The Introduce Yourself Thread

[LKelley67]

With so many newbies and this being a lull in team activity this is a good time for everyone to get reacquainted. Something I like about BnG is that there is some pretty good quality of dialogue and you don't have to sift through so much chaff. The more the merrier fo sho but it is also nice that you can get to know the posters here a little more personally as well.

How 'bout we try to insert some little intro-bio-profiles in one spot here for our reference?

I'm gonna lift the two from the neugey thread that gave me the idea for this---

[LKelley67]

neugey-

Hi guys, I am a Saints fan currently living in Omaha, Nebraska. I've read the forum casually for a few years now but have started to read it regularly this year due to the hiring of Coach Payton and the acquisitions of Reggie Bush, Drew Brees and others. The fan interaction is interesting in the forum and I'd like to put my 2 cents in about the direction of the Saints. I'm really looking forward to this season.

Here's a brief story on how I became a Saints fan. Growing up in Sioux Falls, SD , I really didn't care a great deal for the game of football outside of playing catch with my friends. Why didn't I care for football? Maybe part of it was resentment - almost all the guys on the HS football team acted like self-righteous jerks and lost a lot of games - they seemed like hypocrites. I've been a big Lakers fan since childhood and had always loved basketball more. Also, South Dakota doesn't have a Div I football team to rally around and I had no interest in the Vikings.

I went to Dakota State University in Madison, SD and started getting into football when all the guys in our dorm would hang out and watch MNF. I started to really understand football and became enamored with the strategic aspects of the game. The next progression for me was to become a fan of an NFL team. The regional teams didn't fit well - the Vikings didn't interest me, Packers fans creeped me out, Broncos fans were too arrogant, didn't like the Chiefs colors, the Bears were too close to MJ and the hated Bulls. I liked the Cowboys, especially Emmitt Smith and their style of play, but they were starting to get too cocky, Michael Irvin annoyed me and I didn't want to pile on the bandwagon. Kind of liked the Raiders, but did I really want to put money in Al Davis' pocket? I started to notice the Saints - always loved their colors and uniforms and the Dome Patrol defense was exciting to watch. Sam Mills and Renaldo Turnbull were two of my favorite players. Jim Mora was a no-nonsense coach, but one who didn't seem to be too full of himself. Several other factors also came into play - 1) I was getting into Blues music and I read about how a lot of the great Blues players came from NO - especially Robert Johnson and Muddy Waters. 2) I was developing a taste for cajun food - gumbo, jambalaya and red beans and rice, 3) I was intrigued by the culture of NO - Mardi Gras and the French Quarter. It seemed like the polar opposite of South Dakota.

Becoming a Saints fans was an avant-garde choice and I liked the shock value of telling people in the Midwest that I liked the Saints. I guess I've felt for these and many other reasons certain forces pulled me toward the Saints - maybe there is a voodoo spell at work .

Anyway, I look forward to continually posting here. Cool site!

[LKelley67]

NewMexSaint-

I have been a saints fan so long I cant remember ( 86 or so). I HATE bandwogn fans with a passion. I have been to several games along the west coast. I live in Seattel now, so I have been ridiculed by the seahawk fans, I love the Saints with a passion. I grew up in a small town in New Mexico and , as you all know, we had no team to root for. I worked in a hip clothing store back in the day, and I could not stand how they would come in to buy the latest and greatest team. I remember watching the Saints draft Ricky Williams and getting teared up.,.. I then ordered a Williams Jersey and the vendor could only ship 20 at a time , so I took my size and shipped all the rest of the Ricky Jerseys out.... so no bandwagon fans could have one.

I have had my head split open in Phoenix because I refused to wear the paper bag, Peanuts thrown at me in San Fran, Jeersy ripped off in Denver, and the list goes on. I personally dont give a Fu#% what people think about my Saints. If you dont like it, then eat a D@#$. SERIOUS !!!! Im tired of explaining why I love the Saints and got the Fluer Tattoed on my arm. If you dont agree and you dont like the Saints, Then Screw YA!!! I have now based everyone I meet on " What team do you like" If they say they like who ever won the superbowl last, then I dont like them... it means they are followers and I dont have time for weakA$$ people.

I love our boys and have thrown hooks over the Saints several times, but only because of rude fans for another team. I now live in Seattel and it discust me that the Hawk fans have crawled out of the woodwork , pretending to have been there for the last 20 years of suffering.
Last year was one of the hardest in remembrance to me, and Im still here.

