BREAKOUT: New Orleans Saints’ Tyler Shough, Devaughn Vele Can Shape Their FUTURE in Tampa Matchup

BREAKOUT: New Orleans Saints’ Tyler Shough, Devaughn Vele Can Shape Their FUTURE in Tampa Matchup

New Orleans Saints quarterback Tyler Shuck and wide receiver Devon Vele have the opportunity to solidify themselves as a part of the future this weekend against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. You are Locked On Saints, your daily New Orleans Saints podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. What is good Huda nation and Huda family? I am your host, your friend Ross Jackson, New Orleans native, your New Orleans Saints expert and credentialed member of the media covering those New Orleans Saints as a Saints beat writer over at louisianaapasports.net. And on today’s episode of Locked on Saints with injuries piling up at the position, safety rotation could be a challenge for Brandon Staley’s defense this weekend. Isaiah Stalird and Danny Stzman, the two young linebackers deserve more opportunities as the season is winding down. Tyler Shuck, Devon Vele, and Charlie Smith is where we’ll kick it all off as key contributors to watch this weekend against Tampa Bay. We got all that and a little bit of land for you on today’s episode. We appreciate you very much. Whether it’s your first time or your next time, being here with us this time, making us your first listen and being an everyday here on the show, which is a proud part of Lockdown Podcast Network, now the number one sports podcast network. Thank you for helping us get here as we bring you your team every day. Today’s episode brought to you by our friends over at FanDuel. If you want to be right in the middle of all of the action this season, visit fanuel.com to place your NFL live bets all season long. New Orleans Saints rookie quarterback Tyler Shuck, wide receiver Devon Vele, and kicker Charlie Smith are amongst the mustwatch contributors for me on the offensive side of the football in this game coming up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. You can rest easy on the win loss schedule or the win loss record. The New Orleans Saints are officially eliminated from playoff contention. They’ve effectively been unofficially eliminated from playoff contingent for some time, but now there’s nothing nothing mathematically that can even keep them in that conversation. And so therefore, everything now turns to the individual evaluation of players or the evaluation of position groups. I would say we had a good conversation about that on Thursday’s Saint squad or excuse me, f Wednesday’s Saint squad. My days are running together. The Wednesday Saint squad if you want to go back to that. But you’re evaluating, you know, what positions need an overhaul, what positions need to be redone, where do you need to just add talent versus where do you need to replace talent? And some of that comes down to individual evaluation as well. Actually, all of it comes down at some point to individual evaluation at all. And one of the biggest positions of individual evaluation that the Saints have had all season long, of course, is at quarterback. starting with Spencer Rattler and then the last these two teams met, the New Orleans Saints and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in week eight, making the change from Spencer Rattler over to Tyler Shuck and it’s been Tyler Shuck’s team ever since. And he has shown some very promising flashes. There’s highlight reels of him now all of a sudden on social media and all these other pieces, but you’re looking for consistency and you’re wondering and still trying to find out is he the guy for 2026 where he would then be given the opportunity to prove whether or not he’s the guy from a franchise standpoint. I think this game up against Tampa’s defense would be a pretty good identifier for you, good barometer in terms of where his development is. You saw him in the second half kind of as a fish out of water in that situation, right? Coming in as a replacement quarterback in week eight up against Tampa’s defense. Now he’s going up against Tampa’s defense again for a second time this season. It’ll be the first opponent that he’s seen multiple times. It always seems to be the Buccaneers with these young guys, but it’ll be the first opponent that he he will have seen multiple times. And what does he look like? Where’s the growth? Do you does, you know, does things slow down for him? Does he look better now than he did in week 8, which he’s consistently looked better than he has looked in week eight? But there’s just something about the barometer of being able to say, “Okay, you’re going up against something familiar now. So, how is your game grown? What’s different? What are you able to do? What can you identify? Do you read, you know, are you able to read the defense a little bit faster because you’ve seen it before?” All those little pieces. And so I think that this becomes a really good sort of measuring stick for where Tyler Shucks development is headed. Not where it’s at because that has a finality to it, but everything’s