The Chargers face a New Orleans Saints’ side that is teetering on the edge of existence. After starting out on fire outscoring their opponents 91 to 29 in the first two weeks, they have fallen to five straight losses including last week’s 23 point defeat to Sean Payton’s Denver Broncos to further compound their misery. It’s tough to come back from five losses in seven weeks this season but their future hangs on finding some way to salvage this season.

The Saints have been ravaged by injuries including ones to Derek Carr, Rashid Shaheed, most of their starting offensive line plus a host more on defense. I haven’t watched enough film of them before and after the injuries to say how much of a contributing factor those players missing has played but for any team to lose seven starters is tough.

Dennis Allen and his staff face a likely end to their stint in Louisiana but the buck unfortunately does not stop there for Saints fans. A lot of Mickey Loomis’ misplaced salary-cap-be-damned bets of years gone by are coming to a sad realization next season so if they don’t find a way to compete now, they will have a gloomy future heading their way. They made some steps towards that this week by extending Alvin Kamara but can giving a 29 year old running back a 2 year $24.5 million deal be considered good business?

Offense

Let’s take a look and see what kind of offense our Bolts will be facing at SoFi stadium on Sunday. Jesse Minter will be tasked with facing what is left of Klint Kubiak’s starting offense which has looked a shadow of the downfield passing attach we saw with Derek Carr over the first two weeks of the season. His oblique injury has forced to play the rookie quarterback Spencer Rattler, who they drafted in the 4th round out of South Carolina, to be thrust into the starting spot way ahead of schedule.

Whilst the Saints Although Carr is officially listed as Doubtful, this is apparently a mechanism whereby they can assign his as the emergency 3rd quarterback instead of a healthy scratch. So there is a chance the Chargers’ old AFC West rival makes a surprise start especially after he was seen throwing off to the side of practice this week. This is probably a ploy to make the Chargers split their game preparation due to how different the Saints’ offense has been since Carr went down.

With Spencer at the helm the Saints have been running a ‘Dink & Dime’ offense averaging an ADOT of 7.1 yards per attempt despite passing over 35 times in each of the two games he has started. Derek Carr was averaging 9.5 yards per attempt and that’s even factoring in the three games after the league’s defenses figured out their downfield attack concepts forcing him to revert back to his ‘checkdown charlie’ normality. The two offenses have been very different so to make Minter prepare for both is probably a smart play.

The Saints’ offense sits just behind the Chargers in terms of overall EPA/play even though they have outgained our Bolts by 387 yards, 13 touchdowns and 71 points. That difference is found because they are playing from behind as their leaky defense has meant they have been out of games before they can even get going.

Kubiak’s scheme seems to be predicated on two key concepts, attacking the weak side of two high defenses and bringing defenders into the box by utilizing 2 or 3 players in the backfield. Translation: they want draw you in and then pass over your head to the side that your two high defense isn’t prepared to defend.

• They use the 1×2 formation, that’s two receivers to the weak side with one to the strong side, more than anyone else in the league at 17.8% and they have the 3rd highest success rate from this formation.
• On the face of it they’re a primarily 11 personnel team but when you take out ‘garbage time’ they end up as a heavier personnel team as the data table below illustrates. They run multiple back sets at a top 8 rate across the board with a generally high EPA/per from those looks.

I would hope to see Minter break his tendencies against this look because to run a Cover 6 defense with a light box just isn’t going to matchup well against this kind of offense. Additionally their offensive line is still down to two starters and the remaining five are not playing well. Last week Taliese Fuaga (14.6%) and Trevor Penning (16.7%) yielded the 5th and 7th worst pressure percentages of any linemen, with the rookie allowing a league-high three sacks against the Broncos.

If there were ever a time to rediscover the exciting pass rush concepts from Minter’s Michigan days, this would be the week. Bosa coming back may unlock some more natural pressures but I would sincerely hope this isn’t the sole reliance on stressing the pocket because it has not been successful over the last few weeks.

The run game has been something they have had to commit to even though it’s been dismal viewing, they have ran the ball 21 times in each of the last two games averaging 4.1 yards per carry. They, like the Chargers, have had to stick to then run despite it offering next to nothing because that’s how they gain space for their play action concepts.

Overall there is only one thing that worries me about their offense and it should have been the focus of this week of practice: do not let Alvin Kamara into the flats at all. Kamara on screens will be the Chargers’ kryptonite so to avoid another 16 missed tackles like last week, the game plan should be to play some coverages that will keep someone down low even if those weak side twins of the 1×2 formation clear out the secondary zones. Play Cover 3 cloud from Nickel and send Derwin into the flats, utilize the Cover 1 robber looks we’ve seen sparingly or, my favourite solution, play Cover 2 with the corners playing trap technique.

Defense

The Saints defense under Dennis Allen had been one of the more consistent ones in the league until this season. The waning careers of Cameron Jordan, Demario Davis and Tyrann Mathieu have finally come to a point where the scheme has to account for their deficiencies. The pressure on younger players like Pete Werner, Khalen Saunders and Alontae Taylor to step up, has become imperative for the success of this team due to their financial limitations. I don’t think any of their next generation leaders have played poorly it’s more that the scheme leaves them no room for mistakes.

The saints play the 5th highest rate of single high man coverage in the league, this will only increase now that Paulson Adebo, their impressive cornerback from their 2021 draft class, is out for the year and has likely played his last game for the black and gold. He had 3 interceptions coming into this game and he led the Saints to their 2nd ranked 3.8% interception rate forced. Without Adebo, who is more of a zone corner, the Saints will play more man which suits their new cornerback grouping of Marshon Lattimore, nickel Alontae Taylor and their second round rookie Kool-Aid McKinstry who will be stepping up for his first start in Adebo’s absence.

The Saints may have allowed a huge 180 points so far this season however their EPA/pass is actually the 8th best in the NFL sitting at -0.11, one spot behind the Bolts. This is because they have taken the ball away 13 times, tied for 3rd in the league, so whilst they live and die by how long their corners can hold up, it’s been paying off overall even after teams drive the field on them.

Their run defense on the otherhand, is terrible. Only the Cowboys’ swiss cheese front seven is allowing more success on the ground and both these teams have something in common; they run high rates of Dime personnel. The Saints use it 21.7%, the 3rd highest rate, however the other teams in the top five all have relatively good run defenses, the difference being that the front five that are left on the field are full of fluid hybrid athletes, the Saints are not blessed with that same benefit. This has cost them dearly this season as they have had teams run all over them for on average 146.7 yards per game, 3rd worst in the league.

For me then, the game plan is to expose the Saints Dime looks, play heavy personnel, tight formations and run the ball at least 30 times. This will make them uncomfortable from the offset and its important to stick with it even if they success isn’t there initially. When its time to pass play action will help with the intermediate shots but the chain movers will be crossing patterns. Roman’s beloved tight end screens will be hard to get going but there is scope for this with the right disguises because of the personnel mismatch. This is the game to get the run game back on track, it’s time to grind the win out 6 yards at a time.