My first jeresy was a Shuler , and I still wear it with pride....... and to all bandwagon reggie jumpers out there.... get off our wagon!!!!!

[hagan714]

Let see i have been a saints fan from day one. At 45 I can say I have seen ever possible way to screw up by them. Started at Tulane in game one. Going to the practices and getting the autographs from Billy and the boys.
In high school we would crash the gates. About 10 of us would line up and just run through. They would get at least 2 of us before we vanished into the crowd. Believe you me I now that dome well. Ever watch a game above the the big screen on the cat walks? those are the true nose bleed seats. Not that we could not afford tickets, It was fun.
Went through the brown bag faze. We would sell them to fans out side the game. 5 cents to get bagged.
The most heart breaking game was when we missed the playoffs with a kick wide right from i think 45 yards out. That was what 1983? Got into a fight with some rams fans after the game in front of the dome gates. We got the best of them outside the dome. Hehe remember running from security with the shirt torn off my back. We did not start it. But we finished it.
Moved from NO and was in Chicago for the snowball fight with the bears fans, Must have had 3 feet of snow around us by the end. Bears fans let us drink for free after the game. I guess our reward for being good targets. We got hammered both times. They did feel bad for us but we were good sports about it.
Was living in MPLS when the viking demolished us. They could not understand why I was still happy. hey it was our first winning season.
Now I live in Boston and find the the fans here respect the loyalty we as have have. Sure they laugh alot but we deserve it. They for most point would like to see the saints make it.

[braggbro1]

I'm a Colts fan but as a Purdue grad Drew Brees will always be my favorite NFL quarterback (sorry Peyton!). The Saints are now my right up there with the Colts as my favorite NFL team. Can't wait to see the new-look Saints next year.

[mikesaintfan]

well, lets try to remember how i came to love the saints
I am 34 yrs old and have lived in new jersey my entire life. and i have been a saints fan since i was old enough to pick a team to root for. (Dad was a jets fan and richard todd comes to mind as their QB back then). For many years i could only see games vs the jets or giants due to T.V. restrictions. As i got old enough, the Sports bars woked for a while then came Direct tv
I have my magnetic saints helmets on my truck(you get strange looks in NJ/NY area with something like that on your vehicle) and once football season gets here my flag flies in front of the house. As you can guess, info in this area about the saints is hard to come by so BNG was a godsend. Ihave been reading the fourums for quite a while but just recently joined.
G O S A I N T S

[LKelley67]

Yours truly-

I'll try brevity but I have been a fan since the inception of the franchise.

The NFL used to really suck bad in how terrible they treated new franchises. They made it really hard to even reach respectability to start of with. It wasn't just the Saints. Check the history of the Falcons, Bengals, Buc, etc. Those early years were agonizing but it was all stil new. Hope was all there was, only one way to go, right? Thirteen years to the first 8-8 season! OWWW! If Archie with Thunder and Lighning could have had any defense that would have been a contending team. That era was when it became competitive and more than just a bumbling fumbling expansion team. That was my adolescence. At least I grew up in south Louisiana in the midst of Saint suffering with everyone else. There at least was always Cholly Macs Tigers coming close.

I moved to Alaska and lived there for 22 years. A couple of times I tried to leave my allegiance to the Saints. The end of the Phillips era particularly. That effort resulted more in just trying to not watch the NFL at all. Hope for the Saints always kept me coming back though. In a place that had a very divergent fan base from all over the country I became identified as the Saints fan. It was far and few in between to have any co-supporters. The Mora era was one you could stand with pride though. Those were solid teams no matter what the record was. If it wasn't for being in the same division with the damn team of the decade there would have been greater times then. I turned my head as much as possible when Ditka arrived. I knew this was another Aint chapter that would have to pass. I really liked the start of the Haslett reign. It turned for me (and I think he should have been fired) after that 2002 end of the season 3 game collapse to some of the worst teams in the league. The 2003 1-4 start and I was cemented as a critic.

