blueslover

Hey all, I have checked in on threads this year. Just haven't chimed in cuz I have been traveling and life is still in some turmoil. I posted a lengthy RIP for my wife a few months back if any missed it.

I am damned excited about the Saints though. Let's see how these final few weeks play out. This could be the best overall squad in the Brees/Payton era. I am currently researching travel to the NFC Championship game in New Orleans January 20. That's how good I think they are. I count the '09 NFCC game as my greatest sporting experience ever.

My mantra for years has been just get an average defense out there and Brees can get you a first round bye. Okafor picked up where he left off. The talent of Davenport is obvious. Rankins is becoming what we expected. Cam is peaking as a player. That's just up front. I love the idea that Brees successor one day might be handed a much better than average D with a dominant running game.

:whodat:

1. NEW ORLEANS SAINTS
2017 pass-blocking efficiency: 84.6

Best individual PBE: Max Unger, 98.0

The Saints ended the 2017 season ranked first among offensive lines with a PBE of 84.6 as the unit allowed 15 sacks, 26 hits and 69 quarterback hurries on 559 passing plays. The Saints were anchored by veteran center Max Unger, who played 100 percent of the team’s offensive snaps, doing so for a third consecutive year and allowed just 14 pressures all season. Rookie right tackle Ryan Ramczyk also enjoyed an excellent season, as he earned a pass-blocking efficiency of 96.6, the fifth-best mark ever recorded by a rookie tackle. With the Saints set to enter the 2018 campaign with left tackle Terron Armstead back to full strength, it would not be a surprise to see the Saints top this list once again.

PFF

The NFL has evolved to a who can protect or who can get to the QB game. Saints on the upswing in both.
Time for another shout on the Graham trade too. Unger was all and more of what we expected. Graham was looking for a new job this spring.

Thanks, no words

good luck trying to break into this RB room. After injuries and only 152 carries in the past three years you hafta wonder how much gas is left.

What kicks these old vets too is the minimum salary. It's over $1mil for Charles now. He might be a #4-5 good Kamara-like back up but not for $1mil+. Also a Trey Edmunds might have more special teams value at nearly half the price this year ($555K). I bet a lot of older guys would waive those minimums if it meant a check coming in.

As we are in the low ebb of offseason I wanted to share the death of my wife a couple of months ago. I post because I have noted her as the most knowledgeable female football fan I ever have known. She grew up in in a LSU religious household and learned game days were serious times at a young age. Always a Saints fan, she amped up her Whodatness when we married 13 years ago. I also have known few people who so clearly found their calling in life. She taught school for 44 years. We retired to live on the Pacific coast of Ecuador a few years back. It's a tough balance of universal justice reconciling only four years of retirement for one who gave so much. It was a joy here in a foreign land having a memorial with folks all donning black and gold and purple and gold attire. We even replicated a Second Line singing When the Saints Go Marching In.

She was a joy for football. The 2009 season and the NFC Championship game were highlights of our marriage. How many wives out there enjoy sitting in Louisiana August heat to watch Training Camp practices? Yup, it was another favorite event for us. She would be on my arse to make sure we had a good streaming source before the games started. She loved blowouts and would get giddy when games got out of reach. For tight or back & forth contests she could hardly stay in the room. Sometimes she did leave citing "It's just too much". After a successful play or drive I would have to notify her to come back.

Dedicating the season to her. Hope to return and sprinkle some ashes on the Superdome floor for some playoff games this year. WHODAT

Watching his 2017 game against the Rams, Robertson showed me how he sniffs out plays before the snap.

Linkage here

Was a nice story even if he never gets another rep. Good luck

Will be fun to see how Kamara performs as the sole lead dog. Giant opportunity for someone to snag some reps. Should heat up the RB camp a notch too.

And we thought Graham was soft. Fleener had the soft rep in Indy and continued here. I spose if your bell gets rung enough it gets harder to focus. I thought he would catch a ton down the seam. Huge disappointment.

Most notable to me was that the Saints had medical red flags on 3 of the next 4 edge rushers
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Saints pay big-time price, believe they’ve got a big-time player. I understand why some people are scratching their heads over the Saints selling out for a pass-rusher. After all, to move up 13 spots to get Texas-San Antonio phenom Marcus Davenport, they gave up a 2019 first-round pick to get one, which something none of the three teams moving up for quarterbacks did. There’s risk involved, to be sure. But what if I told you that, when he was discussed over the last few weeks, DeMarcus Ware’s name was invoked? And what if that was backed by weight of two men, coach Sean Payton and assistant GM Jeff Ireland, in prominent positions who were there when Ware was drafted by Dallas in 2005? Then would you be okay with it?

Where some teams saw a different dude in Davenport (he’s into poetry) and wondered how that temperament would befit an NFL pass-rusher, the Saints saw someone whose makeup wasn’t far off from Ware’s, complete with the same ability to flip the switch on game day. In fact, New Orleans marked his motor and competitiveness among his strengths. There are others too, of course—Davenport’s a freak athlete (4.58 in the 40) who’s still growing at 6'6" and 263 pounds, and he hit the trifecta when it came to smarts (good in school, good studying football, good processing in-game action). But having seen a guy similar to him make it playing that position, like Payton and Ireland had, was an important element.

Another key factor was how it hard it is to find legit pass-rushers, especially this year. You almost never find them in free agency, because teams that have them wind up keeping them, and it’s tough to land one outside the top 20 picks because that premium is placed on them. And this year, the Saints had medical flags on three of the four edge players ranked behind Chubb and Davenport, and that’s without mentioning guys with other problems (like LSU’s Arden Key). So they took the confidence in their evaluation, buoyed by that Ware example, and tied it to the scarcity that existed at the position. Add to it a desire to help out All-Pro Cam Jordan with a bookend, and also maximize what’s left of Drew Brees’ championship window … and no, their aggression really wasn’t that crazy.

LINK

For now I have Bradley Chubb ahead of Davenport as the better edge rusher prospect. Chubb is a little more polished and has a little better motor. But I want to be clear that Davenport has just as much if not more potential than Chubb.

Chubb is indeed the safer pick of the two, but with risk could come great reward with Davenport.

All I’m saying is don’t be surprised if three years or so down the road Davenport isn’t at at least as good as Chubb.

Maybe even better.

READ IT HERE