Barkevious Mingo 0.5, reportedly

Yeah, I’m still here. No, sit down. You’re too kind. I haven’t written enough this offseason, so here’s a largely link-free stream-of-thought post on the offseason so far. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, google it. I shouldn’t have to do ALL the work around here.

Thesis statement! This fucking offseason is taking forever.

Really quick (I know, yeah right), before we get started on the building of (enter your terrible 2013 defense nickname idea here), it’s time we closed the ol’ casket on that whole bounty thing. I know, but we haven’t done it officially here on this blog, and it’s fitting that we can do so on this note: friend of the blog Reid Gilbert of SaintsWin wrote the book on bountygate. No, seriously, he wrote the fucking book. Buy it. Read it.

It’s good. It doesn’t contain anything you haven’t already heard if you’ve been watching closely since last March, and there’s not a single dinosaur, but within Reid manages to tie a massive amount of well-researched and cited information beautifully together into a glorious series of electronically-readable electrodes to the testicles of Goodell and all his Legitimate Media accomplices, spelling out a laughable (as you well know) series of events in a way that even your asshole non-Saints fan friend will understand as a trainwreck. It’s the definitive account of bountygate from a non-media perspective, so read it now and you won’t have to buy some shitty Duncanic media-apology piece in 2 or 3 years.

When you get done reading, you are then allowed to cleanse yourself of bountygate forever. Build a fire and burn that fucking book, shotgun a bottle of whiskey, pray over the fire for a while, cut your palms and make a blood oath to never think about it again. Sacrifice a pig to the football gods and beg and plead that they never put us through this horseshit or anything like it again. Whatever your religion calls for is fine – I’m not here to judge. When you get done, you might as well have a kickass barbecue to celebrate the occasion, since you’re drunk and you already have a fire and a dead pig – Jesus, do I really have to spell this out for you?

(Disclaimer: please do not burn the book because it’s only available electronically, and your wife is going to be really pissed about the kindle. Also, The Angry Who Dat does not endorse the shotgunning of whiskey on account of it comes in a glass container and that seems really fucking irresponsible.)

Let’s talk about that defense. Rob Ryan’s making some changes! Hope he knows what he’s doing.

“Well, one thing’s for sure, the defense can’t get any worse!”

No, asshole, that’s not for sure, and I wish you’d stop saying it was. It absolutely can get worse. It can always get worse. Goddamnit, if the defense gets any worse I’m holding you personally responsible. The worst possible defense would allow a touchdown on the first play from scrimmage, every single time. When that happens, it can’t get any worse. In 2012, that happened barely once or twice a game. So you just watch your whore mouth.

It’s okay, though, because I don’t think it’ll get worse. I think it’s already better. Just look, we signed a cornerback already. Every Saints fan had to immediately be happier with the defense as soon as he or she heard that Keenan Lewis had signed. “Hell yes,” you said, “We just landed KEENAN LEWIS!” Okay, maybe not that, not immediately. My reaction was slightly more tentative: “Wait, who the hell is Keenan Lewis? (googles “keenan lewis cornerback”) Oh, he’s from the Steelers. (clicks Steelers message board in search results) Holy shit. They’re not too happy. Hell yes. We just landed KEENAN LEWIS! (Sean Payton fist pump)”. I’m convinced he’s the right guy. Why? His name sits perfectly between “everybody fucks it up” and “totally easy to spell,” in the gray area known as “Saints fans will subtly fuck it up on the internet for years, but just enough to make you question whether you should correct them.” I love it.

And it’s not like Rob stopped there. Hell no. The creepy gray-haired nightmare we’ve all grown to love over the last month (or something like that) has set his mind to revamping the entire secondary (except the half that plays safety). Traceey Porter got a visit. Nnamdi Asomugha even spent a nice day having lunch with his old buddy at Undetermined Fine Eating Establishment in Metarie, tossing back a couple beers and discussing whatever the fuck Rob Ryan and Nnamdi Asomugha discuss in their spare time. Really, try to imagine that bonding session. It’s too bad Nnamdi’s apparently committed to riding the fence all the way to September on this one. MAKE A DECISION, NNAMDI. Asomugha’s standing on the fence. Waving his dick around. He’s making the fence his bitch. And I love him for it, in that Saints-y way that we all love the things that hurt us.

Also noteworthy: his name. Holy shit, will Saints fans fuck that up on the internet. MAKE IT HAPPEN, LOMMIS.

Victor Butler! Youth! I like it. I think. They say he’s pretty good on some websites and stuff. His sack per obvious passing down played adjusted (SOPDPA) is above average for pass rushers who play less than a third of their team’s snaps on the road in the NFC, or something like that (I think I made that up, but it’s totally possible PFF pulled it out of their asses at some point – if so, my plagiarism was unintentional). He has to be good, because Rob Ryan knows him, and Rob Ryan wants him, and we all know Rob Ryan knows what he’s doing.

“I thought you said we didn’t know if Rob Ryan knows what he’s doing.”

But you said the defense can’t get any worse. If Rob Ryan is making all these changes, and the defense isn’t going to get any worse, then he obviously knows what he’s doing. QED, douchebag.

( My wife just walked in. Wife: “Oh, shit, is it football season already?” Me: “No, it’s – what?” Wife: “You have that goofy smile like you’re writing the blog thing again and you’re really proud of yourself for some stupid joke.” TRUE LOVE, folks. )

Downside (we’re still talking about Butler if you lost track): His name is two actual words, spelled correctly. No way anyone fucks that up. I even checked his middle name. Allen. Lame.

Lastly, the Saints may or may not have signed Kenyon “Refrigerator” Coleman. (Get it? GET IT? Never mind.) He’s on the fence, or he has a handshake deal, or he’s waiting in line at Kinko’s. Doesn’t matter. For the purposes of this blog post, we’ll just assume he’s a Saint, because I already gave him an awesome nickname. I don’t know who the fuck he is, but hell yeah, folks – WE GOT KENYAN COLEMAN. Two thoughts:

1. Payton and Loomis have apparently given Rob Ryan carte blanche to just put together a Dream Team of ex-Rob Ryan defensive players. That’s what Rob wants, and that’s what Rob’s getting. I think it’s an indicator, more than anything else, that we need to just sit back and have faith in Ryan until he proves otherwise. If Payton and Loomis believe, who am I to argue? It’s not like someone with the full backing of that Dynamic Duo is going to create the worst defense ever to play a team sport. Right? RIGHT?
2. Coleman’s first name. That’s spectacular. The over/under on message board thread titles to slip an A in there is 40%, at least. If you can get 30%, take that action immediately. I can’t wait.

Now if Ryan has that much power right now, think about draft day. Who do we take round 1? (No, goddamnit, Barkevious won’t be there. I’m disappointed too. I had this awesome thing where I was going to call him “Barky Bark” all the time and annoy the shit out of you.) It’s fun to think about.  No, I’m not going to predict who it is, because we don’t do mock drafts here, because mock drafts are usually fucking stupid. New subsection!

ON MOCK DRAFTS

First of all, without googling, can you explain what a 3-cone drill is? Yeah, that’s what I thought. Amateur internet mock drafts, besides being almost always wrong (oh, but you’ll live for years off of that one time you played GM for the Bengals in your Message Board Experts Draft and picked that one guy in the seventh round who was pretty kind of okay that year, won’t you?), all too often ignore the intangibles. Will Jonathan Reynolds from Western Ohio Agricultural be inspired to destroy the man across from him by the mere sight of a 300-pound playsheet-toting Gollum? How smoothly does Kendrick Thomas out of Sacramento State fake an injury to give the defense a break (FLUID HIPPOS)? Is Bajuiviannne Rijannannarfth from North Alabama College of Science and Technology a fucking sociopath who lives only to inflict injury on his fellow man?