still in motion here. Where is it headed? And there’s no denying the promise of Tyler Shuck. We’ve seen it already, right? The arm and the ability to be able to get downfield. Uh the ability to make plays on the move. want to see him do it a little bit more in timing, in rhythm, in structure. But his ability to be able to step up in the pocket, uh, deliver on time, all these other things, or even deliver out of time in some cases, there’s a lot of promise there, but at the same time, still a young and developing quarterback that you want to see doing some things better. And so, do we start to see that? So, I think Tyler Shuck, of course, a mustwatch player throughout the rest of this season, but specifically speaking in this game up against Tampa and potentially at the end of the season against Atlanta, another team that he will have seen twice at that point. I think both of those uh uh provide a unique opportunity for you to be able to see a little bit more. And I guess Carolina as well. So, he really gets an opportunity to see all three of these teams multiple times here. So, we’ll see where things go for New Orleans and where things go for Tyler Shuck. But I think that he is a mustwatch. And his connection with Devon Vele, the wide receiver that had the big eight catch, 93 yard, one-touchdown kind of breakout game last week. That connection is going to be a lot of fun to watch as well. Devon Vele is a very talented wide out. There’s no doubt about that. You know, there’s the physical tools that he’s that he’s blessed with in terms of being a 6’5, 210 lb bigbodied wide receiver with an enormous catch radius and the ability to, you know, run maybe faster than people thought that he might be able to run and move as fluidly as he moves. But also on the mental side of the game, his ability to find open pockets in zones, his ability to attack on inbreaking and outbreaking routes, his route running ability, which is something that you have to kind of work to master and all that. Those are all places where you’ve seen improvement and development from him and also are seeing him perform well in those areas. On top of it all, just to take a look at what it was that allowed him to be as impactful up against the Atlanta Falcons last week, we saw the Saints run more inbreaking routes over the course of the past two weeks, particularly in routes or digs. They ran more over the course of the past two weeks, according to our friends over at True Media, 48 of those routes, than they have in the four previous games before that where they ran 44 such routes. And we’re seeing some success there, attacking the middle of the field. And in particular, doing so against these cover two or even cover four heavy defenses. And that’s what the Saints have gone up against the past two weeks. They went up against a cover two heavy team with the Miami Dolphins. And in the week before that, they went up against the Atlanta Falcons, who played a lot more quarters defense as well. So, four deep safeties or four deep defensive backs, which opens up some opportunities in the middle of the field for you in the short intermediate areas. And with cover two, two deep defenders, similar thing, invites you to kind of attack the middle of the field. And the Saints did that well. And they did that very well with Devon Vele. Uh he had eight targets for 93 yards as we mentioned as well as a touchdown. But 50 of his 93 yards came on inbreaking routes. That means that 43 of his 93 yards by the way came on outbreaking routes. And so not a bad situation there to where something was way way way kind of over you know you’re overburdening in one area or anything like that. We saw you we saw efficacy from Vele as a route runner in either situation. But knowing that you’re about to go up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, gives you a little bit of an interesting play towards this because last time that these two teams met, Tampa played the most cover two defensive staffs on a percentage basis, 28.2% than any other team that the Saints have faced so far this season. So the thing that has worked or the thing that has worked over the course of the past two weeks in terms of the Saints running these inbreaking routes and taking advantage of that particularly against Miami with Devon Vele and Tyler Shuck is exactly the kind of defense that you’re going to see up against Tampa Buccaneers. Now Tampa also plays a lot of cover three opportunities as well which will give you maybe some chances in the short area on inbreaking routes. So slants, things like that that work underneath. But look for the Saints to see if they’re going to continue to attack in that way with Devon Veil and building up both he and quarterback Tyler Shock. And finally, another mustwatch contributor for me that has the opportunity to put points on the board for you, right? We’ll get to some of the defensive guys here in a second, but the guys that have the ability to put points on the board for you, obviously you’re watching for Deon Neil, you’re watching for Chris Olive, you’re watching to see what happens at