Halling calls it
Wednesday 3 February 2010 22:03, UK
Sky Sports' gridiron guru, Nick Halling, tells us how the Saints and Colts compare across the board.
Halling's guide to the men that matter in Miami
It's the greatest show on turf and Sky Sports will be there in Miami to bring you every tackle, time out and touchdown of Super Bowl XLIV on Sunday night. The Indianapolis Colts and New Orleans Saints are the two sides battling it out for the Vince Lombardi Trophy this season and we have followed them every step of the way, right here. As part of our extensive Super Bowl coverage, we will be sending our resident gridiron guru Nick Halling out to Miami, where he and former NFL linebacker Cecil Martin will be giving us a taste of the pre-game razzamatazz and their pitchside thoughts when battle commences. No-one knows their NFL like Nick, so before he out to Florida, we asked him to break down the two sides contesting Super Bowl XLIV. Here he marks your cards on the quarterbacks, the receivers, the running games, special teams, defense and the head coaches. And we couldn't let him go without giving us a quick prediction...Quarterbacks
NEW ORLEANS
Drew Brees is, without question, an elite quarterback. He's extremely accurate, he's calm under pressure, he's got good mobility and he can make the throws; this is a guy with a terrific arm. He is certainly a very, very efficient quarterback. He can't be considered a great one because you've got to be in a couple of Super Bowls and preferably win one before people give you that credit, but outside of the obvious superstars in Peyton Manning and Tom Brady, there aren't many better out there. I can't say he's shaky under pressure because I've not actually seen him under pressure, but I do wonder how he will cope in a high-pressure game. One thing we do know is Brees is very good at finding the open man in the scheme, whoever is open. He will make some plays; he has far too many weapons, he's far too accurate and far too good a quarterback to be shut down all game. But my question is: can he lead them on a scoring drive every time the Saints get the ball? Because that's what he might need to do.
INDIANAPOLIS
It's been business as usual for Peyton Manning this season. But I think he might even be coming into a whole new phase of his career as well, because he's starting to develop a serious rapport with Austin Collie and Pierre Garcon. He's got a high trust level with these guys now and they get what he's all about; he brings that incredible work ethic and if you are a receiver for the Indianapolis Colts you better share that ethic or the ball's not going to come your way often. The only question mark against Manning is can he find a new level? And worryingly for the rest of the NFL, I think he might. He reads a defense better than anybody and I've never yet seen Peyton Manning, confused throughout a game by a defense. Ever.
Receivers
NEW ORLEANS
This is a corps that has a bit of everything. Brees doesn't really have a go-to receiver, he will instead go to which ever one of these guys is open. Marques Colston is that big physical guy with deceptive speed; Lance Moore is that nippy little inside guy; Devery Henderson has got a ton of speed as well; Robert Meachem has emerged as a serious deep threat. Then you have to bring Jeremy Shockey (pictured) and the tight ends into play, as well as Reggie Bush coming out of the backfield. Whoever is open, whoever can do some damage, Brees will hit that guy. Shockey is the interesting one because he brings a lot of attitude and a lot of experience. People have the wrong idea of him and think he's a bit of a bully but Shockey knows his place; he knows where he is in the scheme of things, he's a good team guy. They miss him in the run game and he's a good pass protector; he brings more than a big pair of hands and a spikey attitude and having him healthy is going to be one of the keys if New Orleans are going to have any chance
INDIANAPOLIS
I think Pierre Garcon (pictured) has the potential to be a monster in this game, I really do. He's got that big body but now he knows how to use it. It's taken him a couple of years to work out this NFL; coming up from that small college (Mount Union) it was a huge step to ask him to make, but he's made that transition now. He does have that big body but he's got that great burst of speed, has breakaway speed as well and knows how to use his hands. The tight end Dallas Clark is due a big game and the question is where do you put your coverage when you're facing the Colts? You have to account for Reggie Wayne, or he's just going to kill you, and you have to look for Clark because he just does so much damage down the seams. But that will leave Austin Collie or Garcon with one-on-one coverage - and we saw what happened to the New York Jets when they did that in the play-offs. They focused on Wayne and Clark and the other guys popped up. Now that coverage has to be rotated the other way and that will free up things for someone like Clark.
Running backs
NEW ORLEANS
It used to be said that if you can run the ball and stop the run you win more games than you lose, but while that's fundamentally true this year, it has not been enough to win play-off games or Super Bowls. But if you can run the football it still gives you an advantage and I think this is one area the Saints have got to look at. You can move the ball pretty well on the ground against the Colts, especially if they go to a lot of nickel packages to work against the pass. Pierre Thomas is a really tough inside runner and Reggie Bush (pictured), in that first play-off game against Arizona, was running hard. I don't think I've ever seen Reggie running as hard as that!