You haven’t thought about any of that, have you? That’s why your mock draft sucks.

I want one thing, and beyond that I’ll trust The Trifecta to make the right decision. Find a way to put Jamie Collins on this team.

“Oh god, homer homer pfft yuck *rolls eyes*”

Oh, sure. YOU have a problem with homerism. You, the guy who roots for the gigantic university in the BCS conference whose campus you couldn’t point out on the map, with the million dollar salary cap. That one that sends five players to the pros every week or so. Well, fuck you. You take it for granted. Around here we don’t get the draft day opportunity to play the blind homer card too often, so when we do, we do it with gusto. COOSA! COOSA! COOSA!

Plus, you know, he has all the measurables. Did you see his time in the 3-cone?

(I did gain from the comment section over there that we are still comfortably in the minority among Saints fans.)

While we’re linking up some worthy shit, I have something else, just in case you’ve been living under a fucking rock and are too old or cranky to get your ass on twitter.  Completing his meteoric rise from the comment section of Pro Football Talk is the genius twitter account @PFTCommenter.  Why is this worthy of its own paragraph?

Well, he’s blogging now.  And it’s, as expected, pure genius.  And near-daily posts so far.  Check it out.  It’s one of the best sports things on the internet.  Just be warned: If you can’t handle blistering facts and NFL takes that don’t agree with your petty fanboy opinions, you might as well not even click your internet on that link.

Let’s talk about Rob Ryan.

According to the people who break these kinds of stories (hint: they don’t work for any New Orleans-based media outlet), it’s all but done: Rob Ryan will be the Saints’ new defensive coordinator.

I’m entirely okay with that.

I wasn’t at first, you understand. I hated the idea the very second his name entered the conversation. Why? Well, I think I hated it only because I was supposed to hate it. He’s Rob fucking Ryan, after all. Who wants that guy around? Funny thing about discussing football on the internets: you have to explain your viewpoint. In most media. Whether on a blog or twitter or on a forum, another’s argument – even one that agrees with your view – can make you question certain things. This happened to me recently. I can’t credit everyone, but I can credit the mass chaos of online dialog for changing my mind, bit by bit. Oh, yeah. :bigbow:The Zoo

So. Why not Rob Ryan?

Well, the more I thought about it, the more I couldn’t really explain why. The more I thought about it, the more I realized it might not be that bad an idea. The more I thought about it, the more excited I got – goddamn, it’s fucking perfect. The first – and most obvious – reason that came to mind was Circus Theory. The show must go on, folks. And if 2012 was any indicator of things to come, if we should expect the status quo above all other outcomes, Rob Ryan is absolute perfection. He’s a loudmouth blowhard, he yells a little too much, he is more than anything else absurd. And Saints fans, we do absurd. We are absurdity aficionados in the year 2013. If any fanbase can embrace Rob Ryan, it’s this one.

But that reasoning, while sound, is a bit self-defeating. We embrace the stupid, but the stupid got us where we are now. 7-9. Defensive coordinatorless. And I think you would agree that we’d trade the gloriously entertaining circus for a boring old Super Bowl any time. So I’m not here to carry on about the exhilaration of the nonsensical. I’m here to convince you that Rob Ryan would be the correct choice even from a football standpoint. I’ll do it by simply dispelling the very weak arguments against Rob Ryan.

1. “Rob Ryan has never taken a defense to the playoffs!”

Oh, yeah, you know your favorite little message board is touting that nonsense (I know because I saw the links in my twitter timeline, even if the sad little people won’t let me read the content). Anyway, a defensive coordinator doesn’t carry a team to the playoffs. You need, like, an offense too. Quarterbacks aren’t everything, but they’re a big thing, and they’ll serve as a nice little comparison piece here. You don’t need Drew Brees to make the playoffs. You don’t even need Drew Brees to win a Super Bowl. You can do it with Joe Flacco. You can even do it with Trent Dilfer. Rob Ryan has never coached on a sideline with a Trent Dilfer. Hell, he’s never even coached opposite a Matt Ryan. Take a look at the starting quarterbacks who coexisted with defensive coordinator Rob Ryan:

Rich Gannon, Kerry Collins, Marques Tuiasosopo, Andrew Walter, Aaron Brooks, Josh McCown, Daunte Culpepper, Jamarcus Russell, Brady Quinn, Derek Anderson, Colt McCoy, Jake Delhomme, Seneca Wallace, Tony Romo.

Yes, that’s Ronaiah’s cousin. The takeaway here: Rob Ryan hasn’t exactly coached defenses in the most stable of franchises. These aren’t perennial contenders we’re talking about here. They weren’t before Ryan came along, and they didn’t magically become so upon his departure. Of course, I could have just said “Hey, he coached the Browns, Raiders, and Cowboys” and you probably would’ve gotten the point. But goddamnit, I like illustration. And that list of quarterbacks is hilarious. Ditkaesque.

2. “Rob Ryan is a(n) (insufferable/loudmouth/blowhard/pain-in-the-ass/ugly) (douche/asshole/goon/fatass/jackass).”

Valid point, internet Saints fan. He is all of those things. And that’s just what we need.

I was a Spags defender all year. Well, kind of. I thought that 2012 was so extraordinary, so out of the realm of the typical NFL experience, that a defensive coordinator, without a head coach, bringing in a new scheme to a marginally-talented squad, could not be judged on a single year’s performance. No matter how terrible that performance was. This opinion came from a difficulty to reconcile the expected with the actual. How could a defensive coordinator who had a record of success elsewhere, given a talent pool that was largely the same unit that found the Super Bowl, come in and fail in such a spectacular way? It didn’t make sense, so the absurdity itself must be to blame.

And then we got a clue. Anonymous Defensive Player told Larry Holder that the shit wasn’t working. The players hadn’t bought in – hell, they just flat out didn’t like the guy they were working for. No matter how brilliant the scheme, no matter how talented the roster, no squad can achieve so much as mediocrity if the crew isn’t on the same page. Of course, there was backlash. We’re not the Jets, goddamnit. This shit doesn’t happen here. But it did. And that precedent of locker room unity and media silence is the perfect argument for the seriousness of a single player’s anonymous outrage. That matters.

Spags lost the locker room.

You can’t lose the locker room. So, then, what do the Saints’ defensive players respond to? What won the Super Bowl? Gregg Williams. The ultimate purveyor of boisterous douchebaggery: that guy accomplished the ultimate goal before all the silly shit got in the way. (And then, of course, there was the 49ers game.)

You know who else is a loudmouth, shit-talking dumbass? Who else is out there, seeking a job for at least the last five minutes, that can provide the precise level of brash idiocy that motivated these guys to play far and away over their own talent level?

Rob Ryan.

3. “Bounty Bowl!”

Asshole. Of course, some will make the fast connection between the Ryan name and the ambiguous term “bounty.” They’re fucking idiots. As a friend of this blog recently opined, Payton’s done the rogue coach thing. The NFL has seen what happens when even the most tenuous “evidence” of pay-for-injury/performance surfaces. Payton will not tolerate a rogue coach again. Nobody in the NFL will make that terrible mistake again. Well, maybe except for this skinny goatee-wearing hipster mountain-climbing motherfucker, but he’s not our problem any more. One can be a dick and not a rogue. One can be a loudmouth and not belligerent (or just the right amount of belligerent – am I right, Joe Vitt?).

