SURGE: New Orleans Saints’ Kellen Moore, Tyler Shough Must Deliver BIG WIN vs. Atlanta Falcons

SURGE: New Orleans Saints’ Kellen Moore, Tyler Shough Must Deliver BIG WIN vs. Atlanta Falcons

If the New Orleans Saints want to get a big victory against their bitter rival Atlanta Falcons on Sunday, it’s all going to start with rookie quarterback Tyler Shuck. We got all that and a little bit of land yap for you on today’s episode of Locked on Saints. 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 beatr writer over at louisianaapasports.net. And on today’s episode of Locked on Saints, we’re going to go through some surprising names that lead the top of the grades for the New Orleans Saints through their first 10 games and what to look for down the stretch of the final seven. We’ll take a look at both sides of this matchup this weekend. We’ll get to the Saints defense going up against Atlanta’s offense. Can the Saints defense continue their surge? But of course, we’re going to kick everything off here with the quarterback position and the New Orleans Saints offense looking to con to to continue its surge up against a tricky Atlanta Falcons defense. We’ll get all that and more 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 and making us your first listen here on the Lockdown Podcast Network. Now the number one sports podcast network. Thanks to 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, where new customers can win $300 in bonus bets by winning your first $5 bet. Just head over to fanuel.com to get started. It all starts, by the way, with Tyler Shuck when it comes to the New Orleans Saints this weekend up against the Atlanta Falcons. Tyler Shuck, Chris Ave, Jawan Johnson getting the run game going with Alvin Chimera, Deon Neil, keeping the front up. Can you get Ty Wonga back? Look, it’s all about the entire offense. We know that. But we also know that everything starts with the quarterback. And so taking a look at where the New Orleans Saints have what they’ve done so far throughout the year and how it matches up to the Atlanta Falcons defense kind of helps us to tell the more holistic story as well. But obviously Tyler Shuck looking to continue that excitement that he brought and has provided and that jolt that’s been provided from that Carolina Panthers win just before the byee. And then over the course of the bye-week, you can’t mess that up. So all that momentum has just kind of been stalled, stilted, and waiting to hit the field again on a Sunday and what is sure to be a rocking Caesar Superdome this weekend as they welcome their bitter rival Atlanta Falcons. So let’s take a look at the New Orleans Saints offense and how they can continue that. But we know where everything starts and it’s the hopeful continuation of that momentum brought upon by uh the Saints offense and Tyler Shuck going back to Carolina. So for New Orleans, they are pretty easy to identify what it is that they do a lot uh throughout the season so far. What they have done a lot throughout the season so far, they are very much a team that loves its 11 personnel. They are amongst the top five in the NFL, top seven in the NFL when it comes to most 11 personnel usage on a percentage uh per play basis. And so we’re talking about 11 personnel. Just a reminder, first digit number of running backs, second digit number of tight ends, one one, one running back, one tight end. The other five skilled position players are filled out typically speaking with wide receivers. Obviously, Taesm Hill throws a wrinkle in there now listed as a quarterback as opposed to a tight end, but he often counts as a tight end in those situations. So, 11 personnel is your usual three wide receiver set, and we see it a lot across the NFL. The Saints running it right now at 69 nice.4% 4% of their offense. Their next most utilized personnel grouping is 12 personnel, one running back, two tight ends. It’s those big body, two tight end sets at 16.9. Nice percent as well. So, it’s super super easy to tell where it is that the Saints want to go personnel-wise. They love their 11 personnel, and every now and then they add an extra tight end, but they do not run a lot of two running backs. That’s.7% so far this season. They’re more likely to have two tight ends and two running backs on the field than they are to just have two running backs. They’re more likely to have three tight ends on the field than they are to have two running backs. Not a part of what the Saints have done so far this season. So, do they change that now that they’ve established that precedent and then now they have the by-week to adjust? Do they start running more of those two running back sets just to show something new and see that big thing we’ll be keeping an eye out on this upcoming weekend against Atlanta. Now, with the Saints running so much of their offense out of 11 personnel, it begs the question, how do the Atlanta Falcons, how does the Atlanta Falcons defense fare up against that? And that’s pretty easy to see, too. According to our friends over at True Media, they allow only 59.8% of the passes up against 11 personnel to be completed. That is a stingy secondary up against three wide receiver sets, but they are allowing 6.8 yards per play, so you can move the ball there a little bit. They’ve gotten six interceptions there, but nine of the 16 six 7 8 17. So nine of their 17 touchdowns that they’ve allowed through the air have all come against 11 personnel, which is of course the personnel grouping that they’ve faced the most. So