I do, however, have bad feelings about how Carolina beat us twice last year and now have the QB they wanted. Can’t take you opponents lightly.

I am not scared but I think we will lose more games than we win. Those losses will not physically injure me or cause me pain, they will validate my beliefs on roster development. And I expect we will get a high first round draft pick. I wish we would win a lot, but I just don't see it this year, and that doesn't make me scared of anything. People can say we just need to be healthy, but our roster is a year older and we brought back Thomas, Peat, etc and used our 1st round pick on a player who hasn't been healthy in 2 years. Thats not how you get healthier. If we have injuries and lose games, we have a built in excuse of bad luck that can never repeat, which is Mickey Loomis' plan every year. I would like us to win, but I feel like Derek Carr is a reclamation story after 9 years of almosts with the Raiders, and Dennis Allen is a reclamation story after a lot of 4-12 with the Raiders and now 7-10 with the Saints, and I just have trouble believing an old roster coming off many injuries pulls of a double reclamation of a coach head coach with 4 seasons in the NFL where he never had exceeded a .412 record stacked with a starting QB who went 9 years without a playoff win. They all have excuses for the past, and maybe those excuses are valid, but the problem is that all the excuses need to be valid. A couple years ago Derek Carr had a head coach who had winning seasons and won a Super Bowl and that didn't save Derek Carr bc the uniform was still the wrong second color. Last year Dennis Allen inherited a winning team but still didn't win. But this will be the year. Maybe. But not so likely. Sorry.

Let me ask you this bako. Who do you think wins the NFC South and do you think that team will win 9 games? In other words do you think every team in the division will be sub .500?

Individually I would predict a sub .500 record for every team in the NFC South. I expect the division overall to be below .500. Overall I expect one team or another to beat the average and would guess that whoever manages to win the NFC South gets about 9 wins, though its definitely possible someone wins it with 7-8 wins. The Panthers and Falcons are younger with young QBs and better salary cap positions and have the most potential to win 9 or more games if their QB works out. I would put the odds on the division something like 35% Panthers, 25% Falcons, 25% Saints, 15% Bucs. But I think whoever wins the division loses quickly in the playoffs. In general the NFC is weak and winning the NFC South could lead to a home playoff game against a beatable team and a trip to the divisional round, but I don't see the NFC South champ getting past that, and at the end of the gauntlet are teams like SF we could not even score on. I don't see us taking the QB we shut out and beating the team that shut us out with him. And if we did, then you get to the real juggernauts in the AFC with QBs like Maholmes, Allen, Rodgers, and Burrow. I just don't see some 9-8 team that squeaks out of the NFC South going to the big show and taking down the hot hand from that AFC group.

So, more anti-Saint points than actual answers.

Let me ask you this bako. Who do you think wins the NFC South and do you think that team will win 9 games? In other words do you think every team in the division will be sub .500?

Thanks for your predictions bako. I personally don't think the entire division will be under .500 again. I still look at how the Saints stacked and performed against the NFC playoff teams and I say it was good. We beat Philly. We lost on a late second FG against the Vikings in a game we had the lead with less than 10 minutes left in the fourth quarter. In San Fran Kamara fumbled on their 6 in the fourth and Dalton got sacked on 4th and goal at their 5 yard line with 6 minutes left. Lutz missed a FG too. The team was in all those games and to say otherwise is just not true.

The Saints worst losses were by 14 and 13 to the Ravens and Niners. Vikings only lost 5 games but three of those were 37, 24, and 17 point blow outs. We both had 11 games decided by one score (8 or less). But they were 11-0 while we were 5-6. Thats a heck of a lot of good bounces, favorable calls, and overall team injuries to go your way. Time will tell and bako could be right...but I don't see those kinds of trends happening again.