The Atlanta Falcons built nests all over Caesars Superdome on Monday night.
In what was their third defeat of the year, the New Orleans Saints lost to the NFC South-rival Falcons at home, 45-24. New Orleans trailed by as many as 28 points with 6:51 remaining in the fourth quarter and gave up 205 rushing yards — and veteran defensive end Cameron Jordan had a message for the Saints after the prime-time loss.
“We got to look at the film to see how we can get better, because it can’t get worse than that s—,” Jordan said on Monday night after the Saints’ Week 4 loss. “It’s one of those games where we’re going to have to break this film down tomorrow. There is no off-day. If you truly love this s—, you’ll be in there early in the morning. That was the message. … Yeah, I doubt I’m sleeping much tonight. There are things that we have to do. … It’s overly upsetting. … I hate that we had a slow start. …
“We got punched in the mouth early, and you’re looking to respond. It’s one of those games where we weren’t good enough on offense, defense and special teams.”
Atlanta superstar running back Bijan Robinson rushed for a 59-yard touchdown on the third play of the game, which would be one of his two scores in an overall 145-yard night on the ground. Fellow Falcons back Brian Robinson Jr. rushed for 62 yards and three touchdowns.
Meanwhile, the Saints rushed for just 50 yards, with quarterback Tyler Shough acknowledging the frustration among the New Orleans faithful with the divisional loss, saying he’d “boo, too.”
Through four games, the Saints’ defense has surrendered the most points in the NFL (32.0 per game), while being 30th in opponent points (147.8 per game), 26th in opponent total yards (360.3 per game) and 15th in passing yards (212.5 per game). They’ve recorded a combined eight sacks.
“You look up in the second half like, ‘fight back!’ When you have a division rival, it’s damn near worth two games. The Falcons come into our building, you’ve got to be able to lock things behind you,” Jordan said. “Two hundred yards rushing? That’s on the defensive line. When you have a ground game like that, you have to look at your defensive line and say, ‘Hey, we got to tighten up!’ It didn’t happen this game, so our secondary had to come down and try to focus on the run, and that’s where they get to have their way.
“They had their way today. F—— embarrassing.”
Jordan, an eight-time Pro Bowler who has spent each of his 16 seasons in the NFL with the Saints (2011-present), has logged four combined tackles in three games played this year. The now-37-year-old totaled 10.5 sacks, two forced fumbles and 47 combined tackles last season and is the Saints’ all-time leader with 132.0 recorded sacks.
Conversely, New Orleans has held its own on the other side of the ball, with it being fourth in passing yards (278.5 per game), ninth in total yards (367.0 per game) and 10th in points (26.3 per game). Granted, the Saints are 27th in rushing yards (88.5 per game).
Next up for Jordan and the Saints is a home tilt against the 4-0 Minnesota Vikings (1 p.m. ET on FOX).
