‘We know we have to do better than what we’ve been doing; we’ve been far too inconsistent,’ says one.
The full bye comes at an ideal time for the New Orleans Saints, who have been inconsistent in their first ten games, resulting in a 5-5 record that keeps them atop the NFC South Division but has been a source of concern for a couple of months.
“First and foremost, I told them I want you to get away, I want you to get some rest, I want you to work on getting your bodies and your minds back,” Allen told a news conference on Monday. “And get ready to run this stretch.”
“That’s really the point of this. We did the same thing last year, winning three of our last four games.We need to reset a little bit, return from the bye, and be ready to go for this stretch run.”
Allen stated that no personnel changes will be made during the bye week, and that Derek Carr will remain the starting quarterback. Carr is currently in the league’s concussion protocol, but his right shoulder injury has been cleared. According to Allen, receiver link-placeholder-1 and cornerback link-placeholder-2 suffered “significant” injuries during the Vikings game, but they are not expected to be season-ending issues, and both will rehab at the team’s practice facility during the bye.
“I think we’ll evaluate everything we’re doing,” Allen went on to say. “We know we have to do better than this; we’ve been far too inconsistent.” We require a lot more consistency. “However, don’t expect any personnel changes during the bye week.”
“I don’t pay any attention to what’s being said in the outside world,” Allen said after Jameis Winston came off the bench to pass for 122 yards and two touchdowns with two interceptions in the Saints’ 27-19 loss to the Vikings. We need to improve in a variety of areas, but that is not something we are considering.”
The Saints’ offense and defense continue to be plagued by slow starts, with the culmination coming Sunday, when both units started slowly as Minnesota built a 24-3 halftime lead. The Vikings gained 297 yards and three touchdowns in the first half, converted four of six third-down opportunities, and quarterback Josh Dobbs completed 18 of 22 passes for 220 yards and a touchdown. The Saints gained 110 yards on offense and converted one of five third-down opportunities.
In the second half, the defense found its footing (91 yards and three points allowed, with seven stops on nine third-down opportunities), and the offense rallied behind Winston for 16 points and 170 yards.
“Defensively, I just don’t think we executed like we needed to in the first half of the game,” said Allen, whose team has given up 92 points in the first halves of the last five games before rallying to give up 23 points in the second halves. “And that’s been a pattern for us, so we’ve got to figure out how to fix it.”
“We’ll be working on a lot of that this week, figuring out how we can – and how I can – get our defensive players to perform better early in games.” Unfortunately, we had a potential interception opportunity on the first drive of the game, which ended up being an explosive play. That’s really been the source of our problems. We’re allowing far too many explosive plays in the first half, and that has to change. We’ll look at a variety of options for how to address this.”
Allen stated that the defense has not started sluggishly physically, but that a lack of execution can give the impression.
“Offensively, I just don’t think we were ever really able to get into a rhythm,” he added. “I believe we had 24 offensive plays in the first half.” It’s difficult to get into a rhythm that way. In the first half, they had some long, extended drives while our offense was sitting on the sideline, and we weren’t able to match that offensively. We played a lot of defensive snaps in the first half, but not enough offensive snaps.”
The Saints have made defensive adjustments that have simply not worked.
“We’ve tried several things,” he admitted. “Because we haven’t found the solution yet, we’ll keep working on it and trying.” I believe that the best answer is to try to do things that you believe you can do well.
“There’s times when we do it and we perform exceptionally well, but if we don’t put our eyes in the right spot or work the proper technique and those types of things, then offenses exploit it.”
Changes to the roster have been discussed and will be considered.
“I talked to the staff today, that we’ve got to evaluate everything that we’re doing, from top to bottom, and we’ve got to make sure that we’re, A, from a coaching standpoint, doing the right things and coaching the right things, and, B, are the players doing what we’re coaching them to do,” the coach said. “We need to fine-tune those things.”
“If they’re not doing everything we’re coaching them to do at the level we need them to do it at, then we do need to make some changes.” And, as you can see, that evaluation occurs throughout the season. That isn’t limited to a bye week.”