parts of that make sense. So let’s take a look at some of the other kind of nuances around this matchup. And we’ll take a look at the Atlanta Falcons in what they do defensively quite a bit, which is run a lot a lot of cover three. Over 50% of their defense has three deep defenders. So, that’s going to be a big thing that we’ll be watching throughout this game is how the Saints plan to counteract that. Their next most utilized coverage group is cover four or quarters with four deep defenders. So, the Falcons have done a lot of covering with four deep and or or covering with deep defenders, trying to take away the big play and effectively daring you to run against them, which they are vulnerable at. You can run against this Atlanta Falcons defense. So, that’ll be a big part of the Saints or needs to be should be a big part of what we’d like to see out of the Saints offense this weekend is can you take advantage of that when they’re daring you to run. Can you do it and can you go out there and get that done? Let’s see how the bi-week adjustments ended up going throughout all that as well. Now, the other thing that we can look at is Tyler Shuck specifically up against cover three defenses and what we’ve seen from him so far this season. Obviously, a limited sample size so far with only two starts and a couple of game appearances beyond that in terms of second half or late game appearances, but he’s had 35 drop backs up against cover three coverages so far this season. He has thrown 34 of those times. So only uh either a sack or a pressure that’s kind it wasn’t a sack, so it must have been a pressure that maybe made him scramble or something like that. Completed 23 of those passes. So he’s completed over 67% of his passes against cover three. Pretty good there. Averaging 7.3 yards per attempt in that category. One touchdown, but two interceptions so far and a pass rating of just 74. So we’ll see where things go in terms of his ability to be able to kind of circumvent that a little bit and then kind of get the touchdown to interception numbers up. But the efficiency metrics look good. 7.3 yards per play, 67 plus percent passes completed. And the touchdown that he threw was last week up against the Carolina Panthers, the 62 yard touchdown to Chris Olive down that right sideline. Both of the interceptions that he threw were games to where he uh was against Tampa where he came in against uh in relief and then was uh that fourth down interception where he was just trying to put something up for somebody to go and and make a play. In fact, actually the Saints offense as a whole on the season has thrown five interceptions uh against cover three, but three of those interceptions were on fourth downs. Put it up, let somebody else go out and make a play. One interception was thrown on a first down by Spencer Rattler uh where he was uh trying to direct traffic downfield against the Chicago Bears, right? Then put one up over the top of Rasheed Shahid on a first down and Kevin Byer came and picked it off. And then the other one was a third and three up against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers where it actually hit Chris Alab in the hands, bounced out of his hands, and then was taken away by um uh uh Antoine Winfield Jr. That’s actually noted as a receiver error, quote unquote, in True Media. So that those are those interceptions that we’ve seen so far against cover three. So Saints finding some success there, not finding a lot of success there, you know, consistently. So, they’ll need to figure all of those pieces out as they go into this game up against Atlanta. But, I think the run game and responding to the deep coverages and saying, “Okay, fine. Running the football is fine here.” Being able to do that is going to be big. And then curious to see any adjustments about getting more running backs on the field or changes of personnel groupings. Coming up next, I want to continue on with the Saints offense up against Atlanta’s defense because I want to remind you about the red zone piece in all of this. And then we’ll look at the Falcons offense up against the Saints defense. But we know that a lot’s going to change there with Kurt Cousins under center as opposed to Michael Pennik Jr. So let’s get to all that next as we continue on with today’s episode of Lockdown Saints, part of Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. Today’s episode of Locked On Saints is brought to you by friends over at FanDuel, the best place to go to get in on all of the action, especially when it comes to the NBA, which has a season that’s continuing to roll along here. And the FanDuel, our friends over at FanDuel are the official sports betting partners of the NBA as well. So everything from even missing the opening tip or maybe you want to ride the hot hand. Live betting gives you an opportunity to jump in on that. You can bet on everything from next person to score to fourth quarter comebacks. You can even piece some of those live bets together for a same game parlay for a shot and an even bigger payout. It helps to make the game feel even bigger and much more exciting. And there’s also stuff going on in the NFL as well. The New Orleans Saints right now. Hold on. Hold on. You’re sitting down. one and a half point favorites going into this game up against the Atlanta Falcons. One of the few games to where the Saints have been favored by the time that the whistle blows. Right now, FanDuel is giving new customers $300 in bonus bets when you win your first $5 