the tight end position, so on and so forth. There’s no doubt about any of that. But Charlie Smith, man, um, you know, the story is awesome, but even beyond that, like the Saints have needed a guy that could go out there and consistently put three points on the board. Charlie Smith hasn’t gotten the opportunity to prove that he is that guy yet. He nailed that 56 yard in his debut, the third longest debut field goal for any player in the NFL, and he deserves all the showering of the accolades that he’s gotten so far and all the showering of the excitement that he’s gotten so far. But I know Charlie and I know Phil Galliano and I know that the next thing that those guys want to prove is consistency. Booting one through 56, booting one through from 56 yards is awesome. But I think those guys want to show as well that they can equally be relied upon to go down there and knock out knock down a 33 yard, a 43 yard, and just simply put points on the board and places where this team could not earlier in the season. So, I’m looking to see if Tyler if, excuse me, if Charlie Smith gets those opportunities in this game up against Tampa and how he ends up cashing in on those opportunities when given. All right, coming up next, we’ll flip over to the defensive side. A couple of guys I’d love to see more from. Isaiah Stalurn and Danny Stsman, the two young linebackers who are making waves in New Orleans. We got that coming up for you next as we continue on with today’s episode of Locked on Saints, part of Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. Today’s episode is brought to you by our friends over at FanDuel. NFL Sundays move fast, but you can move just as fast with FanDuel’s live betting features. It’s one of my favorite things about using FanDuel, America’s number one sports book, is that you get the opportunity to keep up with everything going on in the game. So, even if you miss kickoff, it doesn’t mean that you can’t get in. They’re updating spreads live all throughout the game depending upon the flow of how things are going. You can even bet on individual player props as well in terms of who’s going to score next. You can dive into drive results, game totals, and much more. All of it moves to keep you in the action even after kickoff. It’s what makes FanDuel uh my favorite place to go. And you can check out this week’s game. The Saints 8 and a half point underdogs on the road up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. So, if you want to get into the middle of that action, even after that action has begun, just head over to fanduel.com and place your NFL live bets all season long. FanDuel, the game moves fast and so can you. All right, family. As we turn the page over to the defensive side of the ball for players that you should be watching this weekend, I want to start off in the middle of the defense in the linebacker core with rookie linebacker Danny Stzman as well as secondyear linebacker Isaiah Stalbert who I think both of these players deserve even more opportunities than they are getting so far over on the defensive side of the football. And I think they should be a lot of those opportunities toward the end of the season. We thank you very much here at Lockdown for making us the number one sports podcast network. We’re grateful to be here with you every day and I’m grateful that you are here with us every day as we bring you Locked on Saints every single Monday through Friday and then some here on the show. So for these two linebackers, I just want to see more of them. And and I mean that in the best way possible because it’s not that Pete Werner is playing poorly. It’s not that Deario Davis is slowing down. It’s the best case scenario for New Orleans. They’re getting good play out of both of their starting linebackers. Of course, especially Deario Davis, even at this point in his career, I think he’s like top 10 in tackles still this season. Uh despite the fact that he is, you know, at the point of his career where most players have either hung him up or at least are starting to decline and we’re not seeing that from Deario so far. But despite that, you still want to see Danny Stzman and you still want to see Isaiah Stalber, right? That’s the idea. you know, if I’m if I’m running a restaurant, I don’t want you trying my, you know, the the third or fourth, you know, menu item on the list because the first two were falling off. I want you to want to try those because they’re so good that even though the first two are really good, you still want to try those. You know what I mean? Like, I still want you coming for more than just the special. And I think that that is something that we’re seeing with the work that Peter Surman and Brandon Staley have done at the linebacker menu, if you will. because even behind those guys like Jaylen Ford’s making big plays on special teams and he’s been playing awesome and then Nephi Su who’s had his elevations utilized and stuff like that but as a guy that has been you know a practice squad linebacker has seen a lot of opportunity still on this team and is somebody that they very much