That guy might just be Rob Ryan.

After some careful consideration, and a little discussion with a few friends, in spite of myself I’m excited about this. I’ll be in that number in September (I’ll be doing the terrace), and when the Saints take the field opening Sunday, I hope we get to witness the circus and the glory that could be Sean Payton and Joe Vitt and Rob Ryan on one sideline. Take some time to think about it. Forget the Cowboys. Put that ugly fucker in black and gold, and imagine him coaching an aggressive 3-4 defense in the motherfucking Superdome. Imagine him berating dick journalists at press conferences. Get excited. It’s ok. And think about how it’ll piss off the Duncans of the world. We make the rules, indeed, pal.

And, if it isn’t too much here, Rob, could we get a top 20 defense? Goddamn, that’s all we need to see. It’s not like we’re putting Marques Tuiasosopo out there to run the offense.

I know, I don’t have it in me either.  Life still sucks until Next Year gets here, and hell, we all knew that was coming.  At least we can look forward to some embarrassing incidents involving drunken New Orlenians and Mr. Goodell, sir.  Hopefully none of them involve violence.  I mean that sincerely.  I mean, that’s just not the shit the city needs, right?  Fuck Rog, but let’s not fuck ourselves while we’re fucking him.  You know?

Hey, it looks like Jeff Duncan wrote a nice little pragmatic piece calling for sanity.  Let’s check it out.

Hey dudes, let’s be clear: Roger Goodell is a worthless power-hungry moron.  But look, all eyes on us, right?  We should play nice – we’re a tourist town.  We don’t need bad attention.  We need to look like fucking angels.  Serve him his food, smile, slip in a laxative if you need to.  But keep him out of the hospital.  Because Super Bowls are awesome, and no matter how much we hate this person, we want more.  Okay?

Except, well, that’s not what he said.  That would have been the sensible approach.  Jeff Duncan is a miserable, self-loathing troll who fucking hates his job and his readership and loves the penises of powerful commissioners and Sports Illustrated blowhards, so he wrote this instead.

At Super Bowl 2012, Roger Goodell should be hailed as a New Orleans hero for helping to save a cosmopolitan city

Holy mother of fuck.  A New Orleans hero.  Saved the city.

Oh, hey, Fake Jeff Duncan has a few things to say.  Take it away, Slugger.

By Jeff Duncan, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune 
on January 22, 2013 at 3:17 PM, updated January 22, 2013 at 7:56 PM

Now that the NFL has reinstated Saints head coach Sean Payton, New Orleans has an important decision to make for Super Bowl 2013. With Roger Goodell headed our way, a golden opportunity awaits. We can show the world how far we’ve come after Hurricane Katrina, that we truly are a city of progress and enlightenment. Or we can revert to the cloistered close-mindedness that often characterized us pre-Katrina.

 By Fake Jeff Duncan, theangrywhodat.com
on January 23, 2013 at 3:15 AM, posted January 23, 2013 at 4:10 PM

I can’t even begin to imagine where the City of New Orleans would be without someone from Kentucky to let us know what represents progress and enlightenment.

Remember when all of those world-class urban planners came to town after Katrina to lend their expertise and we denounced their ideas and ran them out of town on a rail? How’d that work out for us?

Pretty well, I think.

Thankfully, those regrettable decisions and dark days are history. Somehow, almost miraculously, a new, better New Orleans has emerged from the tragedy.

So we didn’t need the planners?

If you ever plan on writing for a national LegitMedia® outlet, you need to work on writing at least three sentences before totally contradicting yourself. A true national sports columnist like Peter King at least has the decency to not contradict himself until he’s gotten you to click over to “Page 2″. It’s all about the page views, son.

So as Goodell prepares to visit us for Super Bowl XLVII, we have a conscious choice to make regarding our behavior: Class and cosmopolitanism? Or myopia and provincialism?

I can see that you totally aced the Analogies portion of the SAT.

Super Bowl XLVII is not a time for vindication. This is a time for celebration.

This week is about something much bigger than the Saints or Bountygate or season ticket prices. It’s about New Orleans.

The NFL awarded its marquee event to New Orleans largely as a reward for our inspiring post-Katrina recovery. With more than 5,000 credentialed media due in town, the league has bestowed upon us a global stage to showcase our progress.

In keeping with the rules by which the rest of the league plays, they awarded a Super Bowl to New Orleans because we upgraded the Superdome and because we made whatever “charitable contribution” was customary. I’m sure if Goodell asked the owners in Tampa, Phoenix and Miami if New Orleans could host a Super Bowl because “they’re just so damn inspiring,” those owners would have told The Rog shove it up Benson’s ass.

The last thing we need is an ugly incident to mar the festivities. That’d be a major setback to our burgeoning positive image.

You see, because I thought the “burgeoning positive image” was already sullied when 2 people were murdered and 4 others got shot to ring in the New Year. But, yeah, as long as The Rog makes it out of town in one piece it’s all gravy.

It’s time to move on. You don’t have to forgive but you do have to forget – for at least a week. Bury the hatchet … and the hatred.

I tried forgetting but not forgiving just now and realized that it is FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE! This mangling of a rather common quote somehow managed to be puked out of Scooter’s fingers and get past what I hope is at least one editor.

After all, Saints officials plan to break bread with Goodell at a celebratory dinner on Wednesday night at the Windsor Court Hotel. And owner Tom Benson has invited the commissioner to his private bash on Thursday night at City Park.

Do you hear that, everyone? Scooter was kind enough to let the entire City of New Orleans know EXACTLY WHERE GOODELL IS GOING TO BE ON WEDENSDAY NIGHT!

And if you are unavoidably detained that evening, you can surely catch up with The Rog the following night in City Park.

But I don’t want no fights, now.

Even Sean Payton had the graciousness to say in his statement on Tuesday, “I feel we have learned from our mistakes and are ready to move forward.”

If the aggrieved can move on, can’t everyone?

No, we cannot. Every time the LegitMedia® needs a quote leading everyone to believe that there “really was a HUGE BOUNTY SYSTEM in place” and that “Saints fans and players needs to accept their punishments and move on”, they trot out a statement from one of the coaches.

But they fail to note that these same coaches are the only ones involved that do not have legal protection from Herr Roger’s retribution. The moral of “The Emporer’s New Clothes” was, ironically, the child having the same “enlightenment” you accuse Saints fans of lacking.

The child was able to speak truth to power. Et tu, Jeff?

“I know everybody in the city is belly aching about the last year, but here’s the thing: Roger Goodell has always been a friend to the City of New Orleans,” Mayor Mitch Landrieu said last week.

“Goodell didn’t try to play connect the dots on my hair plugs like that prick David Stern”

Indeed, have people forgotten all of the good Goodell did for New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina?

To use a football analogy, then NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue was the head coach and Goodell was the quarterback in the league’s post-Katrina game plan for New Orleans.

In those grim days of late 2005 and early 2006, when the flood lines were still fresh, there weren’t a lot of folks standing beside the city. To the contrary, much of America had abandoned us, including many folks inside the Saints organization. But Goodell never wavered in his support. As the league’s chief operating officer at the time, he not only stood beside New Orleans, he spearheaded vital parts of the city’s recovery.

Goodell worked with local leaders to rebuild the Superdome.

He didn’t build that.

He cleared bureaucratic hurdles in Washington D.C. to accelerate the construction process. And he was a constant motivator, sending local officials late-night emails for inspiration: “We’re winning! Don’t stop! We’re in this to win!”