bet. So, head over to fanduel.com today to sign up and start to play your game with FanDuel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. All right, family. For all the things and momentum that the New Orleans Saints have been building, there are certainly some things that they can do to be a bit more creative and innovative down the stretch. And I’m really interested to see where they find those moments. We already highlighted maybe the potential of mixing in more of those two running back sets, but there are other things that I’m looking for for benchmarks of creativity, innovation, and adjustment for the Saints over the course of the last seven games. Now, by no means is this a the Saints need to do these things types of conversations. It’s more of we’re curious to see if they do get a little bit more ri innovative, a little bit more risky in some places, a little bit more creative down the stretch, kind of push the boundaries to see what it is that this team can do, where they can pull some things together, where what they can find, all that. So, three other things that I’m going to be watching for the Saints offense is red zone productivity, under center passing, play action. Those are going to be three big things they’re going to be watching. Kell Moore uses motion like crazy. the Saints are, you know, near the top of the league or or around the top of the league, whatever I in motion usage. So, absolutely, that easy button is there. But there are other easy buttons that I’m very interested to see if the Saints end up including play action wise. The Saints are one of the teams that use play action on a percentage basis the least in the NFL, which is very, very surprising. So, I’m interested to see how that changes. Now, some of that can be tied to the fact that the team has not run the ball consistently successfully enough, right? They went on that drought of, you know, non 100yard team rushing games between Buffalo and Carolina. And so, it’s really tough to really lean into your play action game if the run game’s not cooking in any way. You still can, but obviously it makes play action more effective if your run game is working. So, we’ll see how that continues to move forward. Uh, when it comes down to the uh under center stuff, the Saints were under center for 17.7% of their snaps last week up against Carolina. That’s the second most. The Saints changed up a little bit, threw a little bit of a change up up against the Buffalo Bills. So, they went over 18% under center with Spencer Rattler at the helm. And it felt like that was about to become a new trend because not only did the Saints keep that going up again or get that going up against Buffalo. They continued that for a little while as well uh for the next like game or so. And so we were watching that kind of going, “Oh, I wonder if they’re going to keep that going here throughout the season. They haven’t as much as you might expect.” Uh so they were at 18.5% week four up against Buffalo, week five up against the Giants. they were 16.1% and then they were sub 10% every game after that until week 10 up against the Carolina Panthers where it was 17.7%. And that’s a lot of as Nick Underh Hill and I were talking about over at the NOF pod on Tuesday. Uh that’s a lot of what Tyler Shuck did in college. So, it might be pretty comfortable for him in terms of the opportunity of running a little bit more of the pro style offense rather than the heavy shotgun usage that we started to see here throughout the rest of the season. And then finally, red zone. We’ve talked about this before on the show. The New Orleans Saints are last in the NFL right now in red zone percentage at just over 38% over the course of their last three games. They’re converting touchdowns in the red zone at just a clip of 16% six. really bad, really low, not great, but that’s going to be a big part of what they ideally focused on over the course of the by-week. And then we’ll see how they adjust and move forward from there in terms of opportunities to improve in that area. All right, now let’s flip things over to the Atlanta Falcons offense as well. And the Atlanta Falcons offense is probably going to look a lot different with Kurt Cousins under center. They’re probably not going to want to move the pocket as much as they like to do with Michael Penn Jr. and things like that, but there are still some telltale signs or some things that are worth kind of watching throughout all this just to kind of see where the Falcons might look to go. So, offensive personnel wise, again, 11 personnel is very, very heavily utilized by the Atlanta Falcons, but not as heavily as New Orleans. They actually have just a 52.9% 11 personnel usage or three wide receiver set usage. And then they’re next behind the 11 personnel just like the Saints is 12 personnel, but they use it at over a third of their offense at 38.1%. Every other usage beyond that except for 21 personnel is less than 1%. Literally less than 1%. 