like in that linebacker room and so a room that we thought might be weak coming into the season because of the gap of experience there you have a a very experienced Demario Davis uh an experienced Pete Wernern and then you had a bunch of young guys after for that that was something that Brandon Staley actually highlighted on Thursday when I asked him about the relationship amongst those linebackers because it’s a curious thing when you’re playing around with this idea of getting exposure for your younger linebackers. It means you’ve got to take an older linebacker off the field or a more experienced and seasoned linebacker off the field and that could create like you could see a world in which that could create animosity, right? Like you would get that but it doesn’t seem like that’s an issue at all. So there’s a level of professionalism and there’s a level of efficiency and effectiveness that are happening when Danny Stzman and Isaiah Stalbert are hitting the field that just kind of allows this to all play out in a way that seems to be playing out very amicably in a very constructive manner in terms of evaluating the young talent that you have at the position. And so Danny Stzman, who’s played 80 snaps so far on defense so far this season, already has 14 tackles on the year and has been somebody that has ignited this defense in a couple of opportunities. I mean, his tackle last week uh out of the backfield where he looked like he Goldberg speared a Dolphins player. I think that was uh Han if I remember correctly. But I mean, he looked like he came out of nowhere with like a you know wrestling move and and and threw this guy down and it ignited the entire defense. the defense played well in that game despite giving up the opening drive touchdown. It was nothing but field goals after that except for the the pick two which the defense didn’t have anything to do with. And so, you know, you see that kind of energy that can come from a player not even taking the football away. Just making a big play. Like big plays don’t always have to be complete, you know, uh uh takeaways or or or these big time, you know, shocking kind of circus catches and things like that. like it doesn’t have to be that to ignite some momentum for your defense. Sometimes it’s just being in the right place at the right time and make or or in this case making a play emphatically. And that’s exactly what it is that Danny Stzman did. And you remember that when Stman was drafted coming out of Oklahoma, surprisingly the Saints, the only team that took time to visit with him and get to know him over the course of the draft cycle. He was one of the top linebackers. Believe he was actually linebacker one on Dane Bugler’s list for instance. I know our guys over at locked NFL draft had him high on their offball linebacker list as well. And one of the big things we talked about with him was well actually two of the big things we talked about with him were uh leadership energy. Those are the two things that you knew he was going to bring along with the production, right? But we were looking at kind of the intangibles around him. And so far we’re seeing that anytime that he’s on the field, he’s making a play. And when he’s making that play, you can feel the energy boost uh for the Saints. You can feel the energy boost now, especially at home for the Saints fans as well in the building when he’s out on the field and he makes his opportunities uh known and he makes good on his opportunities. It was for a little while alter he was only being rotated in for the third drive in each half. So the third drive in the first half, third drive in the second half. But now we’re starting to see him rotated in a little bit more. Some of that is spelling other linebackers who need a breather. Some of it is uh probably situational and things like that. But in any case, you’re seeing his opportunities tick up and you’re seeing his him make good on those opportunities. My big thing is at what point do you decide to ride the hot hand at the position? Like if Stzman’s performing well in a game and he’s performing and making a bigger impact than maybe some of the other linebackers, is there an opportunity or is there a time at which especially at this point in the season, you say leave him out there, see what else he’s able to do, let him build on his success. I’ll be very curious to see if the Saints ever go that route. When it comes to Stalurn, even though pursuit at the quarterback has been a bit of an over pursuit o at quarterback really has been a little bit of a challenge for him. something Brandon Sely joked about on Thursday as well around, you know, they’ve been kind of picking on him a little bit for kind of overpursuing and needing to finish and Brandon Saley saying like I need to coach him better about like finishing those plays and everything. So, a level of accountability there too. Uh but obviously like the young guy is making a big time impact and he gets more involved on instead of you know being a three- down linebacker he gets more involved as a third down linebacker and so he comes in on