Let's just face it ... it's difficult to write a stock up column after a game like that.
The Saints lost 26-9, with the insult to injury being the end of the defense's streak of holding opponents to 20 or less. But that's the least of this team's worries. The offense goes long stretches without being able to move the ball, and even when it does, touchdowns feel miles away. The defense has been shredded like tissue paper in crunch time of three consecutive games.
The easy thing would be to put this on the play-calling, but honestly I think that's too kind. There's no right play call for bad football, and right now that's what the Saints are playing. They're lucky to be 2-2.
And don't take this the wrong way: I'm absolutely not vindicating Pete Carmichael and the offensive staff. My indictment runs deeper than that. If the issue was solely play-calling, then calling different plays would solve the issue. The Saints are too talented to look as outmatched as it did against an undermanned Bucs team. I'm questioning the preparation. I'm questioning the scheme. I'm questioning everything.
As Dennis Allen said to open his post-game presser: "We got our ass beat today. Unacceptable."
With that in mind, here are my stock up and stock down players. This time I'm starting with stock down, because stock up will be a few sentences maximum and serve as a footnote to a game that constituted failure at every level.
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STOCK DOWN
CARR TO OLAVE
Uh, what happened? I was pretty vocal about my opinion that Derek Carr shouldn't have been starting this game. At best he was playing through a shoulder issue, at worst it was limiting in ways that took a scuffling offense to a new low. But never did I think I'd see a game where you were only able to connect with Chris Olave for 1 catch and 4 yards. The Bucs have a good defense, but they don't have that kind of defense.
So what gives? There was one big miss by Carr on what looked like a busted coverage up the sideline in the third quarter. There were a few plays where it looked like Olave had a chance but he wasn't able to get it done in a contested situation. In the end the entire offense looked defeated both physically and emotionally.
Carr had his worst day yet in a Saints uniform. He won't blame the shoulder, and it wasn't all the shoulder, but too many throws were a tick off to not feel like there was something there. Either way that's on him. If it was a problem, being too proud to miss a game is hurting the team. If it wasn't the problem, being ineffective like he was today is hurting the team.
Take your pick, because neither answer is a good one.
Not all days will be this bad. I doubt we'll see the Saints pulling any major levers just yet, but a day like today certainly brings that possibility a lot closer. It's probably a gift that this team gets to go work on their issues away from home for the next two weeks (at Patriots, at Texans). The Patriots will be 1-3 and don't exactly have a world-beating defense.
All I know is I was as high as I could be on the Carr-Olave pairing through 10 quarters of football. What I saw today makes no sense. Hopefully it's an aberration.
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MARSHON LATTIMORE
I truly didn't think I'd be writing this, but there's officially a checkmark in the Mike Evans half of this rivalry. Evans only played one half, but he still did enough in that time to burn the Saints. His 3 catches for 40 yards also doesn't encompass the third down where won so soundly (you could argue it was OPI), that Marshon's only option was to reach out and grab his legs. It was honestly a great play, because the alternative was a wide open touchdown.
For this defense to be successful, Marshon Lattimore has to put people on an island in prime matchups and never let them leave. He's an outside corner, so he's not going to be following a Chris Godwin into the slot. It was also pretty clear that once Evans went out, Tampa was more than happy to throw away from No. 23.
By anyone else's standards, his day would've been fine. For the second consecutive week he looked human.
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THE TACKLERS
I don't have the stats in front of me, but missed tackles and get-of-the-field opportunities will be brutal to look at on film. Whether it was Baker Mayfield escaping pressure for first down after first down, Chris Godwin breaking free for a huge play to ice the game, or a host of other Bucs plays that picked up a lot more than they had to -- there are a lot of dirty hands in this game.
There is a level to which you could blame the offense for putting its defense in bad situations. That's certainly what happened just before halftime when Isaac Yiadom got what felt like a momentum swinging interception, only for Adam Prentice to fumble inside the 10 and send the defense back on the field. But the defense wasn't gassed when it had the Bucs pinned back at its own 13 with a 3-0 lead and allowed a 17-play, 87-yard drive for a touchdown. At the beginning of that drive, they'd spent a total of 4:50 on the field.
Don't tell me they were gassed after the offense had extended drives for field goals on back-to-back possessions (7:09 and 5:02). The offense struggled, yes, but in an 8-point game, a stop from the defense is what you needed to make this game a real contest. The first time they allowed the Bucs to go 42 yards in 6 plays for a 50-yard field goal. The next time it was 10 plays for 75 yards and a TD.
Perhaps I'm being too hard on a defense that's been asked to carry an anemic offense for a majority of the past two seasons. But at the end of the day this is supposed to be that kind of group. For the third consecutive game they fell flat in crunch time. They got away with it against the Panthers. It burned them against the Packers. The Saints lost in all phases against the Bucs. To me, what's been happening to the defense is more concerning than an offense that's had predictable struggles.
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DISHONORABLE MENTIONS
FB Adam Prentice. I mean, come on, dude. All a fullback has to do to get a cheer is not mess up. In this game there were multiple instances where Prentice had a chance to impact the game positively. He dropped a pass on the second drive of the day that would've been good for a chunk play on 3rd and 9. He fumbled when the Saints were trying to simply get the ball of their own goal line. I wouldn't be particularly surprised if he gets replaced this week. ... OC Pete Carmichael. As I mentioned above, I don't like to harp too much on play-calling. I'll look at it situationally or not at all. For example, I'm OK with shot plays on 3rd and 2 near midfield. In most cases it'll catch the defense in a bad coverage. But it doesn't ALWAYS have to be that. It seems that the Saints offense runs so many tendency breakers that it's actually become an established tendency. Zigging when you're supposed to zag only works if the defense isn't already zagging. That's also true of the Taysom Hill offense, which got too predictable in the third quarter. I think the play-calling criticism is generally overplayed, because there's a lot more to criticize than that. It's still got to better. ... QB Jameis Winston. This is an odd one, but ugh. I understand it's late in the game and you're just trying to make something happen. I understand the interception doesn't really matter in the grand scheme. But if your goal is to instill confidence in your coaches to the point that they'd actually put you in the game, maybe don't throw your only pass of the day up for grabs? Maybe do anything else? All that did was play into preconceived narratives that aren't particularly fair, but absolutely exist. A well-executed drive there and you force people to ask real questions about whether you should be starting. Not today.
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STOCK UP
LT TREVOR PENNING
Lost in the misery of the last two weeks has been the continued development of Trevor Penning, the punching bag of Weeks 1 and 2. He's quietly been the most consistent blocker the past two weeks, even on a day when everything went poorly. The Saints are 2-2. As bleak as things seem after Week 4, the team isn't folding. Penning's development at the LT spot is a positive.
RB ALVIN KAMARA
The Saints couldn't muster much offense in this game, but what they did was virtually all attributed to Alvin Kamara. In his first game back he caught 13 passes, and while he wasn't able to generate huge yardage, his ability to pick up first downs is what kept the Saints within shouting distance in the second half of this game. There are a lot of things the Saints need to do differently, but peppering Kamara isn't one of them.
DT BRYAN BRESEE
The defense struggled today, particularly when it came to getting off the field on third downs. But rookie Bryan Bresee was a key piece in the handful of stops the defense did manage. He blew up a red zone run so effectively in the first half you'd assume he started in the backfield.
He wrapped up Baker Mayfield for a sack on the opening possession of the third quarter that forced a punt.
The interior line tends to be a longer-term development, but the Saints seem to have found a key contributor in Bresee. On a day where so much went poorly, he was a bright spot.