Please see this story, published a full day before Scooter’s column. The linked story has the football analogy as well as the late night messages Goodell would send. I would be alarmed at the lack of attribution coming from Jeff, but we all know this isn’t the first time.

“Roger was with us when it counted,” said Doug Thornton, vice president of stadiums for SMG, the company that manages the Superdome for the state. “He worked and sweated here. People don’t realize how granular he was down here. He was in the weeds with us.”

Goodell worked just as hard for the city in 2002 when the 9/11 terrorist attacks threatened to move Super Bowl XXXVI from New Orleans. The NFL’s decision to cancel the ensuing Week 2 games after the attacks pushed the schedule back. That caused a major conflict for New Orleans, which was scheduled to host the National Automobile Dealers Association convention the week after the Super Bowl. NADA is one of the largest conventions in the business. The Convention Center and most of the city’s hotel inventory were booked. Goodell, though, made it happen and Super Bowl XXXVI was a rousing success for the city and the league.

“Roger was very supportive and played a critical role in so many different ways,” Tagliabue said in a phone interview last week. “He was a major player in executing what we had decided was going to be the policy to keep the Saints in New Orleans, in Louisiana and in the Gulf Coast region. He was the guy who managed the process.”

If anything, New Orleans owes Goodell a thank you. If it weren’t for Goodell and Tagliabue, there might not be a pro football team much less a Super Bowl in New Orleans these days.

Since we owe our pro football team to Goodell and Tagliabue, I guess we are on the hook for whatever fantasies of saving the league from litigation they want to play out in the future.

Thank you, sir. May I have another?

Have we forgotten the Saints’ actions in the fall of 2005? How team officials tried to break their lease with the state of Louisiana. How they tried to sue FEMA for supposedly destroying their training facility. How they collected negative information about New Orleans and distributed it to the other 31 NFL owners. Have we forgotten how Saints players were advised to lease or purchase property in Texas as late as the final week of December?

You see, though, everyone in New Orleans knows and has accepted what an asshole Tom Benson is. But at least he seems comfortable with himself, which we can all appreciate. The Rog wants everyone to think he’s the most wonderful man in the world and he’s really doing you a favor by boning you in the ass.

“It was clear there were things being done by San Antonio and things being considered by the Saints which were clearly focused on San Antonio,” Tagliabue said. “When I told the team that they were moving back to New Orleans, some players stood up and asked me, ‘Who the hell are you? We’re the ones who have to get our kids in school and find doctors for our families.’ The assumption of a lot of the players was they were going to buy homes in San Antonio. I told them the team is going to be back in New Orleans. That is the decision of the league. A team can only relocate if three-fourths of the membership approves the move and there is no such support. I told them they better stop negotiating (real estate) because you’re expected back in Metairie by mid-February.”

Today, Tagliabue said the work the NFL did in New Orleans ranks “right at the very top” of his legacy as league commissioner.

“We made it very clear from the start that we were not going to leave an NFL city in the wake of a national disaster and tragedy,” Tagliabue said. “It was like throwing a Hail Mary pass and somebody had to catch the pass.”

Wait, I thought Tagliabue was the head coach…he’s the quarterback now? Did The Rog throw AND catch the pass? Thanks for the immense clarity of your professional writing ability.

Ironically, it was Goodell who played a key role in what Tagliabue called “lowering the temperature” among New Orleanians and averting the demonization of Benson post-Katrina. Now he’s the one being demonized.

Jonathan Vilma, Scott Fujita, Will Smith, Anthony Hargrove and Sean Payton all agree that it kind of sucks to be demonized and totally sympathize with The Rog.

“I think it’s very unfair,” Tagliabue said. “Roger does not have an anti-New Orleans bone in his body.”

Would he like one?

For his part, Goodell appears undaunted by the situation. When asked at the AFC divisional playoff game in Denver two weeks ago if he was worried about his safety in New Orleans, Goodell answered with a resolute “no.”

“The fans (of New Orleans) are loyal to their team,” he said. “That’s what we expect. They’re great fans. No, I’m not troubled by that at all.”

Because if we’ve learned anything over the past 10 months, it’s that The Rog takes into account all evidence and processes it in a logical manner to arrive at the correct conclusions.

Still, there’s enough lingering resentment to concern league officials and local Super Bowl organizers. That’s why they’ve spent the past week trying to proactively promote a cult of hospitality.

Of which this column is clearly a part. Do they write these for you or are you forced to transcribe notes supplied to you by Greg Aiello?

Meanwhile, the “Do Not Serve This Man” signs bearing Goodell’s portrait proliferate around town and photos of lewd Krewe du Vieux parade floats satirically filleting Goodell circulate on social media.

Be honest, Scooter. You wish you were the Boeuf Gras last Friday night, don’t you? Please don’t tell me you wish you were Super Hole XLVAG.

“It hurts,” Thornton said. “It saddens me to see that Roger would be thought of in that regard after all that he and the league has done to help us.”

Indeed, as Super Bowl beckons, a post-Katrina refresher course appears to be in order. If not for Goodell’s initiative and creativity, the Superdome does not reopen in September 2006. If the Superdome doesn’t reopen, the city’s post-Katrina recovery lags. If the recovery lags, the Saints don’t return. If the Saints don’t return, the city’s recovery efforts suffer.

Without Goodell, there’s no Dome-coming and no blocked punt. There’s possibly no Super Bowl XLIV victory or Lombardi Gras parade.

“If it weren’t for the inspiration, motivation and vision of Roger Goodell and Paul Tagliabue to push us, this project drags beyond 2006 and then who knows what happens,” Thornton said. “I don’t want to overstate it, but it could have literally altered the course of history here.”

“I don’t want to overstate it, ” Thornton said before he immediately overstated the fuck out of it.

The restaurateurs and shopkeepers who are thriving in the city’s post-Katrina renaissance should consider this as they hang those silly self-serving “Do Not Serve” signs behind their counters.

Perhaps they are simply protesting The Rog’s silly, self-serving crucifixion of the Saints in an effort to avoid the CRIPPLING punitive damages that are coming his way once the concussion lawsuits get decided.

“Oh, you suspended our coach and ruined our team’s season? How about I don’t sell you any ice cream!”

See, we can all be self-serving pompous asses, but we’re quite a bit funnier when we do it.

Did Goodell cost the Saints a season? Maybe. But he also saved the team and perhaps the city from virtual extinction.

Yes, the entire city of New Orleans would have been virtually extinct without the benevolence of The Rog. That sounds like the appropriate conclusion everyone would draw from those paragraphs.

Just when you thought Doug Thornton was going to walk away with the overstatement crown, Scooter sees his “literally would have altered the course of history” and raises him a “saved the city from virtual extinction.”

“I love the city,” Goodell said. “Being a part of that work (post-Katrina) was real important. …To see the way that community (in New Orleans) rallied around their team and rallied around the disaster, you can’t have anything but the highest respect for the people and the people we work with down there. We’re seeing the same thing in our community with (Superstorm) Sandy. People pull together. People move forward”

New Orleanians are experts at moving forward in the wake of adversity. If we did it for Katrina, we can certainly do it now.

I’ve moved forward in the “face of adversity,” but never in the “wake of adversity.” If we can’t count on you LegitMedia® types to use clichés correctly, what are you good for?

At every turn over the past 10 months, you have parroted the league story and whenever anyone dares question the narrative, you respond by calling people names.

Since you and your brethren have so spectacularly failed to #DoYourJob, we’re going to avail ourselves of the only opportunity that we have to make sure everyone knows we got screwed this year.

The international media will be here, so we’re going to keep saying outlandish things, making hysterical mardi gras floats and jokingly asking restaurants to “Not Serve This Man.”

