The New Orleans Saints are the talk of the NFL after their hottest offensive start since their Super Bowl season, but things can change quickly.
A fall back to earth will be greeted by the idea that they were all a mirage this whole time. The Eagles would like nothing more than to be the team to kick off that narrative in Week 3.
As Tyrann Mathieu told me last week, "we’re just in that position to where we just have to continuously prove that we can play with the big boys."
Philadelphia might have taken a bit of a tumble from the perch it had sat on before their swoon to end last season, but they're still very much a Super Bowl contender. With what will certainly be a loud and rocking Caesars Superdome atmosphere, this'll be another chance for the Saints to prove their legit against a team and offense they've had difficulty stopping. Let's see what they can do.
With all that in mind here are the three things I'm watching closest in the Saints matchup with the Eagles, along with some lagniappe.
1. Have the Saints solved Jalen Hurts?
The Saints won their last matchup with this Eagles squad a couple years back, but it comes with a very important caveat: QB Jalen Hurts didn't play.
New Orleans got to tee off on Gardner Minshew that day, and it went the same as it did all the other times the Saints got that opportunity. The defense looked dominant.
The opposite has been true whenever Jalen Hurts has been on the field, and he's become something of a poster child for the Saints' struggles with mobile quarterbacks. In those two games Hurts has been pedestrian as a passer, completing 55% (30-54) for 314 yards and a touchdown, but it's the 175 rushing yards and three more touchdowns on the ground that really make it difficult to win.
Related
You can also look at games against Kyler Murray, Lamar Jackson, heck, even Josh Dobbs and Daniel Jones, and it's turned what has otherwise been an elite Saints defense into 11 players riding the struggle bus.
It's an issue that has illustrated a relatively clear team speed issue over the past several seasons, but one the team did do some level of addressing for this year.
The two players in particular who stand out are LB Willie Gay and DE Chase Young, both players I would call peak athletes for their respective positions. Gay has been lightly used to this point (less than 50 snaps across two games), but his usage will always be matchup based. When teams are running three WRs onto the field, you're not going to see Gay out there. But when teams want to run with the QB it typically means heavier formations, and that should particularly true with A.J. Brown ruled out. To this point the Eagles have lined up with either two tight ends or two running backs on the field for nearly 35% of their snaps. Those are the snaps where I expect Gay to play a big role in tracking Hurts, if not spying him outright.
Young is also the type of athlete off the edge that feels like it change the Saints' fortunes in that regard. He'll have to play with discipline, but he should be a bit more effective at not getting juked.
I don't need the Saints to be perfect, and hopefully an improved offensive attack can help take the pressure off, but I do need this group to be improved and take one or two of the scores we've seen in those previous matchups off the board. If the Saints can do that I like their chances to win this game.
2. Keep pounding the ball
The New Orleans Saints have been one of the NFL's best rushing teams over the first two weeks of the season. The Philadelphia Eagles have been one of the worst rushing defenses over that span.
Simple enough, right? To borrow a phrase from the fighting Andy Daltons over there in Carolina: Keep pounding.
The Saints have rolled up 370 yards in two weeks at a clip of 4.9 yards per attempt and with a league-high six rushing TDs. Meanwhile the Eagles have allowed a league-high 6.4 yards per carry. Some of that is circumstantial, for example, a 33-yard touchdown run by WR Jayden Reed isn't a traditional run play.
Related
Still, it seemed like Bijan Robinson could do whatever he wanted in Week 2, and the only limitation was the number of carries. He ran the ball 14 times for 92 yards (6.9 yards per carry).
At this point my biggest concern for the Saints is that they might outsmart themselves. There's no question the Eagles will go into this game with the gameplan of dedicating resources to stopping the run and live with what happens over the top. I don't mind going deep when it's there, but it can't come at the expense of actually forcing the Eagles to fit up and take down Kamara and Co.
Force the Eagles to prove they can stop the run even if they are keying on it. If the answer is yes, adjust. If the answer is no, ride the run game to another easy day.
A 200-yard Alvin Kamara rushing game is something we haven't seen in a while. What better time than now?
3. Hunt the ex-Saints
I'm all for the Zack Baun storyline with the Eagles. It's cool to see a guy who I always felt played hard and did things the right way get an opportunity in a scheme he fits better and find some success.
All that said I'm going try to get him benched with how relentlessly I attack him in coverage.