INDIANAPOLIS
It's almost like they don't care when it comes to the running game! Every team wants that balance, but their approach is 'we've got Peyton Manning, that's what runs this offense'. They'll run the ball once in a while but Joseph Addai is in there mainly to protect his quarterback. If they can run the ball well, the Saints are going to be in an awful lot of trouble but I can't remember Addai doing a thing on the ground in the Conference game against the Jets, but they still won at a canter - and that is pretty much how this offense operates. It's almost an after-thought for them. You really fear for New Orleans if they suddenly find a ground game to talk about!Defense
NEW ORLEANS
I really do have some reservations about this defense - it's not a particularly deeply-talented group. There's a lot of good players and their defensive co-ordinator Gregg Williams is a very smart guy and I think he knows the limitations of this group, which is why he applies full-on pressure all the time. What he will do against Manning is bring in extra bodies, bring linebackers into the blitz schemes. But eventually Manning will start to see what's happening and start breaking it down and when you bring these pressure schemes in, you leave the likes of Jabari Greer (pictured)and Tracey Porter isolated one-on-one. Ultimately you want to have a couple of elite pass rushers and they don't have one; they've got Will Smith and Bobby McCray can be a bit of a nuisance. The middle of the field is not an area of great strength; linebacker Jonathan Vilma is better against the run than he is the pass, Darren Sharper will probably play a lot of deep safety and Roman Harper is a tough little player but doesn't have the quickness.
INDIANAPOLIS
They played average defense in the regular season but seemed to crank it up a gear in the post-season. That group is a very interesting group; they're very small, very fast, very aggressive and extremely well-coached, which is something that often gets overlooked. They don't have any superstars either; other than Dwight Freeney, they've got nobody who was a high-draft choice or a big-money free agent. The stats tell a tale here though because they gave up a lot of yards during the regular season but in terms of points against, they were ranked eighth - what we call a bend-don't break defense. Stopping yards after reception has to be one of the keys and they do have a fast defense that tackles well. But where they really come into their own is that a front four of Robert Mathis (pictured), Antonio Johnson, Daniel Muir and Freeney. They put pressure on and allow them to drop seven into coverage, which makes the windows of opportunity very small for a quarterback.
Special Teams
NEW ORLEANSFor a start, the Saints have Reggie Bush, certainly on punt returns, who is a threat to break one at any time and that's certainly one thing that is going to concern the Colts coaching staff as much as anything this week. Their kicker, Garrett Hartley is a bit of an unknown quantity. It's his first real full season and he's missed four games and a few kicks as well so I wouldn't want to put it on his shoulders if it came down to it. But special teams is the one area where the Saints may well have the advantage. INDIANAPOLIS
Adam Vinatieri probably won't figure because he's been injured for pretty much the whole year, but Matt Stover is rock solid and it was a very good insurance policy of the Colts to pick him up. In terms of returns, in contrast to the Saints, the Colts' coverage units and their return units are really nothing special.
Head coaches
NEW ORLEANS
Sean Payton is an extremely creative play-calling coach. He's also a little bit miserable and a little bit grumpy and I guess that doesn't hurt does it? But you'd like to think you can be a little bit more helpful with people than Sean sometimes is! For us over here it's tough to root against someone that began his coaching career over here 20 years ago with Leicester. He was a player-coach in the British League, his first-ever role was on the fields of Leicestershire - which is something he doesn't seem to like being reminded of! Payton is very much the offensive soul of the team; that is his offense and he is the offensive co-ordinator and he runs things. But he is also the big-picture guy and he lets Gregg Williams take care of the defense. But he will definitely be the guy that has the final say and he holds his players accountable - if he needs to kick someone's backside, he'll do it. He's a tough guy with a sharp tongue and not someone you want to get on the wrong side of, but as a pure play caller and a creative offensive thinker, he's absolutely outstanding.
INDIANAPOLIS
I really like what Jim Caldwell has done because he inherited the job from Tony Dungy, who was one of the all-time great coaches, and I thought he had more pressure than any other first-year coach. Everybody else was going into a rebuilding job - Caldwell was going into a team that was consistently a play-off challenger so anything less than that would reflect on him. The first thing he did was sack the defensive coordinator and the special teams coordinator and I thought that was a really gutsy thing to do because it could so easily have backfired on him. He's taken what Dungy knew was successful - like leave the offensive line alone and let Peyton Manning do what he needs to do to - but he's also made the defense a little bit more aggressive; they didn't blitz a lot but he's brought in more of that. He's a tough talker as well, a quiet man but tough and you can't have the success that the Colts have had this year if you've got a lame duck head coach or just a figurehead. I've been very, very impressed with the quiet leadership that Jim Caldwell's brought to the team.