those particular third down situations in a role that Brandon Stanley said on Thursday they kind of just created for Isaiah Stalurn. It wasn’t that they were looking to fill that role. It’s a great question for Mike Triplet over at NOF but it wasn’t that they were looking to kind of get him into that role and they figured out that that was a thing that you know that role that they wanted and he was the player that fit it. it was like, “Oh, we like this player and the things that he can do and we could use that on these certain, you know, passing down situations and everything and so create this role for him.” And so, it just kind of goes to show you how much a guy like Isaiah Stalbert has kind of forced the issue himself in a in a really positive way. Not in a way to where it’s like, “Hey, put me on the field or I want to be blah blah blah.” Nothing like that, but just being good enough to to make your coaches want you on the football field. That’s a great sign, especially when you have two solid linebackers that are ahead on the depth chart and that are the starters on this roster. And so I think that when you can find yourself providing a unique skill set that you do so well that a coaching staff says we’ve got to get that player out on the field, that’s nothing but good news for a young player. So Isaiah Stalbert, another guy right now around around 60 snaps, around 20 fewer than um Danny Stzman, but you’re seeing the impact that he can have as a pass rusher, as a pursuit player, as a uh as a coverage player in some cases as well. I just think he’s you know, we were doing kind of stock up, stock down talk, Nick Underh Hill and I the other day and uh you know, he was one of my first like stock up guys was Isaiah Isaiah Stalberg with what it is that he’s been able uh to do. All right, one other guy over on defense that obviously you’re gonna or actually two other guys. Um, Kool-Aid McKenry, Quincy Riley should be a big test for them this weekend. We don’t know if Mike Evans or Jaylen McMillan are really going to make it back to the field this week, but even still going up against uh Chris Godwin and Amecha Bua and and Sterling Shepard and and Tez Johnson, like that’s still a good wide receiver group with an aggressive quarterback. And so watching those young guys who are getting better and better, it feels like as the season goes on along with the rest of the defense that those guys are other folks you’re going to be watching in this matchup that are potential fundamental foundational future pieces over on the defensive side of the football. All right, coming up next, I want to jump to the safety spot because with some injuries there, the safety rotation might be a bit of a challenge for New Orleans and that could have a big impact on Brandon Saley’s defense. Let’s get to that next as we continue on with today’s episode of Lockdown Saints. Part of Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. Let’s get it, Huda, Nation. A bunch of injuries at the safety position all of a sudden could have a major impact on the Saints ability to disguise up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers this weekend. And I think that’s going to be a big task for defensive coordinator Brandon Saley. Real opportunity to maybe flex some muscle here if you’re Brandon Sale to show, hey, it’s fine. We’ll be all right. You know what I mean? Uh, so the Saints dealing with some injuries here. So, um, Justin Reed, obviously a big one right now, dealing with the knee injury that took place early on in the game up against Miami. He ended up going out of the game, coming back into the game, going back out of the game, and then eventually ruled out. Brandon, I mean, sorry, Kell Moore, New Orleans head coach, said that IR is probably not something, you know, a route that they’re going to go for Justin Reed at all. By the way, we need to have an IR conversation one day because I heard one of our guys over at Locked on Bengals mention the idea, what if injured reserve could be retroactive? And I’d be really really interested in that. So like if they had already missed two games and you realized you probably should have put him on injured reserve, could you say, okay, putting him on injured reserve, but two games already served, if you will, and then kind of move things forward from there. So we’ll come back to a conversation about that sometime. I thought it was a really intriguing idea. Um there’s obviously ups and downs to that idea, but but super super interesting thought. And so they said that injured reserve not likely a path for him. And so that clearly means that they expect him to be back at some point before the season is over. But him missing this week’s game would make sense from the very beginning when it comes to that injury. Kell Moore has been pretty clear. There’s the potential for some mis time for sure and was like really clear and open about that right away. And so, and to Kell Moore’s credit, he’s done a pretty good job in terms of mentioning when injuries were going to be, what injuries were going to be, and then how they actually turned