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MOBILE, Ala . — Unlike 95 percent of his compatriots at Ladd-Peebles Stadium Wednesday, Sean Payton wasn’t sporting any team gear. Maybe that was the last part of his punishment. No fleur-de-lis until after the Super Bowl.

But Payton didn’t need that to demonstrate he was a man who was happy to be back.

“You miss the competition, that element of what it feels like when you’re winning, when you have success, the butterflies on Sunday mornings,” Payton said. “But the interaction with the people that you’re closest to is what I missed most.

“In other words, it wasn’t just being away from football.”

Indeed, there’s a band-of-brothers mindset about coaching a football team, especially in the all-in world of the NFL, where even road trips to places like the Senior Bowl are spent together.

Payton was properly contrite Wednesday, although he never said the word “sorry.” Nor he did not detail what part he played in the pay-for-performance system, which, in some minds, morphed into a bounty-for-injury system.

Read more: Lewis: Sean Payton did deserve all that he got | Saints | The Advocate — Baton Rouge, LA

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Everyone is entitled to be stupid, but some abuse the privilege.

All little common sense goes a long way.