0.5 on one of them, 7 on another, and then zeros across the board uh all around and all throughout there. But they do use two running back sets at 7.9%. So, not very often. Uh, and a lot of those, uh, 7.9, a lot of that 7.9% happens in sort of third and second downs is where they tend to use a lot of those. So, for Atlanta, they like their three wide receiver sets. They love their two tight end sets. And so, that’s what New Orleans is going to have to be ready to match up with over on the defensive side of the ball. And of course, they’ve matched up with a lot of 11 personnel so far this season because that’s what’s played the most uh up against the or played the most uh across the NFL. But I do think that it’s going to be the two tight end sets that I’m most interested in watching them go up against because I do think that that’s going to be a place where Atlanta’s going to be looking to be a little bit more productive um and can be and has been a little bit more productive as well. So, if we look at like their 12 personnel, the um Atlanta Falcons 12 personnel like production stats from a quarterback perspective, no matter who the quarterback is, they’ve been really really productive there. 71% completion percentage out of 12 personnel. So, there’s just something about that those big bodies that they do a very good job getting the ball there, getting the ball out, things like that. Four passing touchdowns. So, just one interception in those situations as well and averaging 9.4 four yards per passing attempt. So, in the passing game, they’ve been very, very productive in those 12 personnel sets. And it probably shouldn’t won’t surprise you that they’ve been pretty productive in the run game with two tight ends on the field as well, averaging 4 and a half yards per carry. Interestingly enough, they average four and a half yards per carry with three wide receivers on the field as well. So, a big part of the Saints ability to mitigate what Atlanta is going to be able to do offensively is going to be standing up against those 12 personnel sets. Drake London’s not expected to go this weekend. And so, with that, you can expect them to really lean in with multiple tight ends so that they have more of those big bodied receiving options. Alante Taylor, Pete Warner, Danny Stsman, Deario Davis, those guys are going to be integral in terms of finding and limiting the opportunities through the air. And really those same four players are going to be tasked quite a bit in terms of their run fits when they’re on the field to limit the run game in that area and against those two tight end sets as well. So that’s going to be a big part of the matchup that we should be watching here is that second level in slot up against the tight end. However, don’t forget that Atlanta will take those tight ends and get them out wide and so there will be opportunities for them to match up with guys like Koulie McKenry and Quincy Riley as well. Those are going to have to be guys that also stand up to the bigger bodies. And especially with Kurt Cousins at the helm, he ain’t looking to run. He’s going to want to put the ball up in some one-on-one situations. So, you’re going to have to be able to make some stops and defend some passes out on an island every now and then if you’re a corner going up against Atlanta here. So, big test for this New Orleans Saints defense. Even with Drake London out, even with Kurt Cousins out, they can’t sleep on this. They got to go out and perform. Coming up next, the New Orleans Saints have some of their highest graded players that should give you a real big sense of optimism, including some surprises and some young names that you might not expect. Let’s get to that next as we continue on with today’s episode of Locked On Saints, part of Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. I’m Cody Ror from Lockdown Broncos and this episode is brought to you by Pelaton. Pelaton is shaping the future of fitness with the brand new Pelaton crossraining tread plus powered by Pelaton IQ. This is Pelaton’s most advanced equipment yet, giving you realtime guidance and endless ways to move. Whether you’re running, lifting, or you’re crossraining with your favorite instructors like Alex Tusant. It’s training reimagined to make your workout more personal. Pelaton is built for breakthroughs with features that help you plan, stay motivated, and hit peak performance. You can let yourself run, lift, flex, and go while Pelaton handles all the rest. Plus, Pelaton IQ provides real time strength coaching, tracking your progress and suggesting weights that challenge you so you can get stronger. Plus, the new movement tracking camera. It counts your reps and corrects your form in real time, making sure every rep is safer and smarter. So, let yourself run, lift, flex, push, and go. Explore the new Pelaton crossraining tread plus at onepelon.com. Let’s get it. Who that nation? The New Orleans Saints have some surprising names that top the list when it comes to highest graded players through the first 10 games on offense and defense. They might be surprising, but they’re not negative. they actually go to show that there should be a little bit of a sense of optimism in terms of the team’s young building block future talent on the team. Um, and look, I’m going to be honest here. I I don’t put a ton of stock into PFF grades because I don’t know how the grades work. Like, that’s just not knowledge that I have. And so, because of that, if I don’t know how the numbers arrive, I don’t typically lean on them. So, I’m not going to really go into the numbers very much. But I do think that it’s interesting like going in and taking a look at the top five graded players on offense and defense. And I don’t think there are any lies told when it comes to some looks here. Now, specifically speaking, I really want to focus on the players that have seen at least 120 snaps. That’s about equivalent. It’s like an approximation of at least two games for the team. So guys like Kendra Miller would be off the list with only 113 snaps. Zire