Another strong performance from the New Orleans Saints defense was unfortunately lost in the noise after a 24-10 loss to the Atlanta Falcons.
On a down-to-down basis, the Saints mostly kept the lid on Atlanta’s offense.
Talented running back duo Bijan Robinson (28.6 %) and Tyler Allgeier (25 %) were both held well below their season averages in terms of rushing success rate — a statistic that gauges whether individual runs were successful based on the down and distance situations (both of them are averaging around 42 % this season).
The Falcons were working without their regular starting quarterback, Michael Penix, but backup Kirk Cousins is not far removed from signing a $180 million contract with Atlanta.
More than half of Cousins’ 199 passing yards came on three plays — which, obviously, must be factored into the equation. But on a play-to-play basis, he wasn’t finding things easy going against a young Saints secondary, and New Orleans sacked him on 11.1 % of his dropbacks, the fourth highest rate in the NFL this week.
Atlanta ran 11 plays on third down against the Saints (not counting an intentional spike to stop the clock). Those plays went for a total of 21 net yards and only three of them moved the chains.
The Saints sacked Cousins three times, all of them on third down. The Falcons’ -0.75 Expected Points Added (EPA) per play on third down was the fifth-worst mark in the NFL going into Monday Night Football. Chase Young, who recorded his fourth sack in six games since coming back from a calf injury, pressured Cousins four times in 16 pass rush snaps.
The only thing that really bit the Saints defensively was the explosive plays — some of which were designed to use the Saints’ aggressiveness against them.
Four plays essentially led to the Falcons’ two touchdown drives, leading to gains of 23, 32, 32 and 49 yards — nearly half of Atlanta’s total yardage output.
The 23-yarder to Kyle Pitts was a faked screen to Robinson in which Pitts began as a blocker in space before sprinting up the sideline to catch a deep pass from Cousins. A few plays later, the Falcons lined Robinson up in the slot to the right side of the formation, then motioned him across the line of scrimmage to catch a screen. It officially went as a rushing play because the pass traveled backward, but Robinson made one man miss, dusting rookie Jonas Sanker with a juke, before turning upfield for 32 yards.
The Falcons caught the Saints again with a screen to Robinson for a big chunk in the fourth quarter, moving the chains on second and 23 and setting up the deep shot to Darnell Mooney for 49 yards — the only one of those explosives that wasn’t built off of some sort of screen pass.
Overall, it might have been enough to win the game for the Saints, only …
Dead Zone
Surprisingly, there were teams that fared worse in the red zone than the Saints did in Week 12, but not many.
At this point, it’s hard to find the words to adequately capture how poorly the Saints have fared in prime scoring opportunities this season. Sunday’s game against Atlanta seemed to represent a new low, especially considering the Saints’ two trips inside the 1-yard line.
New Orleans ran 13 plays inside Atlanta’s 20-yard line. The New England Patriots were the only other team this week to run at least five plays in the opponent’s red zone and not score a touchdown. The Falcons, by contrast, ran only three plays inside the Saints 20 (one touchdown).
Of the 13 plays inside the 20, the Saints attempted only four passes, and that number is really actually three because one pass was only the result of a botched snap over Taysom Hill’s head on a designed run. Only two of those passes would have been thrown by Tyler Shough — note the would have been; Shough was sacked on both dropbacks.
Some of that number is skewed by Shough’s decision making — he had multiple scrambles in the red zone, and one keeper that included a pass option. But still, Hill was the only Saints player who actually attempted a Saints pass inside the red zone.
And, of the nine rushing plays by the Saints inside the Atlanta 20-yard line, none of them featured a running back with the ball in his hands. Hill carried the ball five times in the red zone, gaining three yards. Shough ran four times for eight yards.
There were failures in execution, to be sure. But that was also a failure in play-calling by Moore.
The end result: The Saints averaged -0.89 EPA per play in the red zone. Only the Minnesota Vikings, Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Buffalo Bills put up worse numbers in Week 12.