out. I think that that obviously the Chase Young situation being uh a misconstrued example otherwise, but that was mostly misconstrued more than it was anything else. Wasn’t actually Kell Moore’s comment that he would be back soon. It was Chase Young’s comment that he would be back soon. And look, the defense has been excellent. Chase Young has been back. Top five in passing defense since he’s been back in the lineup and top 10 in overall defense in terms of yardage since he’s been back in the lineup. But with Justin Reed expected to miss this week’s game at this point. We’ll see later on today when we’re out of practice if that changes. But at this point, it seems at least reasonably understandable to say not expecting to see him. And then with Yonas Sanger now dealing with a head injury, which we haven’t gotten any details on yet. We’ll talk to Kell more later on today where we’ll get some details on that, I’m sure. But he all of a sudden was downgraded quickly to a did not participate on Thursday. That puts him on the wrong side of the trend line as well to play this weekend. So, we’ll see ultimately with where they go. But if the Saints are missing both of those players, that’s going to create a little bit of a challenge for Brandon Staley. Now, he’s got good safety depth, and that’s already been illustrated by the fact that they lost Tyron Matthew earlier on in the season or even before the season start as he retired. Julian Blackman goes down after the first week of the season. And now you have both Justin Reed and Yonas Sanker dealing with injuries. And then so you’re turning to guys like Jordan Hen and Terrell Burgess. And then you’ve got some guys behind them and Elliot Davidson who’s on the practice squad and Ugo Amati as well. But that’s that’s the run of your safety depth potentially going into this game. And so so much of disguising in the NFL and on NFL def defenses and particularly with Brandon Sale happens at the safety position. You either have one safety up high which tells the offense pre- snap that this might be a middle of the field safety look. So that could be a cover one defense only one deep defender and man underneath. It could be a cover three uh defense with a safety in the middle and two quarterbacks bailing to get out to to some deep stuff there and then some zone coverage underneath. But then at the snap, he might rotate that and drop the safety out of the box into the deep area of the field and then show a cover two look or a cover four look with two or four deep defenders instead. And it’s that kind of safety scheme disguise in rotation. That’s a big part of what it is that Brandon Sidley does from a chess match standpoint up against his opposing offenses. You want every defensive snap to look about as same as you can so that when that safety rotation happens and you go into the defense, you’re actually playing, you’re trying to make that quarterback think for that extra half a second or something like that as they’re having to readjust to what picture they’re seeing uh over on the defensive side. something that Peter Surman called dirty pictures at one point. And that’s what you’re wanting to show this the the opposing quarterback, the opposing offense to kind of see, you know, what can you get? What can you earn in terms of a little bit of timing, a little bit of throwing off the rhythm, a little bit of throwing off the the the the you know, the I I guess it’s it is the timing and the rhythm. That’s kind of it. But, you know, throwing off the structure a little bit. And so, I think that that’s becomes a big part of it. Now, it’s not to say that Jordan Howden and Terrell Burgess can’t do those things. Serell Burgess has been a starter in Brandon Sy’s defense before. When Brandon Sy was a defensive coordinator with the Los Angeles Rams back in 2020, the number one defense that year. Jordan Howden has been a starter in New Orleans before. And Jordan Hen has played well for New Orleans. Remember, he went in when Justin Reed got hurt in week five, the win over the New York Giants, and played a really strong game during that time. Yeah, he had a, you know, 90s something yard fumble return for a touchdown, but even beyond that big, you know, that the enormous splash play that that was, even beyond that, you saw really good play from him all throughout. And so I think that defensively when it comes to that safety rotation, this will be something really interesting to watch because it’ll give you a little bit of an understanding of what the Saints have behind their starters if Jonas Sanker and Justin Reed are not able to go and you’re getting that look at Jordan Hen and Terrell Burgess in an extended uh sort of opportunity there. but also shows you a little bit about what it is that, you know, Terry Joseph does well coaching these safeties, what it is that Brandon Staley does well in terms of navigating this from a play calling perspective and from a defensive uh coordinator perspective. I think it teaches you a lot, not just about the players on the field, but the minds and the voices on the sideline as well. This