Let’s face it, there’s this mental thing like the Red Sox had for so many years and the Chicago Cubs still have about winning and the playoffs, etc. What I mean is with the Saints, it’s not that they can’t beat the Bears or Carolina, it’s an inferiority complex. Years and years of losing wil do that. The locker rooms and hallways and meeting rooms and workout rooms- well they don’t exactly exude this atmosphere that one would experience in Lambeau field where Vince Lombardi’s presence can still be felt. Or in San Francisco where, even when they are bad, they can reflect back on Joe Montana and the days of mutiple championships. There’s a reverence there for the accomplishments of the past. Or Giants Stadium and the tradition and history of success and many,many playoff victories. Saints fans are still trying to forget Ditka, Haslett, the bullshit “home” game in NY, Bags on Heads, Ricky Williams debacle, etc etc, but have very little true success to draw from for inspiration and confidence. When games are on the line like last night’s was, it always seems the Saints opponents “know” they can win more than the Saints “know” they can win.

It will change and this core of players can be the group that makes it happen. It’s a harder task then most teams have, NFL or otherwise. I think Drew, Vilma, Fujita, Harper, Colston, Moore, PT, Deuce (hopefully) Reggie, Miller,
Hartley, Pakulak, Ellis, Clancy, Porter, etc are the kind of guys that can make it happen. I truly believe, with some minor tweaks and better coaching, the Saints have the talent o go all the way…unfortunately just not this year.

And, truly, there needs to be better coaching. Haslett was .500, Payton’s around there. That’s not by coincidence. Hopefully Payton has learned some things and next year will do a better job. I think this year his grade would be a C or a D and you don’t win playoff games that way. You also don’t go to the playoffs with the most vanilla, unconfusing defense schemes in the league. Literally no qb’s would have any trouble figuringout what we are doing on any given play.

when they sacked him with 2 seconds left to play.

Jeremy Shockey, and Reggie Bush.
Fire: Sean Payton.
Get some defense for those two prima donnas. You play in the toughest div. in football, take that from an NFC East guy. Defense first. Payton doesn’t get it.

This is 2 years in a row the damn Bears have thrown the ball down the field in hopes of getting a PI, and it was granted and they win the game. Their two big plays were 50 yard PI’s. On the first one David was called for it. BUT AT LEAST HE WAS IN THE FUCKING VICINITY! CAN SOMEONE TELL ME WHERE WAS THE FUCKING SAFETY??? He wasn’t even in the picture. And the last PI…on the fucking safety. Think about it people. Our wrath has been focused on the wrong positions. Sure, cornerback has had it’s issues, but its the worthless safeties on this team that have killed this season. The play for me that epitomises the play of the safeties was last week against ATL. Turner was stopped for minimal gain, when Bullocks flies in and blows the two Saints off the runner, spining him free!! I had to rewind it because I couldn’t believe my eyes. It like he was playing for the other team. It was Pathetic.

They killed it last year too. Safety needs to be the number one priority in the offseason. I feel so strongly about that, that I wouldn’t mind if Gibbs comes backif we upgrade that position!! Thats right. You read it correctly. We’re pretty damn good against the run. Its that pass that has killed us, and I can give you a list a mile long of plays that killed us that had poor safety play involved. I think that if we can get a playmaking safety in either the draft or free angency (both hopefully) that our defense will be in the top half in the league. I truly believe that.

Here’s what needs to happen:

Sign Dunta Robinson. Have you guys seen him play? That dude hits like a firecracker. He’s all of 5’11", 190, buts lays the wood down. Being from Houston, I get to see him, and I love him. Fearless. He will be a FA, and hopefully is sick of loosing.

Either go after that Giants safety, if he’s available, athen draft one of the 3 bad ass safeties that will go in the first round. Taylor Mays? Make a Trojan our first pick 3 out of 4 years.

Bottom Line: GET NEW SAFETIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Payton is once again complaining about the kicking game. WTF?! How about your 4th down call—was it any different than against ATL? And once again the saints can’t cover a BAD receiver down the field…the guy didn’t even have to catch the ball.