In 2004 I moved back to Louisiana to help my son get his life on track. Along the way I found a new wife and life too. If the Saints wouldn't have had those late 2004 wins we could have gotten this rebuilding program on a year earlier. I am optimisitic about the new start this year. I'll be around though even if we are considering picking Brady Quinn in next year's draft. After 40 years just one Superbowl victory will be enough for my lifetime. I'll cry like a baby and scream as loud as anyone when it happens. It won't be just for me though or about the team. It will be because I know the fans here, they deserve a champion. People in other parts of the country do not understand the depths to which football reaches in Louisiana culture. I do not know if fanatical and geeky guys who spend hours chit chatting about this team are the tip or the main part of the iceberg. In any case, these are championship fans, no matter how the team performs.

[FatiusJeebs]

My name is Fatius Jeebs, I am 31 years and I have a Saints problem. I have been a fan since 1989 and I must say it has been a difficult and rather painful journey. But it is a journey I refuse to give up on. It all started in New York in '89. I managed to catch the last 2 games of the season that year. Not sure how it happened but hey....if not for those games I probably would not be here. I was watching the game and I began to admire the amount of heart the Saints were playing with. I also began to notice just how friggin awesome their uniforms were. Last game of the season the Saints had already been eliminated from the playoffs. In fact, a statement came out at the bottom of the screen at the beginning of the game that stated, "The Saints are the best team in football not to make the playoffs this year." They were playing the Colts that night and destroyed the Colts' chances of going to the playoffs with a 31-6 victory. Over the next couple of years it was tough to follow the Saints because things like Sunday Ticket did not exist sooo...I would watch whoever was playing Dolphins or not...just to see the ticker at the bottom and see if the Saints were winning. I fell in love. Slowly...I got to learn names.....faces....schedules....rivalries...and of course...the dubious history. I'm a sucker for underdogs and bad ass uniforms. LOL....GO SAINTS!!!!

[maximkat]

I should probably do this since I don't remember doing any formal introduction. First off I gotta clear up some things. I'm maximkat (26 years young) and no I'm not a woman. It's been my online screen name for multiple things over many years. It also has nothing to do with maxim magazine, as I had this name long before I or anyone else had even heard of it, possibly before it even was a magazine.

Anyways, I grew up in southern new jersey and was automatically a Phillies, Flyers, and Sixers fan by heart. For some reason I always hated the eagles (maybe it had something to do with Buddy Ryan). So up until about middle school I didn't have a football team as much as I loved the sport. Then I had to do a book report on something or other, and I thought I'd use the opportunity to pick my team. We actually had a Saints book in our library (yeah a little tiny library of a middle school out in the sticks had a saints book). I'd peg the book as a "Nfl yearbook" type of things as each team had one representing them in some sort of set. I read most of them, and like many before me said "wow those uniforms are only the coolest i've ever seen in my entire life." I grew up without cable for the most part, the first game I can remember was Bobby Hebert at QB and the Eagles pulling that comeback on our boys in the playoffs which was tough. I only just last year got to see my first Saints game in person when we got trounced by the Giants. The fans were good to me though, for obvious reasons. Hopefully one day I will see one in NO.

I will be getting my Bush jersey soon, and that demotes my Deuce jersey to "lounging around the house clothes" and that demotes my Brooks jersey to "rags for cleaning crap up around the house". My Horn jersey will always be at the "lounging around the house" level as he has never been my favorite, but I'm still a big fan. Also my favorite players ever for the team were Eric Martin and Sam Mills. My dad went to Purdue so I'm a big fan, go Brees!!!

[BJSim]

Some of this I've posted before;

I became a New Orleans Saints fan in 1986. Jim Mora was moving from the USFL to the NFL and bringing most of his dominating defense with him. Unfortunately I could only read newspaper articles and a (very) few internet postings over the next few years to keep my interest. Good or bad seasons I've kept them at the front of my list of teams to watch.

I've never waivered on my love of the Saints and had to put up with a lot of *stuff* because of it and the area I live in. The first Saints game I went to was in Philly (side note: never let me go to a live Saints game against the Eagles, they're 0-3 when I'm there) when it was one of the coldest games on record and Eric Allen returned two INTs for TDs. I've been to five (Saints games) live, two at the Dome, one in Carolina, and two here in Philly. I'm (still) trying to convince the wife that traveling to away games once or twice a year to different cities would be a fun, but she seriously HATES all sports.

I'm HUGE overall football fan. So when the wife wouldn't allow the dish, I actually had (have) Eagles season tickets and would go there 4+ times a year. Sadly I'd be watching the ticker for the Saints scores in between plays and during time-outs. I've finally gotten Sunday Ticket so I can relax and watch the Saints games at home.