Saints Have Become Their Own Worst Enemy

The Saints are a team that could easily be better than what their record says, so what gives after the Titans loss?

NASHVILLE -- Details are important in the NFL, and it's area where the Saints seem to be having some trouble with. Sunday's 23-21 loss to the Titans was evident of this, and it's the second straight week that it's become a real problem.

The issues have to be cleaned up. The tape is going to be hard to watch. The penalties (9-65) were a problem again that led to long yardage situations. This is the same thing that always happens when you highlight a loss, but at some point the issues have got to be fixed and addressed. 

When asked about how to clean up the self-inflicting wounds, Sean Payton said, “Obviously that we look at it as coaches too, you know, start with me, but then pretty soon we start looking at who's doing it. We start evaluating who's making plays and who's not. And that just is what it is. It's our league”

Missed extra points are pretty inexcusable, and it would appear the Saints are going to need to try out kickers again. 

Drops have become a clear problem, but this is also the boat they're in. No one is coming off the street to save them at wide receiver. You're simply going to have to change the people or change the people. 

Bang-bang plays with questionable officiating calls are going to happen, and that one on Kaden Elliss is brutal when you talk about the point swing that came from it. 

Turnovers are never timely, and it was a bad way to start the second half seeing Deonte Harris fumbling the kickoff. 

The problem isn't your quarterback, as Trevor Siemian had a pretty strong day and played extremely well in the second half.

At 5-4, the Saints are in the territory where they can't afford to lose anymore games like this. They play on the road against the Eagles next weekend, and that figures to be a must-win game on the schedule now. After that, you're going to have to hope at worst case that you split between Buffalo and Dallas in back-to-back Thursday games.

Being down key players like Alvin Kamara, Terron Armstead, and C.J. Gardner-Johnson certainly doesn't help, but this felt like another winnable game for the Saints, and for them to come up short in more of these type of matchups this season is somewhat maddening. You know this team could easily be 8-1 right now, or even a cool 6-3 or 7-2, but they aren't.

It will be really interesting to see how the leaders of this team help rally the squad this week and what kind of turnaround they get against the Eagles, but they're going to have to play their tail off and stop shooting themselves in the foot and limit their margin for error.

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