Tag: New Orleans Saints

Saints talent evaluation watch: Smith County > Stockton

For those of you that are not pro football fans I will point out Donte Moncrief is a home boy. Through three games:

Donte Moncrief – 17 receptions, 200 yards, 3 TDs
Brandin Cooks – 16 receptions, 190 yards, 0 TDs

Meantime over NFL fantasy football central:

Since I’m making a fantasy mea culpa, I wish I could take a huge mulligan on Brandin Cooks. This was my biggest blunder of the fantasy draft season (so far). Ugh. Thankfully I had him in just one league this year. Yes, that is past tense. I already traded his (expletive). Thankfully it’s the NFL Fantasy LIVE league, so it’s really not an important league to me. But hot damn, that smarts. (To be fair, the guy drafting in front of me spent the entire summer saying how much he hated Odell Beckham Jr., and then drafted him right in front of me. Which caused me to take Jeremy Hill. Another mistake) I have no idea why I thought we could trust a single Saints receiver, but it’s not going to happen. Oh well, now I can move on. I replaced him with Donte Moncrief (for real), and I’m not going to think twice about it.

Ole Miss and LSU continue to win and Mississippi State is also fielding a decent team so at least we still have Saturdays. Consider this an open thread.

Not to pile on but…….

Ole Miss vs Texas. Photo by Kevin Bain/Ole Miss Communications
Donte Moncrief | Ole Miss vs Texas 2013. Photo by Kevin Bain/Ole Miss Communications

As we watched some of last night’s football game between the Colts and Jets my son and I traded banter about the 2014 NFL draft and how badly the Saints fared in talent evaluation from 2010 to 2014 with 2014 being the apex of the bad talent evaluation.

To set things up conventional wisdom at the time held that the Saints needed help at wide receiver and on defense in the secondary and at linebacker. We traded our first round and third round picks to the Arizona Cardinal and took wide receiver Brandin Cooks. We also signed safety Jairus Byrd to a high dollar free agent contract.

With the Saints first round pick Arizona drafted safety Deone Bucannon, who has since started every game for the Cards. In the third round, one pick before the New Orleans pick that was traded, the Colts took Wide Receiver Donte Moncrief, an Ole Miss guy the Saints scouting department should have been very aware of due to proximity. Last night Moncrief snagged 7 catches for the Colts for over 120 yards in a losing effort against the Jets. The Colts eased Moncrief in last year as they still had Reggie Wayne so Moncrief played the three receiver for only part of last year. How does his career stats compare to Brandin Cooks to this point? Continue reading “Not to pile on but…….”

You know the season is down the tubes when……

The biggest story line coming out of a disappointing loss is a Saints fan taking liberty with Jimmy Graham’s ass followed by the same fan apologizing the next week (during a disappointing loss) for groping Graham’s ass the week before:

And of course through it all the fans in the Dome (don’t get me started on that stupid train whistle) are keeping it classy by throwing elbows to the chin of a female Bengals fan (who has evidently never been to Mardi Gras):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b7azNxpCsww

Yes it is true the secondary has been decimated due to injury but there is a bigger problem at play with the Saints defense. When Rob Ryan showed up the Saints were supposed to swap over to Ryan’s version of the 3-4. Victor Butler was signed as a free agent joining Will Smith and Junior Gallett at outside linebacker. Butler and Smith both ended up hurt, Ryan adapted to his personnel moving Gallett back to D-End and swapping schemes to a 4-2-5 featuring 3 safeties. The Saints experienced some success last season in that scheme. Not so this year as the Saints zone coverage has been easily shredded. The secondary is not the biggest problem here as the lack of a consistent pass rush from the front 4 leaves the back end of the defense exposed. Continue reading “You know the season is down the tubes when……”

Tuesday Miscellany

I have lots of irons in the fire but today is my best opportunity to post some new content. Here are some links of interest:

‘Enemy for life’: Mayor Mitch Landrieu accused of steamrolling those who disagree with him ~ Tyler Bridges

I heard about this article before it was written and one of the examples I was cited was not mentioned by name in Tyler Bridge’s piece. In it is the reason I think Michael Bagneris is running against Landrieu for Mayor and as such there is a kernel of truth in the criticisms.  I found it very interesting that Bagneris even bagged a campaign contribution from Lakeshore, Mississippi, one of the unlikeliest of places one would expect an out of state democrat candidate for Mayor of NOLA to receive campaign ca$h.

Meantime I believe Slabbed was the first website to disclose the GOP was backing Bagneris so excuse me while I take a victory lap and blow raspberries at AROD.  😉

Next up from the consider it a well deserved compliment files:

A quip on Twitter lands me a public audience with Louisiana’s coastal chief, but it could have been worse ~ Mark Moseley

Graves is still full of it on Bermdoggle.

