Freshly-drafted New Orleans Saints defensive end Isaiah Foskey hopes to be the next Cameron Jordan. However, playing alongside his idol would be okay too.
Jordan who set the sack record for the Saints in January, is the poster child for defense presently. As coach Dennis Allen mentioned, he’s not a bad player to have a mentee either.
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“I guess if you’re going to try to learn from somebody, that would be a good one to learn from,” Allen said.
“It’s no wonder the Saints’ second-round pick is eager to meet the player he calls a “Hall of Famer’ type of guy.”
Foskey and Jordan share the same record-setting mentality, with Foskey holding Notre Dame’s record of 26.5 career sacks.
“They’ve been playing football for a little while, so we felt like he was a pretty good player for us,” Allen said smiling after the draft.
But, Isaiah Foskey who was chosen with the 40th pick last week, has more ahead than a mere learning chance. He and defensive tackle Bryan Bresee, New Orleans’ first-round pick, have the power to set their marks on a reformed defensive line.
“I wanted to go to a team that’s defensive, d-line pretty much, oriented,” Foskey said. “That first pick, Bryan Bresee, me and him are going to be dominating the front seven, so that’s great.”
The possibility of becoming a Saint was something Foskey wanted from the start. He met the coaches in the spring through video chats, film study, and in-person visits at the NFL scouting combine, Notre Dame’s Pro Day and the Senior Bowl.
As things were unveiled, Isaiah Foskey held on to the idea of joining New Orleans.
“I fell in love with them, love the coaches, I talked to them a lot. Just the vibe of the whole team, New Orleans,” Foskey said. “I kept telling everybody, this is who I want to go to.”
Isaiah probably also fell in love with the empty slate on the depth chart. Besides Jordan, his biggest competitors are 2021 first-round pick Payton Turner (13 career games, 3 sacks) and Carl Granderson (54 career games, 14.5 sacks).
Considering the way the Saints rushers are rotated, there are good chances for everybody.
Bresee and Foskey are the newest and youngest faces in a team that did an overhaul. Defensive tackles David Onyemata, Shy Tuttle and Kentavius Street were replaced with free-agent selections Khalen Saunders and Nathan Shepherd.
Marcus Davenport who was heavily invested in by New Orleans in the first round of the 2018 draft, went with the Minnesota Vikings after spending five seasons and delivering 21.5 sacks in New Orleans. The Saints have a new defensive coordinator and new defensive line coach too.
Jordan aged 33 is the only player in the room above age 30, and his longtime teammates leaving have been a bittersweet experience for him.
He mused before the draft that Onyemata, who joined the Atlanta Falcons, was one of the last linemen in the locker room that was close to his age.
However, as sad as Cameron has been to watch his teammates leave, he’s been stoked about the draft all offseason, tweeting mock draft selections and hinting at the need for a defensive tackle for New Orleans.
“No, that’s exciting. No such thing as a mass exodus for me,” Jordan told ESPN prior to the draft.
He added: “I think that when you have guys that you played with, and you see them get paid, I’m excited for them, like, ‘Hey Shy, way to make your money,’ or ‘Hey David, how could you go to the dark side? You know, why would you go to the losing side?’ … You think about guys going to different teams, and you understand it’s part of the game.”
In a few ways, Jordan is a reminder of the Saints’ past. When he was chosen in the first round of the 2011 draft at 6-foot-4, he was one of the tallest guys on the defensive line. Defensive tackle Turk McBride who signed on as a free agent in 2011, was the only other lineman of the same height.
Now, Cameron is one of the shortest.
The New Orleans Saints since then, have consistently evolved their prototypes, striving to grow and get taller in front. Foskey (6-5) and Bresee (6-5) align with this trend.
“Not a lot of big men walking the earth right now that have that type of athleticism. You know what I mean? There’s just not very many of them,” Allen said. “They’re a top priority for us. It’s a big man’s game. I’ve said that all along, we like size, length, athleticism, and the prototypes that we talk about are a big part of what we do. I think we philosophically believe that the ability to control the line of scrimmage is important in winning football games. So yeah, it’s been a point of emphasis for us.”
However, Jordan’s success is attributed to more than just height or physical characteristics, and Foskey who boxes as one of the ways to hone and study his pass-rushing technique, knows this. It is something he and Al Washington, his defensive line coach at Notre Dame, talked about.
“You think about Cam Jordan, he’s arguably one of the best defensive linemen in the game,” Washington said. “I think what makes Cam unique is not so much the physical, it’s the way he views the game, his intelligence. I think he makes great decisions, and he has years of experience to look to. For Isaiah, him coming in Day 1, he should be a sponge to a guy like that because really it’s almost like a passing of a torch.
“I know Cam is not done, but I think it really will help a player like Isaiah, who is intuitive and passionate about the game. I think he absolutely will take advantage of that and being in that locker room.”
This is something Isaiah Foskey is definitely up for doing.
“I can learn from him, be a sponge and soak it all in, but compete at the same level as him, try to go on the other side of him, or be him.” Foskey said. “That was like the biggest thing I wanted to do, be underneath a vet, be with a vet. And New Orleans was a great thing, you had Cam Jordan right there.”
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