So many things send NFL coaches into a tizzy. | general | Forum

 Most of them get addressed immediately.The one item they can’t get done quickly http://www.atlantafalconsteamo…..ary-jersey , and often not at all, is finding consistency.Rarely have the first six weeks of a season provided so many up-and-down performances, from weaklings to world beaters, from turnover machines to takeaway monsters.Consider that there are seven teams with 3-3 marks, and another one, Green Bay, at 2-2-1 heading into its Monday nighter against San Francisco. There also are eight other clubs within a half-game or full game of the break-even mark. Had the Panthers and Redskins, both 3-2, and Lions (2-3) not had byes, they might well be .500 clubs now.Those with a positive approach will call it competitive balance. We’ll stick with mediocrity.And, most maddeningly, inconsistency.“Yes, it always hurts more when you know you beat yourself, but that’s part of the game,” Carolina wide receiver Torrey Smith said after a 23-17 defeat at Washington in which the Panthers lost the turnover battle 3-0. “Sometimes you overcome it Kendall Sheffield Jersey , sometimes you don’t. There’s no one particular person at fault. We know it’s us as a team.“Great teams play well all four quarters. Good teams do it sporadically. If we want to be great, we have to be consistent. We had our chances, but we got to be able to do it every Sunday.”What so many NFL teams do is dominate one week, deliver a dud the next. In Week 6, we had:—Chicago (3-2), so powerful in its previous game before a bye, blowing a big lead at Miami (4-2), which was coming off messing up a 17-0 edge at Cincinnati in Week 5.—Dallas (3-3), inept offensively in a prime-time failure at Houston, turning around and pummeling Jacksonville 40-7. The Jaguars seemed like a special group after a 3-1 start that included beating New England. They are now 3-3 with two poor showings in a row.—Tennessee (3-3), which has followed three successive victories with two awful displays of invisible offense, including falling at Cleveland (2-3-1), a team that was hammered Sunday by the Chargers. Indeed, the Titans, Jaguars and Texans http://www.atlantafalconsteamo…..sky-jersey , who lost their opening three before winning the next three games, are tied atop the AFC South. At .500.—Seattle (3-3), where Pete Carroll is doing one of the best coaching jobs of his career in keeping a retooling — say rebuilding in the Emerald City and you will be thrown into Puget Sound — club competitive. But still inconsistent, despite a 27-3 thrashing of the hapless Raiders.—Pittsburgh (3-2-1), which once again stole a win at Cincinnati, a regular occurrence over nearly the last two decades. The Steelers have so many issues on and off the field that keeping them from sinking the season is paramount now compared to finding any steadiness.Don’t expect much of this to change as we move deep into autumn and then into winter. While there are a few teams that are quite good and a bunch that are very bad, the truth about the NFL these days is that the majority of clubs are so-so.Some can’t find a consistent offense to balance a solid defense, including the three AFC South leaders.“I also know that we’re not going to be able to be where we want to be unless we figure this thing out on offense,” Houston coach Bill O’Brien admitted Sunday. “And figure out what we have to do to be able to run the ball, throw the ball consistently, and at times we look like a good offense, not really today, but at times we have this season. We have to figure that out.”Others can move the ball, put up some points, but not regularly stop anybody. The Steelers and Vikings Qadree Ollison Jersey , two teams with a history of strong defense, won’t remind you of the Steel Curtain or the Purple People Eaters right now.Even some of the true contenders, such as Kansas City and New England, have great offenses and sieve-like Ds.Injuries always are a plague in the search for consistency. The schedule, especially when weather becomes an issue, can be, too.Still, the folks at the league offices won’t bemoan ordinariness when it means those teams will be carrying the playoff races down to the end of the schedule. And fans of those teams will be thrilled that, even at 9-7 or 8-8, their guys are in the thick of things, consistency be damned. METAIRIE, La. (AP) — A playful grin widened across Drew Brees‘ face while he discussed lining up as a receiver for the read-option plays the Saints installed last season for third-string quarterback Taysom Hill.“If they’re going to split me out as much, I’m going to need to have some routes that at least I can start working on,” Brees said Thursday after a voluntary offseason practice.It sounded like he was joking, but anything’s possible.The 40-year-old quarterback said learning and trying new things is as important to him now as at any point in his 19-year career.In fact Brian Burns Jersey , he sees it as a recipe for sustained success.“At the end of the year, all the coaches pull out all the film from every opponent and they’re sitting there analyzing and watching it, right?” Brees said. “So, everybody’s studying your stuff. So, you can’t just come back and keep doing the same stuff over and over.”Last season, Brees attempted the fewest passes and amassed the fewest yards passing of any of his 13 seasons with the Saints. Yet Brees broke his own NFL record for completion rate, connecting on 74.4 percent of his passes. He also passed for 32 TDs while throwing just five interceptions.Perhaps most importantly, Brees led the Saints to the NFC championship game, which they likely would have won if not for what the NFL determined were mistakes by officials not to call late-game pass interference and helmet-to-helmet contact penalties against the Los Angeles Rams.This season, Brees is looking forward to seeing what other new wrinkles coach Sean Payton might introduce, particularly in light of the acquisition of veteran tight end Jared Cook during free agency.“I like looking at new concepts and beginning to see, ‘OK, I think this is something we can be really good at based upon our personnel,” Brees said.“That’s fun, too http://www.carolinapantherstea…..tle-jersey , because you begin to pull all these concepts out that maybe you haven’t done before, so it’s a new challenge to try to incorporate that or develop a comfort level enough that that becomes a part of what you do.”Brees said Cook brings the speed, size and catching radius that should help the tight end “fit very well into our offense.”Cook, meanwhile, said he saw nothing in his first three practices with Brees this week that made him doubt whether the Saints’ record-setting QB is still elite.“Nothing’s changed,” Cook said. “He’s advanced in what he does. … He’s very detail oriented and he takes the little things and strives to be great at them.”Brees is under contract for only one more season, and it’s unclear how much longer the father of four might play. He has said he treats every season as if it might be his last now, tries to “stay in the moment,” and takes nothing for granted.“It’s a different approach because I’m so much wiser than I was” as a younger pro, Brees said. “When you’re that age you just think just work in general is good. It’s not necessarily efficient work or that you’re working smart. In other words, I don’t remember having that much of a plan back then. It was just, ‘Hey, I’m a good athlete. I like football. I like to work out. I’ll just go out there and run around and sling it.’“Now the approach is so regimented with everything I do on a daily basis in regards to my sleep habits and my diet and the way that I train and the way I recover and how I’m caring for my shoulder and different parts of my body that require me to play the quarterback position,” Brees said. “It’s just very different now.”