I saw the Richard Sherman interview with Erin Andrews after the NFC Championship game and thought Andrews was in over her head.  Even at its lowest levels, football is all about competition at its most Darwinian.  You gotta have a mean streak and the right attitude to excel at it and the cornerback everyone now loves to hate has it all in spades plus some.

Thus when you make the play that put your team in the Super Bowl and do it against the guy from the other team that has been trading trash with you all week, emotions would naturally be running very high.  You’d think since Erin Andrews has covered the sport for years she’d been more prepared for Sherman’s outburst.  Even better is this nugget from Sherman’s college days at Stanford:

Richard Sherman’s Email To His Stanford Dorm Is Priceless ~ Tom Ley Continue reading “Tuesday Miscellany”

What the peeps are talking about here in Soggy Bottom: Tuesday Omnibus

Pickering to deliver news on DMR foundation boats ~ Michael Newsom

I feel as though a media confab at Darwell’s draws near as the gang erects the grandstand over at the Bolton Building.

Court employee files complaint against St. Charles judge whose father is at the center of an FBI probe ~ Juliet Linderman

Former St Charles Parish DA Harry Morel’s daughter Judge Michele Morel was caught with her pants down showing her fanny to the minion. Bad form Ms Morel, very bad form.

Circus elephant shot in drive-by in Tupelo, Miss.; Ringling Bros. says animal is OK ~ AP Story via the WaPo and Russell

DEA Investigating Saints’ Vicodin Abuse Lawsuit, Sean Payton Denies All Allegations ~ SB Nation Series circa 2010

Pain and pain management in NFL spawn a culture of prescription drug use and abuse ~ WaPo Team Report

After Marathon attack, fellowship must prevail ~ Boston Globe Editorial Board

See what happens when a reporter sells out?

First the journalist sells out, essentially becoming a mouthpiece of the person that buys ’em.  Then said journalist gets accused of all manner of transgressions by the paranoid meglomaniac that owns ’em and are routinely threatened with the loss of their media credentials.

Gregg Williams may have been texting Saints draft picks to someone but it wasn’t me ~ Jeff Duncan

It would be one thing if any of these recent draft picks had actually done anything for the Saints besides warm the bench so I’m not certain what Sean Payton’s beef is with Duncan. I mean hell he already owns him lock, stock and barrel. That’s OK because Payton owns ’em all which is why I read Moosedenied.

Now folks, if you really want to see something fun, let Mini-me call Slabbed into the council chambers under the investigative powers clause of the Parish Charter, wanting to know who leaked me information about his 5am potty training sessions. The fur would fly people, that I promise.

Oh yeah coach, win 12 next year so no one will give a shit what you do to your harem of local sports reporters.

Meantime over on the Saints beat at Wang’s place…..

CPAs like the concept of materiality thus it is only natural I’d be drawn to Grand Master Wang at Moosedenied for a comprehensive Saints update titled Material Issues. His take on whether Sean Payton will violate the terms of his suspension is priceless. Here is a snippet:

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls… dying time’s here.

Welcome back to ass-kicking season, bitches. I don’t know about you, but it seems to me Drew’s looking a little nervous there. And why shouldn’t he be? After all, THE WHOLE DAMN TEAM IS IN TURMOIL! Or something. The Saints are entering the 2012 season amidst UNPRECEDENTED CIRCUMSTANCES! And what in the hell would Drew Brees know about unprecedented? Clearly we’re screwed. The Saints will be lucky not to have completely imploded by Halloween. Dozens of national Legitimate Media™ types can’t possibly be wrong on this.Fortunately for us, there will be plenty of time over the next six months or so for us to troll them and focus on how they suck, as the wins continue to mount and they become increasingly baffled and belligerent. Oh, it’s gonna be big fun. Wait for it… wait for it…

Continue Reading at Moosedenied

And you’re outta here: NFL suspends Sean Payton for entire year.

I’ve been following Bountygate but I did not foresee the boom being lowered this badly on Coach Payton. Coach Gregg Williams is done IMHO folks and Payton perhaps as well as head coach of the Saints. The bounties were not the first sign of the problems inside Team Payton to manifest themselves and that does not count the scathing criticisms levied at him for his behavior during the 2009 Super Bowl run.

Where the 2012 Saints season goes from here is anyone’s guess.  It is not off to a good start.

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Let

Has the Who Dat Nation seen the last of guard Carl Nicks?  There are a bunch of dominos fixing to fall into place one way or the other with our beloved Saints. Mike Triplett over at the T-P has some analysis of the Drew Brees contract talks. Meantime Grandmaster Wang over at Moosedenied figures guard Carl Nicks will be a casualty of the Brees contract.

I remain cautiously optimistic Brees, Nicks and Colston will be back. Neither Jonathan Vilma nor Sedrick Ellis 2011 performances are worthy of the scarce 2012 salary cap dollars they command.

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