Saints at Redskins: How Far Can They Geaux?

New Orleans Saints (11-0) vs. Washington Redskins (3-8)
1:00 p.m. FedEx Field
It was more of the same from the Redskins last week. But instead of having to force myself to talk about another divisional game, I now have an opponent that’s worth writing about. So apologizes if this issue is a little Redskins light.

If you can remember two seasons ago - and considering the massive, massive, MASSIVE amounts of publicity, I’m sure you could – the New England Patriots ran the table for the NFL’s first ever 16-0 regular season. Now, forget for a second how that season ended for New England. That’s tough to do since we all got to see Bill Belichick, his cameras, his ego, his quarterback and his personal television station (ESPN) get their comeuppance in front of billions of people worldwide. It’s still very enjoyable to look back and reflect on. Regardless, that’s not what this post is about. But try to remember all the coverage, all season long, that centered entirely around the Patriots. That’s all football fans, or sports fans in general, heard about for five months. As soon as the Patriots went to 3-0 (and did so by beating bad teams), ESPN and friends started hyping them up as the greatest team of all-time. They started the undefeated talk in either Week 4 or Week 5 of that season. You would think that with two teams currently standing at 11-0 this year, that ESPN would have done the exact same thing for both the Colts and Saints.

Of course, you’d be wrong. After three weeks this season, the story wasn’t Drew Brees and New Orleans. It wasn’t Indianapolis going 3-0 despite a coaching change. The big stories centered around the Jets being 3-0, the Giants being 3-0, Donovan McNabb’s injury/Michael Vick’s return, the return of Tom Brady from injury, anything Cowboys related and ANYTHING related in any way to Brett Favre. In fact, it wasn’t until about two to three weeks ago that the talk on the sports airwaves started focusing on the potential of either the Colts or Saints running the table. Or both.

ESPN completely missed this story. We could easily be looking at two undefeated teams playing in the Super Bowl. Up until Veteran’s Day, ESPN couldn’t have cared less. Because the story didn’t revolve around the Holy Quintet (Cowboys, Eagles, Giants, Patriots and whatever team has Brett Favre), ESPN simply ignored it until it couldn’t be ignored anymore. In reality, this is ESPN’s worst nightmare. Two teams, in cities that aren’t that big, and whose citizens don’t rush home every night to see SportsCenter (because they know ESPN rarely covers their teams), could matchup in the greatest Super Bowl of all-time. And ESPN completely missed the boat. How great is that?

I could understand ESPN ignoring the Colts. They’ve been 11-0 rather recently (they actually went to 13-0 before losing…then lost in their first playoff game). The Colts, despite the coaching change, are still the same old Colts. Peyton Manning is still great. They are still fun to watch. It’s been the same since the beginning of the decade. It’s not like they’d be breaking any news by saying how great the Colts are. Furthermore, the Colts early wins were not that impressive. They were certainly not a collection of games you could look at and say with any conviction that the Colts were going to run the table.

The fact ESPN missed jumping on board the Saints bandwagon is unforgivable. The Saints were blowing people out the same way that New England was blowing people out in 2007. Brees was on pace to beat all of Brady’s records from that season. The Saints first five wins were much better collectively than the Patriots first five wins of 2007. New Orleans beat Philly, the Jets (when they were 3-0) and the Giants when they were 5-0. On the other hand, the Pats beat a decent Chargers team, but also won games against Cleveland, Cincinnati, Buffalo and the Jets. All four of those teams were horrible. And the Saints were winning their games as impressively as the Patriots were winning their games. The only difference is that New Orleans is a couple of thousand miles away from Bristol, Connecticut and has a fewer residents than the greater Boston area. Most of the population still hasn’t returned since Hurricane Katrina. The fact that New Orleans is winning games in style, and is on pace to run the table, in a city that still hasn’t fully recovered from the greatest national disaster of our time, makes the 2009 Saints 100 times the story that the 2007 Patriots were. Yet, ESPN is very late arriving to the party. If you still think that ESPN is more interested in reporting the news instead of making up what they think the news is, then you are clueless. Stop reading this page immediately; I don’t want your support. Go turn on ESPN and watch another hour about Tiger Woods or who the next failure at Notre Dame will be.

I realize I’m getting ahead of myself. Up until a couple of weeks ago, I didn’t think that either New Orleans or Indianapolis would run the table. That didn’t mean I wasn’t paying attention to them like a certain network. I just figured someone would trip each team up somewhere along the way. The Colts toughest game is this week against Tennessee. Other than that, they play the collapsing Broncos, the Jaguars the Jets and the Bills. They may begin resting their starters soon. The Jags and Jets may have enough if the Colts sit Manning and others. If they don’t sit players, they should win the remainder of their games. They should also run through what has become a soft AFC in the playoffs.

The Saints’ remaining schedule looks like this: at Washington, at Atlanta, December Dallas, Tampa and at Carolina. The game in Atlanta appears to be their last chance to stumble. And the Falcons may be without their two best players. No, I’m not counting Dallas until they prove they can win after Thanksgiving. Futhermore, the Saints can’t afford to rest their starters since Minnesota is nipping at their heels for home field advantage. So it’s likely they’ll be playing everyone the rest of the way. The NFC playoff road may be a bit tougher for New Orleans, but they’ve already bashed the Eagles, Giants and Falcons this season. They match-up very well against the Vikings. Only the Cardinals could cause them some trouble.

Anyway, this Saints team is as fun to watch as the Patriots were in 2007. It’s even a better story because the Saints aren't comprised or coached by assholes. Unfortunately, the Redskins are caught on the tracks this week. The Saints defense, while good, tends to give up big plays because their secondary is comprised entirely of ball-hawkers. I’m not all that impressed with what Gregg Williams has done there. A lot of the decent numbers the Saints D has put up are because they are able to be aggressive since their offense is so good. It’s obviously the offense that will be the major concern for the Redskins.

Getting Albert Haynesworth back will certainly help. It will allow the Skins to get some pressure on Brees while dropping six or seven back to cover the receivers. But if you saw the New England-New Orleans game, it doesn’t really matter. Brees is in such a zone right now that he is perfectly placing throws into double coverage. The arsenal of Marques Colston, Devery Henderson, Robert Meacham, Lance Moore and our old friend Jeremy Shockey are nearly impossible to cover anyway. Add in two decent running backs (Mike Bell and Pierre Thomas) with a very good offensive line, and there are pretty much no weaknesses on this team. They are so good that Reggie Bush is basically limited to 10-15 snaps when he is healthy. This game probably won’t be pretty to watch if you are a Skins fan, but if you want to see how good an offense can be, then you should tune in to watch New Orleans.