Damn! Hell of an article, Wright Thompson

Read and weep (and savor).  Thanks, Wright, for getting it right.

And I love it when a coach mixes his metaphors.  Thanks, Coach Wade.  Not sure if you meant “kowtow” or “bow down,” but either way, give it your best shot.

Fortunately for you, Roy Williams seems to think it won’t really be needed.  Hell, all they gotta do is pack??!!

Bring it, you and your similarly over-paid colleagues!

Got our mojo working

Sunday’s game against Washington (not too keen on their name) wasn’t pretty.  Well, actually, yes it was.  Both teams actually played pretty well, but we were the beneficiaries of some amazing and timely turns of events. I don’t know what their order of importance they have, but here’s what made it work for us:

• Robert Meachem (of Tulsa’s Booker T. Washington High School, home of the Hornets and my alma mater) steals a Drew Brees-thrown interception and returns it for a TD
• Morstead’s shanked punt bounces off the back of a ‘Skin, to be recovered by Usama Young
• Shaun Suisham misses a gimme figgie, leaving us less than 2 min, but only 1 TD down
• Jonathan Vilma intercepts, leaving Washington unable to score at the end of regulation
• Sweet forced fumble (and that ball was coming out, y’all) gets us the ball back, and you knew Brees would get it in there.  Frankly, I would’ve run another safe play on 2nd down at the goal line, but all’s well that ends well

This was one that the “old” Saints would have lost and the “new” Saints probably should have.  But I’m with Brees, who notes that we’ve had more than our share of Washington’s experiences in our history.  This was our good fortune, but we’ve had the bad fortune many times.

One thing I hate is athletes claiming they won because, “We refused to lose,” or, “We just wanted it worse than they did.”  I much prefer Jonathan Vilma’s reminder that sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.  Amen, and there’s no shame in saying we caught some breaks.  But if we weren’t a good team, we wouldn’t have been in position to get them or to capitalize on them.  And that’s why this team is great.  Not good, Great.

BTW, I knew we were in trouble, but I didn’t know it was THIS bad (thanks A-train).

Douchebag of the Day: Rich Rodriguez

While normally I don’t care about the suffering of this prick and how he continues to make Michigan fans miserable (which I secretly enjoy, since I have a number of MSU fans as friends), but when ANYone starts comparing their candy ass struggles to Katrina, it’s on.

It’s really kind of ironic that the New Orleans Saints overcame the hurricane a few years back. I used to live and coach in New Orleans for a couple years, and I know how devastated that city is and how they overcome and rebuild the stadium and rebuild the program.

And we’ve had a few hurricanes of our own. We had a big hurricane in August, and it kind of hit us like a ton of bricks. But you had 120 young men and a bunch of people on the staff that said this is not going to tear our program apart.

Thanks to DetroitForLife via ExtraMustard.

Adventures in Sports Journalism

Alright, for a big Saints game like Monday night’s, I lose that day and the next to scouring the Internets for any and every mention of the game.  A few observations:

• If you missed the game, here‘s the recap, courtesy of Gary.
• I love Bob Marshall’s environmental reporting, but does he know anything about the Saints?  WTF is this “Who Dat talkin’ ’bout beatin’ dem Saints?”  “Talkin’ bout???”  Never heard anybody say it that way.
• Speaking of awkward writing, how about this excerpt from the NYTimes about the Pats:  “They are 7-4 and still lead the American Football Conference East by two games.”  Who the hell spells out American Football Conference?  Someone who doesn’t write much about sports.  Or is that just a stylistic thing like the New Yorker pompously spelling out all numbers and putting an umlaut over the 2nd e in words like re-establish?
• You gotta read Peter King on McKenzie’s re-signing.  Turns out, a little initiative can really pay off.  He was a real stud.
• Speaking of McKenzie, Dude, call me. 
• And those Patriots will stop at nothing.
• If you love reading about the 12th person heroes as much as I do, take a listen to the first 12 min or so of Bill Simmons’ BS Report.  This coming from a real Boston guy.
• Michael Homan received the following tweet about the game:  Somebody show the Patriot’s defense the molestation doll and ask them “Where did Mr Brees touch you?”
• My brother texted me at 10:12pm the following:  ESPN is doing everything possible to try to make this seem like a game.  It ain’t.  Saints are scoring at will…Brady looked like a beaten man on the sidelines in 2nd quarter.
• I hope if I’m ever involved in a worldwide scandal, these guys pick up the story and animate the re-enactment.