And nobody is going to follow through on any of it.

The fact that you think we might shows just how “enlightened” you really are.

Sorry I’ve been MIA (again). Holidays and family and other real people who required interactions not facilitated by the internet, and all that. Plus, you know, it’s hard to write a whole thing when your last thing was about how you were right all along and the thing you’re supposed to be writing about was a pretty damning piece of evidence against the rightness of the thing you spend a thousand words crowing that you were right about.

Sigh.

Of course, I never said the defense wasn’t bad (although it’ll be characterized that way by certain twitter assholes). But I did think that they were getting better, that they were better than we thought they were, that they had the ability to be a little more good and less claw-my-fucking-eyes-out atrocious, and the Tampa game did prove that, and in spite of 14 points in like 12 seconds (that’s how it felt) and in spite of Johnny Patrick not being able to cover a guy who is literally laying down in the endzone with 00:00 left to play, and in spite of everything that happened in the miserable three hours this past Sunday, that remains true.

The defense has demonstrated the ability to shut down good offenses, and once that’s done, it doesn’t go away. Which makes some other performances (about 10 or 11 of them) nothing short of baffling.

How can a defense that’s capable of shutting out an NFL team – no, fuck you, any NFL team, because it’s an accomplishment any time it happens – allow the most yards of any team in history?

One can’t help but wonder how a defense that’s absolutely, without a doubt, better than the worst thing that’s ever taken the field (since the worst defense ever wouldn’t be capable of the Atlanta and Tampa games, among others) manage to achieve the dubious honor of being the one that every fucking idiot who believes that one isolated stat can be defined qualitatively as the measurement of half the players on an NFL team labels the worst in history.

No, fuck you, that sentence was correct.

It does irritate, that willingness to take a yardage measure and define it as the end-all of defensive quality – it’s a stupid notion that widdles fifty fucking percent of a football team down to a statistical mark that doesn’t appear on any scoreboard, and it’s the mark of laziness and oversimplification of fucking everything in football Legitimate Journalism / Fandom. No need for any analysis here, seven thousand and something means worst ever!

The Saints’ defense allowed the most yards of any defense ever. That’s terrible. But it does not equal “worst ever.”

However, it is terrible, no matter how it happened, and no matter the result. To be clear: I’m not saying the defense isn’t eye-wateringly bad. That stat-equals-hyperbole shit just gets on my fucking nerves, and I needed to get that off my chest.

The last two games did more than prove some anonymous member of the Illegitimate Media painfully wrong about the supposed turnaround of the Saints defense – it proved that something worse is going on. It doesn’t negate the steady progression that we witnessed with little exception from game 5 to game 14. This two-game atrocity was an atrocity of its own; it is a new trend, and it’s telling of more than a lack of talent or a failure of coaching and scheme.

Disclaimer: Here ends the portion of this post that was not edited the morning of posting (1/1/13).

Allow me to explain. The original version of this post, which I planned to clean up and put out there on the internets today, continued in this fashion for about 200 more words. I explained, in a paragraph or two, how talent and coaching can’t be completely to blame (or that you can’t blame just one or the other) for a collapse like this, that the roster was once again riddled with pussies, that the team just gave up. I offered some evidence from the Carolina game that this was, in fact, the case.

And then I went on to tell a story. You know what? I’m going to tell it anyway. See, the last game of the season I had a couple extra tickets to give. I hooked up a buddy of mine who has a nine-year-old kid who has never seen the Superdome. Awesome, right? I was ten when I saw my first game in the Dome, when the Dome Patrol put a little whooping on Mark Rypien and the Redskins on a Monday night. I’ll never forget it.

So we took the kid along for his first trip. He made some new friends at the tailgate, threw around a football, and predictably got bored at some point while most of the adults (excepting the designated drivers and designated babysitters of course) got drunk and had a blast. We treated this game like any other; we got out there at eight in the morning, we cooked up some good food, we drank, we talked with our tailgating neighbors.

Even on a meaningless Sunday at the tail end of a shitty season, friends, there’s no place I’d rather spend my morning.

It was cool to see the wonder in the kid’s eyes at the size of the place, the ridiculous distance to the other side of the terrace (the people are so tiny!) and the coolness factor of being in the building for an NFL game which we all take for granted sometimes. Dad took the kid down to the plaza, and they watched a few plays from some empty seats. Great day. Except, you know, for the game.

Again, a kid made me aware of what I take for granted sometimes when I talked to him at the car as we waited for traffic to clear. “Glad you had a great time, buddy. Sorry they lost.” His response: “Yeah, that sucked! But it was a lot of fun though!”

Perhaps I should gain a little self-awareness from that comment. Maybe my inability to relate to his enjoyment of that catastrophe should wake me up to the fact that I’m just a little too involved in this silly game if I can’t enjoy a day at the Dome. Maybe, just maybe, I should step back and reevaluate this ridiculous obsession.

No such luck. I just smoked, and rehydrated, and mourned the end of the nightmare that was 2012.

The nightmare is over, and we can look forward. To Payton’s return, whenever Goodell feels that should happen. To the draft: may it produce a pass rusher. To training camp and the preseason: where we hope, illogically, for that mythical, mediocre, middle of the road defense that could be enough to get us to a Super Bowl.

To motherfucking September, people. 2013 is going to be great.

But, if I’m to be honest, 2012 will be missed in some ways. Every season for every fanbase is unique; no two teams are quite the same. However, we’ve experienced something truly unique in so many aspects that we can claim a year of football fandom entirely different, in fundamental ways, from anything any group of fans has ever experienced/tolerated/enjoyed/suffered. I’ll never forget it, not one minute of it, and that’s something to be cherished for better or worse.

2012 really sucked. But it was a lot of fun though.

See what I did there, how I wrapped it all up? Nice, huh? I liked that post. I acknowledged a little crow, bitched a little, and then shined a little positive light on the future. It was fun to write. But before I could proofread, Larry Holder dropped a fucking bomb.

It negated all that shit I wrote about the team giving up in the Panthers game, and it explained a few things (the obvious one, as many have already pointed out, would be the Mack-Spags blowup on the sideline). It proved that as much as we’d like it to be, 2012 just isn’t over yet. It’s hanging around for a few more sucker punches. 2012 is a bastard asshole. 2012 is that fucking guy who doesn’t know when it’s time to go home. You need to lay down, 2012. No! Fuck that! One more drink! Did you see the way that guy looked at me? 2012 is the guy who gets you thrown in jail. That motherfucker.

Here’s the link. And here, for your convenience and for maximum impact, is the entirety of Anonymous Defensive Player’s comments as quoted by Larry Holder, in one paragraph:

Trust me all the guys were being politically correct this season when answering questions. It’s bad. To give up what we gave up can’t be all talent. Look at where his units (have) been ranked before. I think one top 10? Players have no say in anything. It was (a) complete opposite from before where it was a simple D that players had lot of control and say. We couldn’t suggest (expletive)…Nothing ever changed. It was his way only. Don’t even get me started on lack (of) ability to adjust during games. Bad, bad, bad. (It was) tough putting on a supportive, everything-will-be-OK face, for you guys (the media) all the time. He does have that good-guy persona, but he is a control freak and treats people like crap. (Spagnuolo has) no patience and zero personality. (He) has a way of pissing players and our defensive coaches off with how he says and does things. (I) think it’s even harder after having (former defensive coordinator) Gregg (Williams), who guys enjoyed.

