Make it two in a row?

Saints travel to Vegas seeking next win
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NEW ORLEANS -- Saying his play calling was “awful” in the New Orleans Saints’ 34-23 win over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers this past Sunday, head coach Sean Payton put the onus on himself for the lackluster performance of the offense.
“Offensively, that was probably as bad of a game as I’ve had as a play-caller,” Payton said. “Just trying to find a rhythm and a tempo. That was awful. There’s a handful of plays that we’re going to watch on tape and it’s not going to be the players, It’s on me. I’ve got to be a lot better.”
For all of the pre-season hype of the New Orleans offensive unit and their plethora of stars, the Saints managed to produce only 271 yards of total offense. In fact, Tampa Bay out gained New Orleans by 39 yards.
The biggest difference in the contest, the Saints’ defense. Despite giving up an early Buccaneers’ touchdown, the New Orleans defensive unit held the Tampa Bay rushing attack to under 100 yards and picked off future Hall-of-Fame quarterback Tom Brady twice.
“For us defensively, it was just important for us to start fast,” stated linebacker DeMario Davis. “We knew that we were going to be facing a good offense with a lot of weapons and arguably one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever play the game, probably top two. So, we knew it was going to be a challenge.”
“We knew it was going to be a dogfight,” Davis continued. “Our defensive front played amazing, even though there is some stuff that we have got to clean up. They just played phenomenal.”
With the front seven able to keep the Buccaneer running game in check, New Orleans could keep their safeties over the top to help on wide outs Mike Evans and Chris Godwin and tight end Rob Gronkowski. Evans was held without a reception, while Gronkowski hauled in only two receptions for 11 yards.
Another integral part of the win was the play of the Saints’ special teams. Defensive end Margus Hunt, just called up from the practice squad, blocked a field goal and New Orleans recovered a short kick-off when Mike Edwards muffed the ball at the Tampa Bay 17-yard line.
New Orleans looks to move to 2-0 on the season when they travel to Las Vegas to take on the Raiders. It will be the first time and NFL game is played in the Gambling Capital of the World.
The game is set for a Monday night kickoff at 7:15 p.m.
The Raiders come into the game with an 1-0 record after a come from behind 34-30 win over the Carolina Panthers.
In that game, Raider quarterback Derek Carr threw for 239 yards and one touchdown, while 2019 first round pick Josh Jacobs rushed the ball 25 times for 93 yards and three touchdowns.
Rookie wide receiver Henry Ruggs III caught three passes for 55 yards, while Jacobs hauled in four receptions.
“Today was a very sloppy performance on the defense’s part,” Gruden said after the game against Carolina. “We got to go out and execute a way lot more than we did. We gave up a few big plays, and if you give up big plays in this league, you get beat. We were fortunate enough to come away with a ‘W’ today, but overall we did what we needed to do to get the win.”
Beating the Raiders will mean being better offensively. The Saints, a team built on a rhythm offense, cannot be off key this coming week if they wish to go 2-0 on the year.
New Orleans quarterback Drew Brees knows that getting the offense back to the form it was in last season will take some more work.
“Well, if you ask me how I felt like I played, I’d probably say I played awful as well,” Brees commented in his post-game interview. “So I guess we get to be our harshest critics coming off of this game. I know that certainly we are used to playing at a much higher level, offensively, and I think especially the passing game. So we’ll get that back on track.”
The Raider defense gave up 388 total yards of offense to the Panthers, including 260 yards through the air to former New Orleans quarterback Teddy Bridgewater.
The Saints have not started the season 2-0 since 2013 when they began the season 5-0 on their way to an 11-5 record.