Panthers vs. Saints: What's the Game Plan for Carolina?
It’s been over a calendar year since the Carolina Panthers last lost a regular-season game. Their 15-game regular-season winning streak is tied for the 10th-longest in football history, as well as tied for the longest ever in the NFC, post-merger, with the 1989-90 San Francisco 49ers and the 2010-11 Green Bay Packers. They are beating their opponents by an average score of 30-17. In other words, they’re rolling pretty well at the moment.
The streak started last year in the Superdome against these New Orleans Saints, who now have the tall task of stopping the Panthers’ current streak. The Saints are coming in on a three-game losing streak and seem out of any hope in the playoff picture. They’ve already fired their defensive coordinator this season, replacing Rob Ryan with Dennis Allen. That gave them a bump in the defensive category last week, but in turn, the offense let them down.
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The Saints have played the Panthers well at home, with Carolina losing four out of the last six matchups. How will the Panthers extend their streak to 16-0, a perfect regular season, albeit one spread over two years? Let’s take a deeper look.
Offensive Game Plan
Let’s not mince words—the Saints defense this season has been terrible. It ranks dead last in points allowed and yards per play, and it has given up the most yards per attempt in both the passing game and the running game. That’s not great.
Football Outsiders’ DVOA has the Saints as the worst defense in football, though the site has them as a rather generous 29th against the run. Making matters worse, they haven’t exactly played a murderers' row of offenses that would explain away their poor raw defensive statistic.
Arizona’s the only team on New Orleans' schedule you would really consider a good offense. The Carolina offense is above average, and Tampa Bay is right there in the middle of the pack, but the other eight opponents are all below average or worse. Every team seems to have its best days when facing the New Orleans defense.
When facing a highly movable object such as New Orleans, the best strategy for Carolina is to continue doing what it does well.
New Orleans is marginally worse at stopping the pass than the run, but Carolina is set up to be a running team first and foremost. That’s what it should stick to in this one. The Saints have allowed over 100 yards rushing in nine of their 11 matchups this season, and both Houston and Washington ran for over 150 yards in the last two weeks. This could be a huge week for Jonathan Stewart on the ground.
Don’t count out Cam Newton in the air, though.
New Orleans held Houston to just 195 yards passing, but its previous four opponents all topped the 300-yard mark. Right cornerback Brandon Browner is having a terrible season—he’s ranked dead last among cornerbacks in PFF’s rankings—and has given up 628 yards receiving for an opposing quarterback rating of 103.4. Meanwhile, Jerricho Cotchery is quietly having a productive month, with 14 receptions for 218 yards over his last four games. Three of those games have seen him top 50 yards receiving, so he’s been a key figure in Carolina’s recent step forward on offense.
If New Orleans has a strength on defense, it’s on the defensive line, where Cam Jordan and Kevin Williams play. Jordan had four hurries against the Panthers back in Week 3 (per PFF) and leads the Saints in sacks, so he’s worth keeping an eye on. Williams, a six-time Pro Bowler, is still quietly effective at age 35. If last week’s defensive bounce-back performance was real, it’s the play of Jordan and Williams that will anchor the New Orleans defense going forward.
Still, this is a defense that gets no push against the run and can’t cover against the pass. Carolina just needs to stick with its legitimately good running game and average-but-improving passing attack, and it shouldn’t have a problem putting points on the board.
Defensive Game Plan
In the past, the Saints’ prolific offense has made up for their defensive woes. The New Orleans offense has ranked in the top 10 in yards every year going back to 2006—the beginning of the Sean Payton-Drew Brees era—and it's back in the top three again this year.
Don’t let the yardage total fool you, however. This team isn’t as good as the offenses of the past.
Part of that is the departure of Jimmy Graham, whom the Saints traded to the Seahawks for Max Unger and draft picks. Unger has been having an OK season, but the Saints have not been able to reproduce Graham’s performance with either Ben Watson or Josh Hill. Watson’s had a couple of big games, twice going over 100 yards, but he hasn’t provided the same level of consistent production or big-play ability that Graham brought.
What they do still have is Drew Brees, who is enough to give any team a fighting chance in any game. He’s completing 68.1 percent of his passes and has thrown for 20 touchdowns, so he’s still producing at roughly the same level he has over the past few seasons.
What is up for him is his sack rate—he’s been sacked 25 times already this season, compared to a total of only 29 times last year. That’s due in large part to his offensive line.
Left tackle Terron Armstead is solid, but every other position is at least questionable. The Saints just flipped their left guard position, going from Tim Lelito to the rookie Andrus Peat—and it’s not like Peat could do much worse than Lelito has been. Right tackle Zach Strief has struggled against pass-blockers, and age is finally beginning to catch up to 32-year-old Jahri Evans.
This is where Charles Johnson, Kawann Short and company can perhaps collapse the pocket, forcing Brees to throw into trouble and generally be off his game. Add in Josh Norman clamping down on Brandin Cooks, and you begin to wonder how Luke McCown threw for over 300 yards back in Week 3. Don’t expect a repeat performance this week.
