance Moore, who emerged as Brees’ go-to-guy in Colston’s absence, averaged a modest 11.7 yards on his team-high 79 catches.

Devery Henderson, the Saints’ best deep threat, averaged a whopping 24.8 yards but had only 32 receptions because of his inconsistent hands.

Tight end Jeremy Shockey, limited by a groin injury, had zero touchdowns among his 50 receptions and averaged only 9.7 yards on his catches. He was less effective than backup Billy Miller (45 catches, 579 yards).

Second-year wideout Robert Meachem was virtually invisible, busting too many assignments to earn consistent playing time.

The Saints have enough pluses to make the playoffs and enough minuses to be looking at tiebreaker scenarios as they chase that elusive goal in late December.

Marino, the man Brees chased all of last season, missed the postseason four years in a row in the prime of his career (1986-89) because the parts around him weren’t good enough.

That’s one mark Brees has no interest in catching, but he is in danger of inching closer this year.

NFL Sport Channel Latest

• Just How Far Would You Go?
• Sorry Rex, But It Isn’t Happening
• Super Bowl Predictions: Five Stat-Free Reasons Why the Eagles Will Reach The Super Bowl
• Seahawks Attempt to Turn Corner With Heavy Pursuit of Pete Carroll
• Bill Cowher Unlikely to Coach in 2010