QBREES9

NEW ORLEANS – OK, there’s 6:53 left in the first quarter and it has become clear to me that the Saints ain’t going to finish 16-0.

I never really gave much thought to it before because it’s such a long way from 7-0 to 16-0, and I’ve never considered this team to be a team for the ages.

But watching the first eight-plus minutes of the victory against Carolina on Sunday in the Superdome reinforced what we had seen the last two weeks – the Saints’ run defense is vulnerable and their pass protection is suspect.

The run defense was exposed right away as DeAngelo Williams zipped through the New Orleans defense for a 66-yard touchdown on the second play from scrimmage.

The pass protection was shaky from the beginning and calling passes on each of the first four plays wasn’t helpful. On the fourth one, Drew Brees was sacked by Tyler Brayton, fumbled, and Jon Beeson recovered for the Panthers at the Saints 11. Two plays later Williams had another touchdown and Carolina had a 14-0 lead, and I had the lead to this column.

The Saints ain’t going to finish 16-0, they’re not a team for the ages, and they’re vulnerable against the run and in pass blocking.

They’re still a very good team, quite possibly the best in the NFC, and they can overcome those shortcomings. But there is going to be overcoming that needs to be done.

As worrisome as the run defense can be, right now the pass protection is the greater concern. The Saints’ biggest strength, by far, is Drew Brees and the passing game, but as good as Brees has been, he’s like every other quarterback in the history of football – when he is forced to operate under duress he’s going to be less effective and turn the ball over.

In less than 10 quarters from the start of the Miami game into the second quarter Sunday – Brees had turned the ball over eight times, including six interceptions.

No team, including this one, is going to go very far if its quarterback is averaging nearly a turnover per quarter.

Of course, these two areas can go hand in hand. The Saints never trailed in their first five games and scored on their first possession of each game, including four touchdowns. New Orleans was constantly playing with the lead, which made it difficulty for opponents to establish a consistent running game, and which also enabled the Saints to avoid predictable passing situations.

In the three games since, New Orleans has been in far more competitive games, playing from behind much of the time.

These deficiencies were masked during the first five victories, but have since been unmasked.

Now the third quarter has just ended and the Saints have finally pulled even at 20. They’ve done it because Brees and the big-play passing game have gotten untracked, and the Panthers can’t take full advantage of their running game because they’re scared to death to let Jake Delhomme to try and make a play in the passing game.

Now that the game is tied, the Panthers decide to let Delhomme throw down the field and it yields a few first downs but they wind up punting when the Saints surround Johnathan Stewart for a loss on third down.

New Orleans takes over at its own 2-yard line and after a few first downs I’m having flashbacks to the 27-24 regular-season victory against Philadelphia in 2006.

The Saints aren’t able to run out the clock in scoring a tie-breaking field goal as they did in beating the Eagles, but they do break the tie with a 40-yard field goal by John Carney.

Along the way Sean Payton outdoes even himself in the ridiculous replay challenge department. It’s ironic that Payton’s reluctance to challenge an incompletion to Marques Colston cost him because it’s usually his overzealousness is choosing to challenge that’s the problem.

But while Payton was vacillating on whether to challenge, the play clock was about to run out. At this point the sensible thing to do would have been to challenge the play because you were going to have to call timeout anyway, you might as well hope the replay officials somehow decide to overturn the play; it can’t hurt since you were going to lose a timeout anyway.

Apparently this is what Brees was trying to convey to Payton on the sideline, but the coach called a timeout AND challenged the ruling. The officials rightly upheld the ruling and New Orleans lost two timeouts.

But all’s well that ends well and after Anthony Hargrove recovered two fumbles and returned the second for a touchdown, this one ended Saints 30, Panthers 20.

New Orleans for the first time is 8-0, halfway to 16-0. But the comeback and victory – as impressive as they were – don’t change my original premise.

The Saints ain’t going 16-0. But at this point, who cares?

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