Mitchell Peyton, who’s actually the fifth highest graded player on New Orleans offense. That’s the new tight end they brought in after the Chicago Bears game. Uh he is only has 26 snaps, so we’re not going to include him. So, I’m focused on the guys that played at least 120. So, the number one rated player on offense is Luke Forner. Yes, it’s Luke Forner and a pretty good rating at that. But with 199 snaps, 135 of those being in pass blocking, he has been a bit of a revelation for New Orleans. and I love the fact that he is at the top of this list for the Saints. Uh so far throughout his his time starting at center uh for New Orleans, he’s produced well and the Saints offense has not taken a step back. We saw how much the loss of Eric McCoy last year completely derailed this team season thanks to a guy like Luke Forner who’s played 135 pass blocking snaps and allowed just two pressures, both of which just hurries. We haven’t seen the offense sink in a way like it did last year. So, he has been huge for this team. And I love that he’s actually the top graded player because again, this is a guy that the Saints do have and can move forward with, can keep as a depth player and have continued to be behind Eric McCoy. He’s finding success here as well. He really likes it here. He continuously talks to media, stuff like that. like every sign points to this guy being able to be a good fixture for you as a depth piece and potentially even beyond uh when it comes to your center position depending upon what’s necessary injury-wise and things like that. The number two player on offense with over 120 snaps is Tyler Shuck. Um and a lot of that has to do with a great performance up against the Carolina Panthers. We’ve spoken a lot about him already today, so I’m not going to kind of like wax philosophic again, but I will tell you that I am buying in very much and I am being sold on Tyler Shuck quite a bit because of how well he played in that Carolina Panthers game. I’m so excited to see how things go this weekend up against Atlanta to see if he can continue the streak, continue to move it forward, and turn that initial performance into consistent performance. And that would be gamechanging for New Orleans. The third highest player with at least 120 snaps on offense is wide receiver Chris Olive. Especially coming out of that Carolina Panthers game. And now moving forward through the next seven weeks. He’s the focal point of the passing game. He’s the focal point at wide receiver. So him and Jawan effectively become Jawan effectively become the focus of the passing game with Tyler Shuck. So that should be a lot of fun to watch. And then um we have the next two here. Spencer Rattler uh with over 400 snaps and then Kelvin Banks Jr. with over 600 snaps. again, young pieces that are a part of this team’s future in some way or another that continue to be highly graded for this team. Spencer Rattler may not be the starter, but man, as a backup right now, if you had to turn back to him, you’d feel pretty okay about it. And then Kelvin Banks Jr. has been a guy that has been uh pretty solid for them despite maybe some of the national thoughts on him uh over at left tackle and will only continue uh to get better as well. All right, let’s flip over to the defensive side here. Listen to this. All right, I’m just going to tell you the top five right off the bat with at least 120 snaps. Deario Davis, Chase Young, then we go down to Chris Rump, Cam Jordan, Jonas Sanker. Those are the top guys. And by the way, right beh and and by the way, in the midst of all that are guys that haven’t taken at least 120 snaps, it’s guys like Isaiah Stalird, it’s guys like Jordan Hton, it’s guys like Danny Stzman that are all also within sort of that top 10 of graded players. Um Terrell Burgess and Julian Blackman is in there as well. Julian Blackman. How unfortunate his season ended so early. He is absolutely considered the highest graded player for the Saints defense, but unfortunately, of course, only was able to make the appearance in one game. But listen, Deario Davis leading off the grading feels so appropriate. It feels so apppropo of how important he has been to this team this year. And it’s not just the onfield stuff, it’s the off-field stuff, too. You don’t get graded on that, though. So, the onfield play is still up there as a 36-year-old player that is seventh in the NFL right now in total tackles in tackles combined. Seventh, number seven, top 10 at 36 years old. It’s incredible. It’s amazing watching Deario Davis play. And I said this about Drew Brees in his sort of uh toward the end of his career, like as he got a little bit older. And I’m going to say it about Deario Davis, too. We should appreciate every minute. We should appreciate every second that we get to watch this dude in the black and gold because he is super super uh still really good and he is also still a ton of fun to watch. Chase Young being the second highest graded player that passed that snap threshold. Excellent news for New Orleans. They got him on contract for two more years and that’s a guy that you want to build around over on defense. Can you get him another edge rusher partner that can be a hybrid drop back guy? Can you continue to shore up your secondary to make that quarterback hold on to the football just that little bit longer? So, a guy like Chase uh Chase Young who had three sacks in three games can continue uh to get home. Chris Rump, Cam Jordan, those guys uh big- time boosted by their contributions to the run