A weekly look at what the New Orleans Saints must fix:
To beat the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday, the New Orleans Saints will have to be able to finish them off.
The Saints (4-5) have lost four games by three points or less -- two more than any other team in the NFL, according to ESPN Stats & Information data. And they've been leading all four of those games with less than two minutes left in regulation.
There have been many reasons, including some costly turnovers by Saints quarterback Drew Brees. But the most maddening mistake that keeps creeping up is huge breakdowns by the secondary.
They had a blown coverage assignment on a 28-yard pass in the final seconds at Cleveland in Week 2. They had a series of missed tackles on Golden Tate's 73-yard touchdown catch in the final minutes at Detroit in Week 7. Then they got burned by San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick's big arm when they left Michael Crabtree wide open for a 51-yard catch on a fourth-and-10 play this past Sunday (click here for an extensive breakdown).
Saints safety Kenny Vaccaro was the deep safety who decided to roll his coverage to the middle of the field instead of staying back on Crabtree. After watching the tape, Vaccaro admitted Monday that if he could redo it, maybe he would have stayed deeper. But he disagreed with TV analyst Tony Dungy, whom Vaccaro said called him "undisciplined."
"When a guy rolls out, we're taught as safeties, you gotta roll with him. And he was at the far sideline. … Once he shuts down half the field, we close half the field. He just has a cannon, that's it," explained Vaccaro, who said he decided to run up on tight end Vernon Davis in the middle of the field instead because he considered him a bigger threat and had seen Kaepernick make a similar throw on film.
Whether it has been a lack of discipline, poor judgment or just plain poor execution, it's clearly been a consistent problem for a young Saints secondary. Although they've shown improvement over the past month for long stretches of games, they're still breaking down too often in those less-scripted situations.