Jake Haener was named the starter ahead of the New Orleans Saints’ matchup against the Washington Commanders last week, but he did not make it through the entirety of the contest before being benched. After about two quarters of action, Haener was pulled in favor of former Oklahoma and South Carolina quarterback Spencer Rattler.
Haener was asked after the 20-19 loss to Washington about his thoughts on the quarterback change made by interim head coach Darren Rizzi.
“Obviously I’m disappointed,” Haener said postgame. “You go out there and you make good play, third play of the game. Gets called back, which is tough.”
Rizzi had said himself that the move was not all on Haener but that he did feel like Rattler’s presence did ignite a spark. And, to be fair, Haener did help engineer a positive play quite early on in the game with a deep lob to Cedrick Wilson Jr., but it was called back due to a penalty.
Haener applauded Rattler for coming in and getting things moving in a better direction for the offense, something that may or may or may not be fully attributed to him when the game film is gone through and broken down.
“I thought Spencer did a great job coming in and handling the moment of the game,” Haener said, “gave us a chance there to win at the end. I was proud of how he handled himself.”
Of course, with the state of the quarterback position in limbo as long as veteran Derek Carr remains sidelined, Haener was asked about the future and what he felt he could have done better in this particular performance after he completed four of his 10 passing attempts for 49 yards with one interception.
“I’ll have to go back and look at the tape. The only thing I can really think of that comes to mind right now is (when I was) trying to force the ball to (Alvin Kamara) when we were down,” Haener said.
Learning from that and not making that mistake again. Overall, I feel like that was my one bad decision. When you go back and look at it, you will probably say the same.”
At the end of the day, Haener sees his own performance for what is was and was not. But he did recognize and applaud the strides that were made for one reason or another when it was Rattler lining up at quarterback instead of him.
“But I didn’t get enough first downs, didn’t move the team, and like I said, Spencer came in and did a great job,” Haener reflected.
Whether or not Rizzi chooses to keep Rattler in front of Haener for the future consistently will be something to keep an eye on.