game in particular. They’ve been excellent there in terms of helping to defend the run. And then Yonas Sanker being one of the highest graded players, a guy that got thrown into a big-time situation uh much earlier than anybody expected and he’s performing like one of the highest graded players uh over on the defensive side. has proven to not be a liability despite the fact that he’s a rookie that got thrown in earlier than maybe anybody anticipated for him and he’s been awesome. So, uh, everything from young building blocks to core building blocks that maybe are veterans but are going to be around for a little while. There’s a lot of reason for optimism around this New Orleans Saints team. Now, the biggest thing is going to be finding out and making sure that they can keep it going here, right? Can you build the momentum and maintain the momentum? maintaining the momentum probably more important. But hey, look, getting it started is is is an important piece all on its own. All right, we’ll wrap up today with a little bit of lanyap for you. And uh I just want to take a look at the Saints last seven games. And I want to tell you, I’m not going to be surprised to see this team win three or four games down the stretch. And listen, you might hear that and you might think to yourself, “We’re rushed. You predicted them to finish with five wins this season and you predicted them at this point to be at two wins and then pick up three wins towards the end. That’s that’s that’s a weak thing to just like come out and be like, “Oh, look, this thing’s going to happen when you’ve been saying it.” But and that’s a fair critique. I’m not mad at you for that at all. But I think I believe it more now than I believed it when I gave the predictions at the beginning of the season. I may I mainly gave the predictions of the Saints going on a little tiny run three or four games, not in a row, but three or four games in the last seven. I mainly predicted that at the beginning of the season because of how bad the opponents were at the end. But now I think that like if the quarterback position continues to hold up and we see the rest of the rising tide from that, then it might not just be that the other teams are bad. It might be that the Saints are good enough, right? Doesn’t mean that they’re good. Doesn’t mean that they’re great. Doesn’t mean that they’re all of a sudden a playoff contender. Doesn’t mean that they need to be the number one, you know, power ranked team going into 2026 or anything ridiculous like that, but good enough to win and beat teams that are better that that they are better than. and there weren’t a lot of teams that we were able to say that they were better than early on in the season. Now, it’s starting to feel like if if the quarterback position continues to hold up and the defense continues to ball out like it did up against Carolina, then all of a sudden all of a sudden they are actually better than some teams down the stretch. And if they can win the games that they should win, that’s going to put them in a certain place when it comes to their rebuild and when it comes to their process that is an optimistic one and that is headed in the right direction. far from a finished product. Still so much to do with this team. Still so much to adjust on the roster. Still so much to adjust schematically. Still so much to achieve. But heading in the right direction is part of the ball game. And if the Saints can do that as early as and begin that as early as this weekend up against Atlanta, I think that goes a really, really long way for New Orleans. All right, we appreciate you very much as always for being here with us. Coming up in tomorrow’s episode, Crossover Thursday, Aaron Freeman from Lockdown Falcons will be here. We’ll break it down a little bit further. We appreciate you very much as always making us a part of your day part of your routine for saying yes to me on the show. If you see me, please say hi. If you need anything else around your New Orleans Saints in between these episodes, make sure you follow me on your favorite social media, RossJackna. Hit me up. Let me know the family’s doing them or how you living. Let me know how you moming them. And trust Nation, I’ll holler at you.

Rookie quarterback Tyler Shough takes center stage as the New Orleans Saints prepare to battle the Atlanta Falcons, racing to build on the momentum generated against Carolina. Shough must look to exploit Atlanta’s heavy Cover 3 defense while Kellen Moore takes advantage of the run game opportunities they offer. With Chris Olave and Juwan Johnson primed as key targets, the Saints’ passing game faces a crucial test, while Alvin Kamara and Devin Neal look to attack a vulnerable defensive run front.

On defense, emerging talents like Jonas Sanker and established producers like Chase Young headline a promising core, with Demario Davis continuing to lead with top-notch performance. The Falcons, potentially without Drake London and shifting to Kirk Cousins under center, could lean into heavier sets and two-tight-end groupings, forcing Alontae Taylor, Pete Werner, and Danny Stutsman into pivotal roles.

0:28 – Saints Offense vs. Falcons Defense
10:31 – Saints Offensive Innovation
14:01 – Falcons Offense vs. Saints Defense
19:34 – Highest Graded Saints Players & Optimism
26:21 – Season Outlook & Closing Thoughts

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FanDuel
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FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)