Payton not buying into third time is the charm in matchup with Tampa Bay

The common narrative this week, at least nationally, has been that the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are an improved team than the one the New Orleans Saints defeated twice in convincing fashion and that it is very hard, even daunting, to beat a team a third time in the season.

Saints head coach Sean Payton reiterated his thought of Wednesday, that he expected to face the Buccaneers again in the playoffs for a third time this season. He added that he is not a buyer on the third time is the charm theory being promoted this week.

“Each one’s different,” Payton said. “The first two days, you’re having Déjà vu of these games and of these were thoughts and ideas and no, that wasn’t Carolina, that was Tampa and you get brought back into things that were applicable. You didn’t run last time and you begin to put your plan together. I think that it is what it is for both teams.”

Payton went on to question the thinking that is going to be too hard to beat a good team a third time.

“There’s a little bit more familiarity with personnel, some of the nuances,” Payton said. “You read oh, it’s hard to beat a team for the third time, whatever, but I think, statistically thinking, it’s in the 60-something percentile, you do or you don’t. I think that’s a little bit of a myth if you really do the math.”

Things have changed significant for the New Orleans Saints and Tampa Bay Buccaneers since week one, when the Saints downed the Bucs 34-23 on Sept. 13 in New Orleans.

Payton believes he knows why.

“You’ve got to remember, relatively no offseason so someone like Tom (Brady) comes to a new club, you’re not provided those normal OTA’s, call it mini-camps where you’re having opportunities to begin to put in a system,” Payton said. “I think that without speaking for them, I think we saw that progression that’s probably still evolved throughout the course of the season and quite honestly, with us, the same way.”

Payton has seen clear improvement in the Buccaneer offense most recently.

“This last half of the season or last third of the season, I think they’re playing at a very high level,” Payton said.

What does Payton think has made Drew Brees and Tom Brady in their brilliant careers?

“If you listed four traits that these elite players have, you would have to put competitive nature in both of these top five traits,” Payton said. “You can decide where you want to put it. It is certainly, arguably, in the top three. There’s a gift athletically of throwing the football, there’s a work ethic, grind that fits in.”

Then, there is the week-to-week difficulty involved in the process.

“The mental and physical grind of what they do is hard to even begin to fathom, relative to the preparation each week, each season, countless receivers,” Payton said. “I’d be curious to know the number of tight ends, receivers and running backs that these two have worked with in their careers and just think about the mesh point, the play-action, the route depth, the shallow cross, the timing of the deep in.”

It is all part of getting ready to play well each and every Sunday, Monday, or even Saturday.

“That attention to detail just speaking from my vantage of watching Drew is pretty impressive and it can be exhausting,” Payton said. “This isn’t just like the old sheep dog and the fox where you just punch in. This doesn’t go away. Some of you are too young to remember that cartoon.”

I remember it well, coach. Ralph Wolf and Sam Sheepdog were outstanding memories of my childhood.

Payton made light of the difficulty of not knowing who will be available each Sunday of the crazy, different, challenging 2020 season.

“That’s been the whole season,” Payton laughed. “What better drama? The Saints don’t have any running backs, they’re going to play the Panthers tomorrow, tune in! Well I’m going to watch that game if I wasn’t already.”

Payton cited one such situation not involving his own team that he witnessed.

“I think that that element is impressive when you watched the Browns the other day and you watched them play in a playoff game and they’re missing a bunch of their important coaches, their play-caller and then you get introduced to new people,” Payton said. “I think it’s good for television so new kicker? Make it overtime game-winner! It’s historic, really.”

Despite the challenges, Payton feels blessed to be working in the NFL in these strange times.

“There are these moments in time that I think, we’re fortunate to be in the sports industry because it keeps moving eventually,” Payton said. “It doesn’t pay attention to the economy. It doesn’t pay attention to these other things. Certainly some of the challenges this year, we’ve all had to deal with and we’re continuing to.”

Payton said Brees helped him get through this season in an usual way.

“Brees gave me a book called Breathe,” Payton said. “I don’t know if that was a hint but it’s the art of breathing properly through your nose and calming yourself and I think I do feel like we do a better job of spending more time on the things that we can control because it’s exhausting if you try to pay attention to or give that amount of attention to every detail. What can we control and then let’s go play.”