Yikes. My first thought when reading this? This dude can’t be alone. I hate when players bitch without putting their names to things, but I don’t think that’s exactly all this is. This was too thorough. It was timed perfectly a day after Black Monday concluded, and before everyone’s attention was completely drawn to the playoffs this weekend. Anonymous Defensive Player believes he’s speaking for the entire squad, without caveat. He refers nine times to “players” and “we” and the “guys”, with only a single “me.” This fucking thing was a prepared, rehearsed statement, make no mistake. He mentions Gregg Williams in comparison. He addresses the fact that players have been supportive of Spags. He talks to the media about talking to the media.

If this is one guy’s gripes, he’s experienced with careful legal statements and media manipulation. That’s what I’m saying. But I don’t think it’s one guy.

I think it’s all the guys, who elected a spokesman to play this through the media. They’ll have their chance with Payton, of course. But there are a couple big names out there now, right? Right, Lovie?

The message had to go public. The identity of the messenger is irrelevant, because the message comes from the defense as a whole.

If that’s true, then it’s worth pointing out the brutal irony in the fact that hate for Spags has gotten the defense on the same page and working together better than Spags ever did.

Update: Looks like Vilma’s not happy with the Anonymous Defensive Player. So maybe it’s not 100% agreement. Of course, lack of unity does not preclude a majority. I’ll go out on a limb and say we’ll probably hear more about this.

Of course, I’m only speculating. Maybe Anonymous Defensive Player is one bitchy guy and all the rest of the players are all #smh this morning. But I’ll say this: if I’m right (and I think it’s not just me this time), if this isn’t just one guy but a coordinated team maneuver, Spags gotta go. He has to go now.

#HireLovie

And then maybe 2012 will really be over. Finally. I can’t wait. Because it sucked so fucking bad.

But, hell, it sure was a lot of fun though.

Jeffy’s been a journalist much longer than I’ve been a blogger.  Somehow, without professional training and decades of practice, however, I know what “this week” means.

Months ago, I wrote my first blog peice.  It was a troll piece – I needed a place to put it where I could use colorful language and not get in trouble, and I had no plans for this thing to become what it has become (that being, some would argue, a really, really long troll piece).

Anyway, here’s the post.  In it I made fun of message board reactions to a Falcon blogger’s diatribe on the perils of persecuting the Saints and stoking the furor of their fans and their seedy online presences.  (Again, I’m not saying he was wrong.)

That Falcoholic blog post appeared on March 23, 2012.

In Jeff Duncan’s Weekly Reader, dated December 21, 2012, he included that post under the heading “THIS WEEK’S WEB GEMS.”

That’s stupid, but consider also: of his six WEB GEMS OF THIS WEEK, only two were posted in the last week.  I’m not the type to nitpick over a day or two – he has deadlines and all that kind of journalisticky stuff.

By combining all the classic Jeff Duncan themes in one section of one post today:

1. Insulting Saints fans and embracing everything they hate
2. Praising what amounts to internet trolling as a “thought-provoking tome”
3. Doing so without adding any real information or content of his own
4. Doing so after everyone already knows about it (Jesus, Jeff, MONTHS)

Jeff Duncan has done the most Jeff Duncan fucking thing in the history of the internet.

Congrats, Jeff. For posterity:

One more week! Just one more, please!

I sympathize a little with the Governor, you know?

This season just won’t end.  Not mathematically, anyway.  Math was always one of my favorite things.  I was an idiot.  This is excruciating. 

The Saints’ playoff chances are fucking walkers, dead but not exactly, something so unlike what it used to be that someone needs to just put it out of its fucking misery.  The playoff scenario is an abomination just because it exists.  It needs to die.  But I love it so much.  I can’t let it go.  Maybe there’s a miracle cure!  It can come back to life!  We have to try, right?

So we do what we have to do.  We don’t kill it, but goddamn, we can at least put a hood on that fucking thing’s head and chain it up in the closet so nobody has to look at it.

Shit.  It’s just so ugly.

Anyway, I reckon we have us about three subjects to tackle this week, in some order.

1. How the hell are the Saints not eliminated yet?  Yay?

2. I was right about the defense, assholes *beats chest*

3. Maybe I was wrong about the entire roster being, um *clears throat* “riddled with pussies.”

Hey!  I know!  Let’s tackle ‘em in reverse order.

3. Maybe I was wrong about the entire roster being riddled with pussies.

Kind of, I guess.  I know I’m skipping over basically any description of the game yesterday, but what’s the point, really?  It was the greatest thing we’ve seen from this team in the regular season since at least the Giants last year (probably the Patriots in 2009) and undoubtedly the most fun we’ve had in 2012.

How do you discuss what was basically a perfect performance?  Is this where I list the great things that happened yesterday?  Shit, if you need a reminder, go watch the game again.  Spoiler alert: it ends in a shutout.

A fucking shutout.  How in the hell?  Okay, I’m getting ahead.  Let’s slow down.

How does a team that just as clear as day gave up on everything a week ago, to be dismantled by a team that, by the way, got dismantled themselves yesterday, and a week later destroy a Tampa team in ways that wouldn’t have seemed possible 8 or 9 weeks ago?

How does a team that looked like a big bunch of bitches – the team that I stopped watching because I felt like I cared more than they did – give us so much to be happy about?

Well, it’s because they truly were in give-up mode last week.  Tampa doesn’t disprove that, it reinforces the hypothesis.  Because a team that can beat anyone – regardless of circumstances and meaninglessness and lack of a quality opponent – by 41 points can no longer lean on the no-coach crutch.  You can’t explain this season away by saying that Goodell took it away before it started (not that he didn’t help) and you can’t say that the Saints never stood a chance.

Without a head coach, with a continued string of distractions, with the same talent (or even less) that they started with, continuing the same faulty defensive scheme or talent pool or whatever the culprit was supposed to be, with the same overpaid brand-minded quarterback, with the same drop-prone receiver corps and an identical identitylessness that plagued the 0-4 Saints and the 0-3-in-the-last-3 Saints, they blew an NFL team clean the fuck out of New Orleans.

The intangible excuses for what came before are insufficient.  The players on the field have not delivered consistently, while proving that they are capable.  Sean Payton would have made this team better.  But his absence is not responsible for the totality of the failures of 2012.  If it was, yesterday should have been an impossibility.

– Update: just seconds after I hit publish:

@Gkatt_17
Saints P Thomas Morstead saying the win yesterday was bittersweet because the way they won, wonders why they couldn’t do that all season

Well said, Mr. Morstead.

2. I was right about the defense, assholes.

If you didn’t expect me to beat my chest and crow a little on this one, you either a) haven’t been reading or b) were fucking deluded somehow into thinking this blog embraces humility.

Fuck right off if you don’t like it, or scroll right down to the next bolded item if you must.  Because, goddamnit, I was right.  I won’t lie, I worried a little about crowing too much.  How long can I go on before I start looking like a dick?

@animatedGeoff
@angrywhodat I’d say at least as long as people that were wrong about the defense went on and on

GREAT POINT, GEOFF.

“Worst defense ever,” they said.  Hopeless.  Maybe just firing Spags immediately and starting over is the solution.  We’d be better off just going for it on every fourth down instead of punting and allowing the defense to start over.  Cut Greer.  Fire Harper.  Robinson couldn’t cover a three-legged Yorkie.  The linebackers don’t know how to tackle, the secondary can’t learn this scheme, we were better off with Gregg Williams, let’s just blitz eight on every fucking down like we learned nothing from 2011.

Maybe a full overhaul is necessary.  The window is closing, and Drew deserves better. 