In the draft: safety, cornerback, defensive end. I don’t know how our tackles are doing so well but we have really stuffed the run this year. At least that’s how it seems—I don’t think we’re ranked in the top 5 on defense against the run.

I’m worried about the receiving game. Colston has looked pretty bad. Meachem faded fast but always looked good when he played. Something has to be done about that group.

And at running back we need another bruiser….somebody bigger than PT.

I’m not going to repeat what everyone else has said about the safety’s.
I’m not going to repeat what everyone else has said about that piece of shit GIBBS.
Is it possible for our Safety’s to be this crappy or is it Gibbs’ scheme? I don’t know, but something has to be done.
I saw Meachem, Colston, Devery, and Shockey drop easy passes.
I saw Drew Brees make bad decisions and bad throws.
All of this and we were still in the Game.
I think Payton is a good coach.
That’s it.

I really gave up on this season back in week 3. After blowing our 2nd straight game and with our injured player list approaching near 50% of our starters, it just seemed like this would be a season to try some new things, play some players that don’t get many reps, and build a foundation for next year with what we could learn.

Instead it seems like we really haven’t learned much or used these opportunities to grow at all.

Then on top of it all, we have the 3 quasi-suspended players. Of which only 1 is even being used, yet they’re all fighting the suspension which brings to mind another bad thought.

Now that they’ve pushed back the suspensions, should they get upheld (which is probably very likely to happen) we’ve now tainted 1/4 of next season with these suspensions since it’s unlikely this gets resolved before week 16 at this rate.

Seems like the smarter move would have been just to deal with the suspensions now, and aim to be at full strength next year.

I don’t know, just seems like the more things change, the more they stay the same.

This ain’t now or never has been rocket science or brain surgery. Until Benson brings in a real Football guy at the GM level someone who can real in any rogue coach and help motivate underachieving members of a coaching staff. Our history holds true today as it did in the 60’s and 70’s. Which is to bring in one or two really good players and take what you can get with the rest and hope for the best. It’s like hey we are in a party town, the dome is right down the street from the french quarter, liquor is flowing, so win or lose, laissez le bon temps rouler, and these fans will fill the dome, continue to scream who dat and dance to the sounds of Louis Armstrong. And as pissed off as I am now, hell I know and all my boys know (who are Cowboy, Dolphin, Panther and Stealer fans) I’ll be right there again next year.
Geaux Saints. Geaux find a damn team and a coach to take us to a superbowl. Hello!!!

…but someone needs to organize a full-city voodoo curse on Soldier Field. I’m tired of seeing our season die in Chicago year after year. I know some others are too.

Reggie’s probably gonna get traded man. PT’s showing him up (although Reggie didn’t get the ball despite him actually not doing too bad with carries) and this situation reminds me a lot of the Marshall Faulk situation. Gibbs? The fool is a ripe idiot from a tree of idiots. Pick him off and throw him away!!! Payton? Someone said it before, he’s a quarterback coach but as far as head coaching goes he’s an idiot. He went for a pitch out on 4 and inches. Had it worked I’d still say he’s an idiot. Brees is the man, just under a lot of pressure. The receivers are fine. Shockey is solid and if he gets traded we’ll regret it just as much if we traded Bush. I’m hurt man…even when we went up by 3 I felt like we were going to give it up. I don’t much but I agree with Phill, we have an inferiority complex. That’s all I have to say.

Bunch of babies. So the season is over. Big deal. Just like the prior 41 seasons.

I watched the game again tonight on tape. The Bears offense sucked without Forte, they should never have scored even 10 points. Their defense played with a LOT of spirit and they shook Drew up pretty well in the first half. When they shut down that 4th and inches pitch play, they ALL got up and RAN off the field celebrating. And still the Saints offense came | | that close to beating their ass. The defense couldn’t make a play to shut the Bears down on the last drive in regulation. Saints beat themselves.

The Giants win that game. Patriots too. We just need to get better and get some confidence. And a secondary. And a few other things.