The Saints know Zack well, and in particular they know his limitations. There's a good reason he only saw 56 coverage snaps over the entire 2023 season. He was targeted 8 times and allowed 7 completions for 54 yards and a pair of touchdowns. The lone incompletion went for an interception against the Texans that he fumbled back during the return. He's already logged more coverage snaps this year in two games for the Eagles (59), but the results haven't been better. He's been targeted 12 times, according to Pro Football Focus and allowed 9 receptions for 62 yards.
Related
We saw Derek Carr attack that in camp last year. Every time Baun got isolated in coverage the ball went his direction. I expect we'll see that again. The biggest thing the Saints have to watch for with Baun is his ability to pressure the QB from the second level, something we haven't seen much of against the Saints to this point.
The other player to attack in coverage, and honestly just watch out for in general, is C.J. Gardner-Johnson. I don't think for a second he'll miss the game with his foot injury, but there's a reason the Saints never turned to him at free safety. I'm challenging him over the top when I can with Rashid Shaheed. If he can keep up on a bum foot, good for him. I don't think he can.
The area of the game C.J. (who apparently goes by Chauncey now?) does concern me is the mental one. We all know about his ability to weaponize trash talk. He did it repeatedly for the Saints and drew personal fouls on opponents. He did the same thing against the Falcons on Monday and drew a punch from WR Ray-Ray McCloud. When I asked Dennis Allen Friday if they had to take some extra time this week to go over the mental land mines that might be putting down by any particular player, he joked a bit that he wasn't sure who I was talking about before confirming that yes, it's been a point of discussion.
Let's see how they handle it.
LAGNIAPPE
One of these days the pressure could be on the specialists, so we'll see how they handle it when that happens. So far Blake Grupe's only miss was a blocked PAT against the Cowboys, and he's otherwise 5-5 on FGs he's hit his other 10 extra points without issue. Matt Hayball showed a bit of what won him the job in his lone attempt with a 49-yard net kick in the 4th quarter against the Cowboys. I'm still not to expect when there's actually pressure on these guys. Maybe we find out this week. ... We're still waiting to see the Chris Olave explosion, and that's more about the Saints' opponent than anything else. There's been no stress on either of these games and no real reason to open it up. A line of 4 catches for 84 yards is actually pretty elite when you consider the QB only completed 11 passes in the game. His day will come, maybe the Eagles can put up a fight and force the Saints to open up the gameplan. ... To this point Klint Kubiak has done no wrong, but I do think there's a bit of a learning curve going on in the opposition scouting process. There's simply no book for what he's been doing with the Saints to this point, and to be honest, neither of the Cowboys or Panthers did a good job of forcing him to really show his hand. There should still be a good bit of that playbook left to mine that we haven't seen yet. Still, situational tendencies have been created and it's going to be on Klint to self-scout and understand what those are and when he needs to break them. The true test for an OC isn't whether you can surprise people with new wrinkles, it's whether you can continue to be effective once the opposition knows what you like to do. I still don't think we're there yet. ...
Related
... Marshon Lattimore is healthy now, and it's nice to see an injury be a one-game absence instead of a healthy one. It seems like this isn't the type of matchup he thrives in, though. When I've seen Marshon struggle it's been against teams that don't seem to have a clear-cut No. 1, and without A.J. Brown I'm not sure if the Eagles have that. Obviously Devonta Smith is a very good receiver, but I don't think he's necessarily a shadow candidate. If the Saints can lock him up with one guy and the defense can devote another hat to stopping the run, well, I don't think this game will be close. ... The protection plan last week in terms of stopping Micah Parsons was to do it by committee. It worked, Micah was a non-factor, but it did largely take the tight ends and backs out of the passing game -- with the exception of a long screen to Alvin Kamara. That won't be your gameplan every week, and I certainly don't think that'll be the case on against the Eagles. To this point the Eagles have three sacks, two of which came from Baun in the season-opener. To this point that group has been credited with just 13 total pressures, which ranks No. 24 in the NFL. For perspective, the Saints haven't exactly blown the doors off in the pressure department, but they have 7 sacks and their 24 pressures rank No. 6 in the NFL. I think you'll have the option to go to some of your more nuanced protections in your back pocket, but otherwise you'll play this mostly straight up. It'll be a good litmus test to see just where Taliese Fuaga and Trevor Penning are at in their development. If you can do that, things will open up in the passing game. ... Can Derek Carr keep this up? It's too early now, but if we see another few weeks like this the conversation for MVP will start being legitimate. Just saying.