“Hold on, folks,” said the Angry Who Dat.  Mockery ensued.  “But wait, we don’t really know what this secondary is capable of until there’s some kind of pass rush.”  Yeah, right, buddy, that secondary couldn’t cover if we got to the quarterback in a second and a half.  “These guys have to play to the time the quarterback has.  Limit it, and they might be able to jump some routes, get some picks, you know?  We can’t be sure until it happens, and it might never.”

LOL!  You right, buddy!  It’ll never happen!  These guys couldn’t jump a pass route to save their lives!

Yep.  That’s what I got.  In exchange for moderate, restrained optimism, for advancing the idea that maybe this defense wouldn’t always be the WORST DEFENSE EVER, I got ridicule and hyperbole.

So, that’s why I don’t have a problem with a little self-congratulation.  The defense isn’t the worst ever, because no shutout is possible for a defense that is the worst ever.  Not against Tampa, not when the playoff chase is pretty much over, not after a drubbing by the Giants – no circumstance, no intangible makes yesterday possible, not for the worst ever, not in the NFL.

What changed then?  Well, first of all, the offense and special teams stopped being such a dick.  This defense is the same one we saw against Atlanta.  It’s the same one we saw against the Giants – pre-give-up, in the first half or so.  But the offense didn’t cough the ball up on a drively basis, and the special teams weren’t quite so special.  They were unremarkable, which we’ll take every time.

And, with just a hint – just an illusion – of a pass rush, the quarterback had to make quick decisions.  The receivers didn’t get three or four moves.  Sacks aren’t even a necessity just as long as the quarterback is uncomfortable enough to hurry his throw – and as long as the cornerback or safety can hang on to the ball.

It was a beautiful thing, this shutout.  It showed that Spagnuolo’s defense wasn’t doomed from the start, it shows that those who saw glimmers of hope in weeks 5-7 were not seeing mirages, but a future teeming with “Wait Til Next Year”s more real than any we’ve ever seen.

Because next year, we herald the return of the Payton (fuck you if you think he’s going anywhere), hopefully some semblance of a gameplan and consistently-genius playcalling (those areas in which a coach actually does make a difference), and a defense that’s not just mediocre or less bad but pretty fucking good all of the sudden.

Pretty fucking good?  Yeah, really, since Denver.  And holy shit, even I’m not dumb enough to pretend I saw that coming.  All along, I argued and argued for the potential of this defense to attain a weekly mediocrity that would be digestible at best – we got something instead that’s damn near miraculous, this defensive turnaround.

To conclude, yay defense. 

I don’t have the reason why it took so long, though.  I wish I knew the answer.  I could probably be an analyst or a coach or something and make money for it if I did.  How does a defense that was that fucking terrible at the start of the season (and you’ll note, I’ve never denied that they were in fact atrocious for weeks) turn it around like this?  If they’re capable of this, why weren’t they capable of it before?  It can’t be just the scheme, because scheme doesn’t affect the imperative that a defensive lineman beat his opponent one-on-one, nor make a large difference in his ability to do so.

Maybe there’s more of that intangible bullshit.  Maybe the players just took that long to “buy in”.  If they didn’t believe in the scheme for the first half of the season, maybe that affects the pass-rushers’ ability to give it their all.  Again, this is bitchery.  But, as we saw against the Giants, bitchery is sometimes reality.

I just hope beyond hope that we can enjoy two more games like this from Spags’s crew.  Because I like this feeling of being hopeful about next year and would like it to continue all offseason, but mostly because of the shit I’ll take if the defense gives up 40 points to Tony Romo next week.  Oh, mothers of all gods, I might have to quit the internet again.

1. How the hell are the Saints not eliminated yet?  Yay?

Somone in the twitters (I can’t remember who) said recently that a season like this must end in an incredible heartbreak.  It can’t die with a whimper – some unspeakable horror awaits us at the end of this ride.

The very fact that we came out of this week, with two games to go, still mathematically uneliminated from playoff contention causes me to dread the righteousness of that statement.  Take a look at the scenario to stay alive for one more week – at a minimum this requires (in addition to a win over the Cowboys, of course):

1. NYG loses at Baltimore
2. CHI loses to Arizona
3. MIN loses at Houston

That’s it.  That keeps us alive for another week.  Week 17 gets a lot trickier, of course, and in no way am I trying to build hope that this miracle could happen.  No, sir.  Just the opposite.

Those are all very possible results.  Chicago is tough, but they can find a way to lose any game ever right now, from what I’ve seen.  I do think that we beat Dallas, and somehow I think we find our way in to week 17 with a real scenario for making the playoffs.

I don’t pretend to know how this turns out, but the one thing I know – the one thing I understand from the last two decades of Saints football and from the torment of the last year – is that the ending will be a debacle unlike the worst my imagination can conjure.  An absolute horror.

I can’t wait.

I intended, in my post, to parse many of these quotes and break them down for their lunacy and faulty internal logic. 

But Reid already did so, and he did it better than I could have.  So go read it immediately.  I’ll wait.

Yeah.  So, all of what he said.  Well, with one exception.

At the end of his fantastic (and more accurate than anything in the Legitimate media) breakdown of the judgement, Reid expresses a common sentiment:

That’s a damning sequence of events for the commissioner, especially in light of the harshness of the penalties. This was a fuck-up of massive proportion.

It was a fuck-up. That much is true.

But I disagree with the premise that Goodell has been seriously harmed.  In fact, I feel that that premise, the one where Goodell just got kicked in the nuts by his predecessor, is not only in the best interest of Goodell but was cultivated for just that reason.

Let’s be clear about one thing: this will not harm Goodell’s perception in any way other than very temporarily, at least in the eyes of the rest of the league – and in the Saints’ organization/players/coaches/fans’ case, Goodell was already irreperably harmed.  The national media may crush Goodell for a few moments; they may state that he was, in fact, excessive in his penalization of crimes which did or did not exist.  But they’ve been on board from the start; whatever harms Goodell naturally harms his shills, and for this reason, the bountygate story will quickly disappear from the national consciousness.

Make no mistake: Goodell and Tagliabue (his fucking lawyer, remember) are fully aware of this.  The players’ case in court was rock-solid.  That is nothing short of a victory for the players, especially Jonathan Vilma.  It’s something we all know.  It’s something Goodell knew.  It’s something the legal team knew.  They acted too fast and too extremely, and the recourse consisted of two options:

1. Keep fighting

2. Admit as much

One was not an option.  Why?  Well, because they were destined to lose, and because a court judgement against the NFL in favor of the players would have been disastrous.  That kind of thing would have stuck in the minds of fans all over the country.  It wouldn’t have happened until the offseason, during a slow news cycle.

So what’s the plan, Tags?  How do you rescue your current commissioner from himself? 

You admit wrongdoing, but you blame it on the coaches.  You admit that the commish acted too quickly, that he was too severe, and that he made some mistakes.  You lash him in the appeal decision, because it makes the new appeal process look just.  Yet, while releasing the players from their punishments (cut-and-run), you attack them for what they’ve done.

Freedom, but not exoneration. 

You solidify your case in two aspects: in the courts against an accusation of defamation, and in the media against those who have no recourse, the coaches.

The players won, and I do not dispute that.  But Goodell and the machine that is the NFL won also; they’re winning the battle of public opinion.  They’ve found the solution that everyone outside of New Orleans will quickly forget.

They made that decision, conveniently, not in the slow news period of the offseason, but in the heat of the playoff chase, after the Saints were all but mathematically eliminated.

It was ultimately a genius move for an office that has made many a terrible mistake during this process that is now nearly nine months old. 