is a pretty big opportunity, honestly. And it stinks that it comes along this way because the Saints have been relative to their history very healthy. so far this season. But now all of a sudden some of these late season injuries piling up when you’ve got guys like Chris Olive and Tales Fuanga and Justin Reed and Yonas Sanker and others all on Oh, and Alvin Camro of course all on the uh injured uh the injury list, the injury report. But that safety rotation in particular is going to be a very very intriguing one to watch this weekend in Tampa. All right, before we wrap up here today, get into a little bit of lap for the real ones still here hanging out for the show. Um, I one of the big things I want to see from this team overall in this game up against Tampa, less about like individual player evaluation stuff, but one thing I’d like to see that I think we’d all like to see from this team is an improvement in the first half and in particular an improvement in the early goingings of the game, an improvement in the first quarter. The New Orleans Saints right now have 19 points scored in the first quarters of the 12 games that they have played so far. That’s fewest in the NFL and fewest by a pretty good margin. And so this is an opportunity here for New Orleans to kind of show another improvement point. I think that they started to show one last week, right? one of the historically worst red zone offenses in the last 10 years, ranking 317 out of 320 offenses over the course of the 10 last 10 seasons going into this game up against the Miami Dolphins. And then they walked out of that Miami Dolphins game two of two in the red zone. Now, they were second action plays. They were, you know, out of structure and all these other pieces, but still found the end zone on a couple of plays. one touchdown pass from Tyler Shuck to Chris Olive, another from Tyler Shuck to Devon Vale. And so watching to see if this team can come out and start a little bit faster and a little bit hotter than they have over the course of really this entire season would kind of be the next little growth point that I’d like to see. Can you take away from that that the Saints are all of a sudden a first half team after just one game of them scoring better in the first half? No, of course not. But do you still want to start to see some of the incremental improvements that we’ve talked about from this offense in particular? Yeah, I think you do. And especially as you’re starting to learn our players like Tyler Shark, our players like Devon Vele to an extent are players like Chris Olive, right? They’re talking about a contract extension with them and all these other things. Trying to figure out like what these players are for you in your future. getting some thing going in or the early portion of these games I think is kind of that next step for a lot of these players and for this team. So, just to highlight another piece that I’ll really be watching closely, it’s what this offense does with its earliest opportunities in the game and can it keep itself from getting into another double-digit deficit scoring, you know, situation before the half and if that’s something they can improve, especially up against this Tampa Bay team that has some firepower and has the ability to be disruptive on defense, but also has weaknesses on defense, particularly its passing game, which is ranked 29th in the NFL right Now, go out there and show that you can do that. And that’ll be one of the other big pieces that I’ll be watching this weekend for New Orleans as they take on Tampa. Thank you so much for being here. We’ll see you Sunday after the game, the squad show, and then I’ll have an extra show for you as well after on Monday morning. We appreciate you very much. As always, making us a part of your day, part of your routine for saying yes to me and the show. If you see me, please say hi. And if you need anything else around your New Orleans Saints in between these episodes, make sure you follow me on your favorite social media. Ross Jackson N O L A. Hit me up. Let me know how the family’s doing with them or how you living. Let me know how you moming them. And trust you that nation, I’ll holler at you. [Music]

The New Orleans Saints shift their focus to player evaluation and development, with rookie quarterback Tyler Shough and wide receiver Devaughn Vele emerging as must-watch talents against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Shough, who faces the Bucs defense for a second time, seeks to prove his growth in facing familiar defenses and finding rhythm in the passing game.

On defense, young linebackers Danny Stutsman and Isaiah Stalbird are earning more snaps, injecting energy and versatility behind veterans Demario Davis and Pete Werner. Injuries at safety test Brandon Staley’s safety room and disguises, spotlighting Jordan Howden and Terrell Burgess while Justin Reid and Jonas Sanker manage injury.

0:26 Saints Future: Shough & Vele
11:01 LB Stutsman & Stalbird Earning More Opps
19:37 Safety Injuries & Defensive Scheme Impact

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