In his latest Yahoo! Sports article, Jason Cole discusses last night's Saints vs. Falcons Monday Night Football game and Drew Brees' record-breaking performance. Unfortunately, he's not too happy about the way Brees, head coach Sean Payton and the Saints went about breaking that record.
Here's what Cole says:
Classy? Not so much, and Payton pretty much admitted that when he said he stretched his ethical standards for this situation.
"Someone is going to ask this question, so I am going to answer it before it's asked," Payton said. "Typically, would I be throwing there? ... probably not. In fact, the answer is I wouldn't be. But I thought it was appropriate to get [the record] and we did it."
Pretty much admitted it? I don't think so. He didn't admit anything. All he said was that he probably would have run the ball a bit more late in the game if Drew didn't have a record to go after. That's not an admission of guilt, just an explanation of his process. Have you met Payton? If I had a dollar for every time he decided to throw the ball late in a game rather than run it, I'd be a wealthy man. The fact is, this record was a potential distraction and Payton did what he could to get it out of the way so his team could focus purely on winning football games the rest of the season. Smart move, if you ask me.
Thanks for trying to sensationalize and tarnish this memorable moment for Saints fans by putting a bullcrap spin on it so you can score some page views, Jason. That, in and of itself, is classless. And to Falcons coach Mike Smith: if you don't want the Saints to run up the score, have your defense do something about it!