The New Orleans Saints lost their first regular season game against the Tom Brady-led Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week 2 somewhat inexplicably. It’s a difficult ask for the defense to pitch a shutout against Brady twice—though they did so through the first half. While they’ve performed at Super Bowl caliber, the offense looked like a group of strangers. Despite the overwhelming weapons at wide receiver, New Orleans could not sustain drives or momentum past the opening series. The offense has been out of sync barring one quarter this season.
Head coach Dennis Allen in his postgame remarks referred to the turnover battle as the story of this matchup and noted it was the deciding factor in Sunday’s loss. It doesn’t explain everything, but the game was tied until the fourth quarter. Five turnovers are insurmountable. Mark Ingram has to be better at ball protection to remain the next man up in the absence of Alvin Kamara.
The focus, ultimately, was on Jameis Winston’s turnovers and inaccuracy on deep balls. I think the back injury took people off guard, myself included, and it was hard to evaluate that inside the game in real-time. That, in tandem with the deep throws that were leaned on perplexingly given how they failed, made me explore his play on film deeper. I also did some research on his specific spinal fractures. Here’s what I saw: