The Saints game plan was to expose Carson Wentz and Sidney Jones
The Philadelphia Eagles took a beating by the New Orleans Saints. Their game plan was simple – Expose Carson Wentz and Sidney Jones.
Well, this just isn’t fun anymore. The Philadelphia Eagles Super Bowl hangover is not only confirmed, but it just keeps on getting worse. This team is not right in 2018. Back in the preseason, we saw this kind of sluggish play, but we chalked it up as rust, and just the simple fact that it was preseason and the games didn’t matter.
At the end of the day though, this Eagles team was terrible all along in 2018. The Eagles didn’t practice that well during the summer. Their preseason was pretty bad. And now their regular season performance is reflecting precisely what we saw months ago, but just didn’t want to believe. So, to continue their struggling season, the Eagles got destroyed by the New Orleans Saints by 41 points during ‘America’s Game of the Week.’
It was all bad. The Defense was pitiful, the offense is useless, and the coaching staff is clueless. Once again, the Eagles got out-smarted by the opposition. Except for this time, the other team made sure to take their best shots at some of the better players on this struggling team. And man did the Saints expose the Philadelphia Eagles in front of everybody.
What was the game plan?
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The Saints have been playing lights out all season long. But Sunday’s matchup was their Super Bowl, for now. They were revengeful since they genuinely believed that they should’ve been in the NFC Championship last season playing the Eagles. And because of that, they made sure to destroy the Eagles and run the score up on them.
That’s not even the worst part about it though. The worst part about the whole game was finding out that the Saints plan revolved around exposing Eagles quarterback Carson Wentz, and cornerback Sidney Jones. The Eagles offense is one-dimensional, and we already knew that.
Since Doug Pederson wants to throw all day, teams don’t even have to prepare for the run. And who is Carson Wentz’s favorite target? Tight end, Zach Ertz. Naturally, the Saints focused all of their attention on the Wentz-Ertz connection, and Wentz completely shut down.
Wentz threw for 156 yards, zero touchdowns, and three interceptions. He had a season-low of 57-percent completion percentage and a passer rating of 31.9. He was only able to complete two passes to Ertz for 15 yards. The Saints perfectly executed their plan, and they forced Carson Wentz to have the worst game of his career.
The Plan for Sidney Jones
On the other side of the ball, the Saints wanted to expose the Eagles top cornerback for the week, Sidney Jones. With Jalen Mills and Ronald Darby out, for the time being, Jones returned to the field after suffering a setback with his hamstring issues. Knowing that Jones would be rusty, and prone to getting injured again, the Saints decided that they were going to pick on him as well.
What do you know? The plan was executed perfectly. According to Peter King, Saints’ Head Coach Sean Payton told his coaching staff that they have to run the ball right at Jones on the first drive. Of course, on the first play of the game, Saints’ running back Mark Ingram breaks out a 38-yard run all thanks to a missed tackle by guess who? Sidney Jones.
The Saints picked the Eagles secondary apart, and Jones had a lot to do with that happening. Nobody could really expect the Eagles to have a big day on defense considering all the injuries that they have suffered this year, but yesterday’s showing was just flat out pitiful.
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Jones was easily the best cornerback on the Eagles during Week 11, and he fell flat on his face during his return. Hopefully, this won’t be a weekly occurrence for Jones and Wentz, but after Week 11 it’s pretty difficult to start thinking that everything is going to be okay for these guys moving forward.