New Orleans Saints: Complete roster breakdown vs. Arizona Cardinals
By Jason Reed
The New Orleans Saints have one more game before the bye week against the Arizona Cardinals and look to move to 7-1 with Drew Brees back in action.
Drew Brees has not been under center for the New Orleans Saints since Week 2 but the team has done just fine without him. Teddy Bridgewater is seemingly getting better every week and the Saints’ defense really has stepped up as one of the best in the league.
All of that is just icing on the cake for Brees’ return, which reportedly will be in Week 8. At the time of writing this, the team has not yet confirmed the ESPN report that Brees will be back in action in Week 8.
This may come as a surprise to some, as the Arizona Cardinals do not seem like that big of a hurdle for the 7-1 Saints, with or without Brees.
The Cardinals probably are better than some Saint fans may realize. To put it into perspective, as we have with every game this year, here is the complete roster breakdown of both sides.
Special teams: Advantage, Saints
Cardinals’ kicker Zane Gonzalez is second in the NFL behind Justin Tucker for the most points this season but that is not enough to give the Cardinals an edge in the special teams unit.
While Gonzalez has scored a lot, that has more to do with the Cardinals coming up short in scoring position rather than Gonalez being a fantastic kicker, although he has been reliable this year for Arizona.
Gonzalez has three misses in 21 attempts while Wil Lutz has three missed in 18 attempts, so we will give a slight advantage there to the Cardinals.
However, the Saints have one of the best punters in the league in Thomas Morstead, who is a master of his craft in pinning the opponents near their own endzone.
New Orleans ranks ahead of Arizona in average kickoff return and punt return yards as well.