On the ground, Mark Ingram is having a solid season, with 713 yards and five touchdowns already. He has over 1,000 yards total when you add in his receiving yardage. That’s a matchup for Luke Kuechly, who missed the last matchup between these two teams with a concussion. Expect him to cover Ingram from sideline to sideline and prevent the big play.
The New Orleans offense is still above average and should not be taken lightly, but Carolina boasts an excellent defense and should be able to handle it, especially if the offense jumps to a lead and forces the Saints to become one-dimensional.
Key Players
Panthers HB Jonathan Stewart
Stewart is third in the NFL in rushing yards, though his efficiency leaves a little to be desired. Perhaps the most impressive thing about his season so far is that he’s absorbed 211 carries already. That’s 10 short from the most he’s ever done in his NFL career and second most in the league behind only Adrian Peterson.
All the other Panthers running backs combined—not including fullback Mike Tolbert—have just 21 carries. Stewart hasn’t played a full season since 2011; his health has been a major positive for the Panthers in 2015.
The Saints have only allowed one rusher to individually have a 100-yard game—Devonta Freeman back in Week 6—but most rushers don’t carry as much of the load as Stewart does, and the Saints allow 134.5 yards rushing per game. Stewart could be in for a big game this week.
Saints RG Jahri Evans
There was a bit of a surprise on Friday: Jahri Evans was missing from the Saints’ practice, per the Times-Picayune's Evan Woodbery. He’s officially listed as questionable on the injury report. That’s better than the other two Saints who missed practice, but it leaves an already questionable offensive line further in question.
If Evans can’t go, Tim Lelito will probably be replace him. Lelito was just pulled from his left guard position last week in favor of Andrus Peat, so having to plug him back in right away isn’t the Saints’ ideal option. Even getting up there in age, Evans is still a significantly better option than Lelito, so it’s something to watch out for as we approach game time.
Panthers DE Charles Johnson
Johnson was carted off the field with a hamstring injury during the first matchup against the Saints this season. He didn’t return until last week against Dallas and even then was on a limited snap count. He should be back to something approaching normal usage this week, especially after a 10-day layoff since the Thanksgiving Day matchup.
Brees’ completion percentage drops below 50 percent when pressured, and he’s been sacked on 19.8 percent of his snaps under duress, according to Pro Football Focus. While he’s normally efficient enough to get the ball out of his hands before pressure gets to him, he has not done particularly well when the rush gets there. It’s up to Johnson and the defensive line to get that quick pressure and disrupt Brees’ game.
Saints LB Stephone Anthony
Anthony, one of the Saints’ two first-round picks, hasn’t been having a light’s-out season. He has the second-lowest PFF grade on the Saints defense, though he does lead the team in tackles. He hasn’t shown the same playmaking ability he had at Clemson, though he has been playing a bit better as of late. In Week 3 against Carolina, he was flagged for an unnecessary roughness penalty early in the fourth quarter, helping the Panthers score the touchdown that got them to 27 points and thus sealed the win.
His job responsibility this week will likely involve a lot of spying on Cam Newton, and that’s been a tough task for any defender this season. The Saints will probably use multiple players and looks to try to slow down Newton, but Anthony will likely be the linchpin, which is a tall task.
Panthers CB Josh Norman
Josh Norman is having a Pro Bowl-caliber year at cornerback, and part of it comes from the nearly game-sealing interception he made against the Saints back in Week 3. The interception prevented the Saints from scoring go-ahead points and allowed the Panthers to drain all but 11 seconds off the clock in the aftermath.
However, Norman also allowed 43 yards receiving in that game on four receptions, his second-worst day of the year, per PFF. The interception was bigger than any one of those receptions—and, frankly, bigger than all four combined—but it’s so rare that opposing teams get any significant yardage against him, that it’s worth noting. We’ll see if the Saints can have any success against him in the rematch.
Prediction
For the fourth straight week, the Panthers are up against a team that is more or less out of postseason contention, and for the 16th straight week in the regular season, they should pick up another victory.
It’s certainly not a guarantee—a divisional game on the road is a tough matchup regardless of record, and the Saints played the Panthers close back in Week 3.
Since then, however, the Panthers have improved from an above-average team that was winning close teams to a great one that boasts a dominating defense. The Saints, if anything, have regressed from a below-average squad with defensive deficiencies to a terrible one with one of the worst defenses in modern memory.
If the Saints keep up their current pace, they will allow 493 points. That would be the sixth most allowed all time and the most since the 2011 Tampa Bay Buccaneers. They would allow 6,698 yards, the third most allowed all time and the most since the 2012 Saints. The 4,547 passing yards they are on pace to allow would be the eighth most of all time. These are not good numbers to have.
That’s not to say the Saints will never be favored again—their offense is above average, and they could still win shootouts against other teams with questionable defenses. Perhaps last week’s defensive improvement was real, as well.
The Panthers are not one of those teams with questionable defenses. They should come out on top of this one fairly easily.
Final score: Carolina 34, New Orleans 17
Bryan Knowles is a featured columnist for Bleacher Report, covering the Carolina Panthers. Follow him @BryKno on twitter.
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