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Saints Training Camp 2021: Transcript of Coach Sean Payton from Thursday, Aug. 5

Aug 05, 2021 at 04:13 PM

New Orleans Saints

New Orleans Saints Coach Sean Payton

2021 Training Camp presented by SeatGeek

Post practice press conference with local media

Thursday, Aug. 5, 2021

Opening Statement:

"Any questions on today's practice?"

Cherry lime snowball for you today or are you going to change it up?

"I haven't paid attention. That would be the flavor though probably."

Could you talk about Marcus Davenport? Would you say he had a good day?

"Yeah, we'll look at the film. I thought defensively, we were just talking about momentum and how that affects games and how there's typically flows to that. But regards to him, I want to make sure I watch the tape, those guys did a good job though."

What's your evaluation of him so far?

"I see, No. 1, he's healthy, he's active. I think he's having a good camp. We're still one week in, but he's doing a good job. He's very explosive. And I would say he's been a little bit more consistent. And so we just did our first evening long kind of meeting on personality of the night. And it's been positive with him."

When you talk about the ebbs and flows, offense to defense, is it kind of some of those younger guys on defense, kind of figuring out what to do?

"Yeah, the main message was, in the course of these games, in the regular season, there's always that pendulum that swings with momentum, and you're trying as best you can to keep it when you have it as long as you can, capitalize on it. And when you don't, that ability to correct, to get it back, to slow down what they're doing well, but it happens in almost every game you play. Rarely are you in a game where you don't see a couple different momentum swings. And you've got to work on that. Today was one of those days, I just thought offensively there was a period of practice where we needed to autocorrect real quickly."

When you're evaluating quarterbacks? How important is it just to evaluate where the ball is going? As opposed to maybe the execution?

"I think that's important. Where it's going and then is it effective? It's easy for me to say, 'Hey, lead your team and find ways to score.' It's an imperfect game at times. And so you are working with the progression, where their eyes are, the protections, all of those things. Ultimately, how efficient you can do that, how effective you can do that. But where it's going at times is really the decision column in the grade."

You do grade (the throws)?

"Yeah, every throw we have got a decision grade. There's different type reads. There are some reads that fall in the line of a progression read, there's some reads that are here or here based on coverage. But that gets evaluated with every throw."

In that evaluation, if somebody's open and they are not seeing it does that go into it?

"Well, look, there's times if the progression takes them A, B and C, C's open, we throw it to A who's open, not maybe as much. That's fine. Within the progression, if we pass one that's open, then it's fine. No. 2 on a basic cross is coming open and you're too quick off of it. That's kind of an easy way to describe it though. But that element or column exists with each decision on a pass play."

(Erik) McCoy said the other day, he was talking about the cadence in the huddle, said their cadence is pretty similar. But he said how they operate in the huddle that Jameis (Winston) is a little more fun-loving and joyful and kind of makes them smile and Taysom (Hill) is a little bit more serious. Is it just kind of their personality?

"I think the last thing we want to do is change who they are, their personality. Drew (Brees) is a certain personality, Jameis, he is wired a certain way, no different than Taysom. And so there's been no formula for what you have to have, the hard work is necessary. The attention to detail is necessary, but our league has seen a history of all sorts of personalities at that position. I think the first mistake would be trying to be someone other than yourself."

Like Bobby Hebert?

"We know his personality."

(Bobby Hebert)

"I'm probably more like Jameis."

I don't want to be presumptuous, but did the video of No. 2 (Jameis Winston) going through the (gauntlet machine) make that way into the team meeting?

"So I didn't see it. But my assistant Kevin (Petry) did, and that's probably in a file somewhere. He showed it to me so. It's certainly not going to make the manufacturer of gauntlets file."

Photos: 2021 Saints Training Camp - August 5, 2021