But make no mistake: Tagliabue is on Goodell’s side in every way.  He’s looking out for his protege.  And only time will prove my contention: that he’s done a bang-up job of it, and that the current commissioner’s image will not be harmed permanently in the minds of the fans or the media.

If you came here for statistical analysis and deep insight to the existential drama of a coachless team, the answers to the questions of life, the universe, and goddamn soul-sucking failure, go here instead.  He’s got it covered, and he has done it well.

I need to bitch.  I think you need to bitch.  Let’s bitch together.  Here’s the thing: I’m disgusted.  This is as homer a blog as probably exists on the entire Saints Internet.  But this loss – this one was different.  It was different from the Niners, this year or last; it was different from the Falcons; it was not the same fucking thing that we saw against the Panthers and the Chiefs.  No, folks, this one stands alone.  Only 10 days after I complained that the Falcons loss would be one of the hardest to get over that I can remember in my life as a Saints fan, the Saints got me over it. 

Because, for the first time in over 6 years, I couldn’t help but notice that the Saints just didn’t really give a fuck.

Most of what we’re getting from the media (Legitimate and Illegitimate alike) is some form of this autofellatio:

2012 was, after all, a test – not of the players or the staff, but of a theory – the very idea of the importance of coaching in a true team sport.  We see now that the influence at the top of the football organization is, rightly, a revered position.  We see that a great coach is truly worth as much as any player – verily, more than the sum of the entire lot of them.  We know now how important coaching is in the NFL, and if we didn’t before, all we needed was the grand experiment in leadershipless athletics that was the 2012 New Orleans Saints.

Eat my asshole, you pretentious fucks.

This wasn’t some fucking grand experiment, and it proved absolutely nothing about the principles of coaching or the need for leadership in an organization.  It would have done so had the Saints only been victims of insufficient game planning, play calling, and in-game adjustment.  It would have made sense had a pile of coaching errors amassed half of the losses.  That didn’t happen.

Or, more accurately, all of those things happened but they weren’t the only things that happened.

What we really proved in 2012 was this: the Saints – not football teams, not team sports, not the NFL specifically, only the Saints – maintain a roster fucking riddled with pussies.

I don’t have a problem with a slew of kick returns.  I have a problem with a pretty damn good coverage team giving up their own territory more times than I can count on one hand in a single game against a mediocre return team.  Because that demonstrates not giving a fuck. Sean Payton’s absence doesn’t – or shouldn’t – explain those kickoff returns.

I don’t have a problem with terrible defense.  Hell, we knew we’d experience that bit of perennial frustration, with a new coach and not a whole ton of defensive talent.  What we didn’t (and had no reason to) expect was the particular terribleness of this team through the first few games.  Even given that information, we shouldn’t have expected the great turnaround (and, for the most part, it was pretty impressive) that they experienced through the next few games, only to be overshadowed by the most mediocre offensive effort we’ve seen through three games since Aaron Brooks taunted us weekly with his uniquely infurating shit-eating grin.

Hey, speaking of grinning at failure, Lance Moore: fucking stop it please.  You know what smiling after a third down incompletion during a battle for your playoff lives says to the fans?  That you don’t give a fuck.  I get that it’s a game and I get that you have to have fun.  It’s still okay to fucking frown for a bit after you commit a very dumb mental mistake.  We’re frowning.  Frown with us, dick.

“Jed Collins went to the sideline after his fumble and nobody yelled at him!  See?  That’s the difference.” – All of Twitter

Which brings me to my point.  The reason I have a problem with the “coaching really does matter” crowd.  That is, it shouldn’t.  Not in this circumstance.  A coach like Sean Payton that is a football genius will be missed on the field.  He shouldn’t be missed in the players’ heads.

You’re telling me that this guy made an NFL roster, is living the dream many of us can only, well, dream about, he’s making a big fat pile of money to compete at the highest level, and he needs someone to yell at him in order to comprehend the magnitude of a fumble in his own territory?

He sounds like a pussy.  And, you know, I really don’t think Jed Collins is a pussy.

No, he knew he fucked up.  So did Marques Colston.  So did Drew Brees, and so did Drew Brees, and so did Drew Brees.

But, watching the game Sunday, I got that feeling, that one I haven’t felt in the better part of a decade now.  I felt like I cared too much.  I felt like I was investing too much goddamn energy into a silly game when the players didn’t care nearly as much as I do.

And hell, that was before the defense finally gave up.

“That’s why we need Sean Payton!  He would have fixed things!  He would have motivated the defense to keep playing until the offense got in gear!”

That dreamcrywish bullshit is probably one hundred percent truth.  But why?

The defense played its ass off for two and a half quarters.  Spotted half the field on all but one first-half possession, the opposing offense scored two touchdowns.  Two.  And the defense countered with one of their own.  That’s admirable given the full-on shitbeating that the offense took.  But you can only ask so much, right?

Right.

They gave up too, and the Giants scored more points than they have in a single game since 1894 (unverified stat). 

Why?  Because the defensive players, like the special teams and the offense, didn’t have Sean Payton to berate them into not letting the other guys score or something?

Get the fuck out.

That run. You know what I’m talking about. Shades of Marshawn fucking Lynch. Except, you know, it wasn’t Marshawn Lynch. It looked, to me, instead like a rookie just gashing a defense that didn’t have a care left in the world.

2012 is not a football narrative.  It’s not a sports narrative.  It is only a Saints story.  It proves only that the Saints – in this isolated, team specific case study – are powerless to stop that tiny little snowball of suck and bitchery as it gains mass and speed and whine on its way down the precipice until we, the innocent fans, find our living rooms and sports bars and man caves buried in a fucking avalance of piss and miserable defeat.

The loss doesn’t suck.  That old feeling of caring more than the team itself: that shit sucks.

“Only 15 percent of football players are self-motivated.  The other 85 percent need someone to get them going.  It’s human nature.” – Bobby Hebert (paraphrased and translated by Angry Who Dat)

Fuck off, Bobby.  That’s not human nature.  Humans are fucking competitive.  That might be entitled bitchy football player nature, but it’s not human nature.  Human nature is the reason someone like me dreams sometimes that maybe in another life I could have been granted just a shred of talent and had a shot at what these guys get to do every day of the week.  Human nature is why the dunces on the local message board cheer for the Chris Ivories and the Walter Thomases and the Mike Haases and the Onome Ojos of the world.  Because if those guys can make it, then maybe even we might have a chance in another fucking parallel universe.  We want to believe – we have to believe – that the underdog can make it if he works hard enough.  Human nature is the reason Rudy is a cult classic.

Human nature is the reason sometimes fanhood isn’t enough to overcome the disgust at watching people do things we’ve always wished we could have had a shot at doing, and doing it half-heartedly.  It’s the reason we turn off the TV at the beginning of the fourth quarter because it’s just too hard to watch someone who doesn’t give a shit compete at something you care deeply about.

It’s that time of the year again, when we revolt in horror at the absolute fuck-it-all we’re watching on our TVs and in our Dome.  It used to be an annual tradition.  It wasn’t anymore. 

Until this year.

“Good news!  5-11 is a high draft pick!  Go Bucs!”

One more example of absolute, unadulterated bitchery right here.  As disgusted as I am right now, I hope that the entire team gets their shit together and realizes that their fucking mommy Sean Payton is watching every move they make.  I hope they realize that someone in power is taking notice of their half-assed play (and I hope beyond hope that someone actually is).  I want nothing more than an 8-8 finish.

But you know what?  I think your high draft pick is probably more likely than my 8-8.  So there’s that.