Week 11 - GDT - Falcons (3-6) @ Saints (7-2)

[Mid Iowa]

16 hours ago, Canadian Saint said:

Not a whole lot to complain about today. Defense has really stepped up, in the last 3 weeks we've given up 25 points total. Not per game, total. That includes QB scrubs such as Tom Brady and Matt Ryan. Nick Mullins was the best QB performance of that trio thus far. Dennis Allen take a bloody bow. The way he's turned around the D has been really amazing. We're getting more pressure, but more importantly our secondary is covering much much better. DPI and penalties in general have trended downward. Kwon Alexander really compliments Demario Davis in a way that Anzalone never has. I'm not sure if it's his play recognition or his mastery in coverage, but goodness those two looked phenomenal together. Kansas City is going to be a massive test.

Our D was one of the worst in the first 5 weeks, and is the best in the NFL in the most recent 5 weeks. What's crazy is our front 7 is only allowing 3.3 yards per rush. #1 in the NFL.

16 hours ago, Canadian Saint said:

The offense wasn't great but it improved as the game wore on. There are some growing pains, but we had the same experience with Teddy B. I think it'll take a few weeks for Hill to get comfortable in this offense, but I think he can be solid. It's going to be a lot more RPO and deep balls but with MT and Sanders, I think we'll handle it. Having Kamara take off the pressure is going to be huge.

Agreed. Look at his performance yesterday. Granted, it's against the worst secondary in the league, but Hill's numbers were really good, and he had 2 dropped passes that hit receivers right in the hands. He was 78.3% in his first ever start. 

If we want to compare Hill to Brees, we could look at Brees's first 2 starts of the season and chat about who had the better "out of the gates" game. 

We also know teams are going to have film on Hill, so it's going to get harder for him, and he'll flow with the offense more, so if he stays healthy, I think we're in good shape with him. And we always have Winston to back him up, so not a bad 3rd option.

Many teams struggle to find a suitable QB. We might actually have 3. That's depth!!!

[nolaexpat]

5 hours ago, Mid Iowa said:

Our D was one of the worst in the first 5 weeks, and is the best in the NFL in the most recent 5 weeks.

That almost seems normal to me now for our Dennis Allen defense. He brings the whole New Orleans experience: start with a monster hangover but eventually get yourself together and do some real work by about the middle of the day season.  

Hill definitely has potential. He leaned heavily on MT and that was probably part of the plan. I mean, he basically stared him down on almost every throw and Thomas still caught almost everything that came his way. It's nice for a QB to have that kind of a blanket at his disposal. I think that's also why Kamara was not as involved in this week's plan: the goal was probably to use this time against a bad version of the Falcons to get the new QB's feet under him. He's going to start for at least two more weeks and probably one or two more than that. You have to imagine, like Payton is, that Hill has to go vs KC because Drew might not 100% by then. He's a monster player and an extremely tough human but this injury isn't nothing, and he isn't 30.

We didn't need Kamara to be Kamara to win this game, but we did need Hill to get some actual game time reps and get rid of the jitters in a game that we were not likely to lose, even without offensive punch. ATL usually plays us hard but they lost their coach and I think it took the wind out of them. Also without Drew on the field, it looked like even they just had less... fire. Just my observations, of course, completely meaningless in the real world. Maybe next tie will be different, who knows?

[Spartica4Real]

Taysom Hill.

[JMG5]

4 hours ago, nolaexpat said:

We didn't need Kamara to be Kamara to win this game

Looked like he was on a snap count with the ankle injury. We used Murray a lot.