New Orleans Saints Forums - blackandgold.com

It's better to hope owner Tom Benson, who ripped into his team and its performance after Sunday's 34-13 loss to Denver and sounded ready to begin whacking people like Vito Corleone, wisely snatches New England offensive coordinator Charlie Weis or Patriots defensive coordinator Romeo Crennel to lead the Saints' rebuilding on the field, and hires Baltimore director of player personnel Phil Savage to have final say on talent evaluation.

It's better that than to waste another second trying to figure out why the Saints are who they are and do what they do, why they spend a week on preparation and play as if they're on Preparation H.

"We got our heads beat in today," center LeCharles Bentley said.

"Right now, I'm at a loss for words," running back Deuce McAllister said. "It's frustrating. I'm tired of losing. I'm tired of losing."

But having their helmets cracked and dropping games is what the Saints (4-6) have done best and most often this season, which will be their fourth in a row that ends without a trip to the playoffs. Mercifully, though, it will end for New Orleans after six more Sundays.

But it's not soon enough to prevent more of the same from happening.

The Broncos' drive-through flogging -- and the future ones to occur at home and on the road -- pretty much was par for the Saints' course this season. New Orleans previously had been hammered, on the field if not on the scoreboard, in losses to Seattle, Arizona, Minnesota and San Diego.

"This team can look like champs one week and come out with not the same energy (the next)," Saints tackle Wayne Gandy said.

Which is utterly confounding, if not downright amazing, when you consider that the Saints' principal figures have labored alongside one another for years, under virtually the same coaching staff, in essentially the same offensive and defensive systems.

There's no comprehending how high it registers on the idiocy scale that a team with as much "talent" as the Saints profess to have regresses so spectacularly from week to week.

After salvaging a measure of respect last week in a victory against Kansas City, and inflating in-house hopes of a belated playoff run, the Saints bombed spectacularly against Denver (7-3). They trailed 7-0 before the sound of the national anthem had stopped reverberating, 14-0 before you could buy a hot dog, 20-0 before the first quarter ended and the Broncos realized there actually was an opponent on the field.

"We can't win one week, (and) come out flat the next week and not play well," McAllister said. "We expect to gain some confidence or some momentum, but you've got to sustain it and come out to play each week. We haven't done it yet."

And that, officially, can serve as the obituary to this season and to the Haslett-Loomis-Mueller regime.

The Saints haven't done it, aren't going to do it and should understand and respect why those feelings exist. The goodwill they have been extended only has provided more time for the failure to become more pronounced.

"We started slow again," Haslett said.

Start slow, finish slow, slow to a crawl in the middle -- it really doesn't matter. It all has added up to the same thing, Saints losses and Saints mediocrity and Saints postseasons spent watching games all players and coaches say they ache to participate in.

Kicking them can't even be considered sporting, not under the current circumstances, which suggest the franchise should be scheduled as a guest on "CSI," playing the role of the victim.

It's better, and more productive, to think ahead, to compile the lists of candidates for the various openings.

It's better to hoist ourselves above the muck, lest, like the Saints, we become mucked up.

. . . . . . .

John DeShazier can be reached at jdeshazier@timespicayune.com or (504) 826-3410.