Sean Payton runs a silent ship, and it’s a rarity in today’s NFL

New Orleans Saints head coach Sean Payton has become a master of misinformation. On Thursday, Payton addressed the media on Drew Brees’s availability against the Kansas City Chiefs and left everyone, including NFL insider Adam Schefter, assuming Brees was unlikely to start so soon after breaking 11 ribs and puncturing his lung.

Just over 27 hours later, Schefter reported the exact opposite scenario.

Of course, after the news broke of Brees’s return, another NFL insider reported the Saints had known Brees would start since he returned to practice on Wednesday.

Another insider reported the Saints knew as early as Monday that Brees would be starting. It’s incredibly impressive for Brees to be cleared to play only a month removed from such serious injuries, but it’s just as impressive a team of 53 active players, 12 practice squad players, and two dozen coaches were able to keep this news mum all week.

In a time when most players are active on social media, being able to keep the starting quarterback a secret for so long is especially difficult. As former Saints right tackle Zach Strief pointed out, this isn’t even the first time the Saints have been able to use this tactic of making their opponent wait to find out who the starting quarterback will be.

After Brees was initially declared out, Payton led most of the media and the rest of the NFL to believe he was going to start Jameis Winston over Taysom Hill as Brees’ replacement. However, it does appear that Payton really did have a hard time determining which backup would get the chance to start in place of Brees.

Before Hill’s first start against the Falcons, Payton told Dianna Russini of ESPN, “It’ll be exciting. It’ll be different. He’s a different type of quarterback, and that had a lot to do with us holding off any announcement. Because they’re two entirely different quarterbacks when you look at Jameis and when you look at Taysom. And I’m glad we’ve got both of ‘em — we’re gonna need both of ‘em this year.”

Payton also shed light on the reason why Winston finished the game after Breess’ exit instead of Hill. The team understood all season that if Brees ever got hurt during the middle of a game, “we weren’t gonna be able to make a switch to Taysom with the roles he’s playing in the kicking game on offense.”

Just as there were probably very legitimate reasons as to why Payton waited so long in both instances to reveal his starting quarterback, perhaps the best reason was the most simple explanation of all: deception in order to cause confusion and mis-dedicated preparation time for the team’s next opponent.

With the 12-1 Chiefs heading to the Superdome on a current NFL best eight game winning streak, the Saints should use any tactic available at their disposal. Deception just happens to be one that Sean Payton might be the very best at.

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