subguy

I am curious after the first game what everyone now thinks the Saints record will be...................8-8 here

CheramieIII

I\'m still going with 11-5, I was going to say 5-11 after the thing yesterday and I will not call it a game again, but after reading the following article by King I stuck to my guns:

Playing it smart

Peter King, SI.com

CLEVELAND -- Lest you take the first game of the season as some indicator of January success or failure, let me remind you of these scores from opening weekend 2003:

Buffalo 31, New England 0.

Atlanta 27, Dallas 13.

New York Giants 23, St. Louis 13.

Pittsburgh 34, Baltimore 15.

And, on Monday night, Tampa Bay 17, Philadelphia 0.

The Bucs went on to win seven, Buffalo and Pittsburgh six, Houston five and the Giants four. The five losers made the playoffs. The Patriots, you might recall, had a pretty decent year. After such decisive openers, the fortunes of all 10 teams turned radically in the next four months.

I write that because the team I\'m going to write about, Cleveland, had an inspiring win over Baltimore yesterday, 20-3. But history says we shouldn\'t attach too much meaning to it. I like Cleveland more than most people do. I wrote a few weeks ago that I thought they\'d be a winning team this year. But I don\'t want to make any more judgments on the Browns right now. Too early. I just want to tell you what an intelligent game they played against Baltimore, and how it could bode well for their future.

\"You really needed this one,\" I told Butch Davis after the game, when most everyone had cleared out of the Browns locker room. Davis was there with his polite and energetic son, Drew.

\"We did,\" he said, \"especially after the way we opened the last two years. Two years ago, we\'ve got the Kansas City game won and then we get that helmet throw. [Dwayne Rudd took off his helmet and tossed it in exultation late with the Browns ahead, got penalized for it, and the Chiefs kicked a field goal to win.] Last year, we lose to the Colts 9-6 here after we get inside the 10 twice and have to settle for field goals. I\'d say we had just as good a defensive performance that day as we had today.\"

The Cleveland defense may not belong in the same league with Baltimore\'s, but it played the same in this game. Last year, in two games, Jamal Lewis ran 52 times for 500 yards in the two Baltimore wins over Cleveland, an NFL record for rushing yards against one team in a season. (I mean, duh. No kidding.) This year, he never could bust free. Twenty carries, 57 yards.

What was so inspiring about the Cleveland effort was the team-ness of it all. On five Lewis runs, at least five Browns were in on the tackle. Not just in on the tackle in that jump-on-the-pile-at-the-end way. But on a quarter of his attempts, at least five guys pushed and grabbed and gnawed at the ankles of the NFL\'s reigning rushing king.

When I told Davis that, he said: \"That was the plan. Our defense made a pact. They were on a mission. Everyone to the ball. In fact, in the last couple of weeks at practice, all 11 defensive players had to touch the ballcarrier on every play. You don\'t hear this a lot, but we had to be disciplined gang-tacklers. Last year, when we played Jamal, it reminded me of one of those old Oklahoma games, with J.C. Watts and Billy Sims playing. You\'d control them on nine plays, but on the 10th ... boom! They break a long one. Same with Jamal. We just pounded home the message that the only way we were going to get it done was by an 11-man effort on every play.\"

Lucky for the Browns that left tackle Jonathan Ogden was missing with and injured knee he tweaked in the preseason against the Giants, and center Mike Flynn was out too. But there was something about this run defense. Baltimore would certainly have given Kyle Boller a better pocket with Ogden playing instead of Ethan Brooks at left tackle. Still, I\'m not sure Lewis would have dented 100 with Ogden on the field.

The one other thing I liked about the Browns was the smarts of Jeff Garcia. Case in point: his touchdown pass to Quincy Morgan against what looked like a Baltimore defensive breakdown late in the third quarter. All day, Garcia had been throwing the dinks and dunks, mostly because the Ravens were coming after him so hard and not giving him time to throw. Now, with the game tied at 3 with 35 seconds left in the third quarter, from the Baltimore 46, Garcia did the bait-and-switch. Buying time in the pocket, shifting nervously, looking everywhere, he pumped and drew the Baltimore safeties in. And here came Morgan, stepping free beyond safety Ed Reed. Garcia lofted the ball right into his hands, and this stadium exploded almost at the moment the ball landed in Morgan\'s hands. An amazing, pent-up explosion. Morgan pranced in, and the game was starting to be over.

\"That\'s a great example of what we preached to our defense,\" said Davis. \"Stay alive, stay alive. By that I mean, don\'t give up on a play. The play\'s never over till the whistle blows.\'\'

Then Davis started to walk out of the stadium. There was one player left in the locker room, defensive end Courtney Brown. Davis went to him and gave him a one-armed hug around the shoulders.

\"One down, coach,\'\' Brown said.

It\'s an optimistic Monday in Brownstown.

WEEKLY AWARDS

Offensive Player of the Week

Three-way tie among New York Jets RB Curtis Martin, Philadelphia QB Donovan McNabb and Minnesota QB Daunte Culpepper. How in the world do you choose? Martin rushed 29 times for 196 yards against Cincinnati and when asked following the game whether this was the best of his career, he said, \"I believe so.\" McNabb was exquisite, completing 72 percent of his passes -- 15 percent more than his career average -- and throwing four touchdown passes in routing the Giants. And Culpepper threw five touchdown passes against one of the best defenses in football, Dallas. And there are about five other guys who deserve this award, too.

Defensive Player of the Week

Detroit S Bracy Walker, whose 92-yard return of a blocked field goal gave the Lions their first lead of the season and whose end-zone interception with 18 seconds left sealed Detroit\'s first road win since 2000.

Special Teams Player of the Week

Detroit DT Shaun Rogers, who blocked that field goal I was just talking about, and added four tackles and a sack in the first game of what should be a breakout season for the Leos.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/news?slu...nnsi&type=lgns

Golf and sex are about the only things you can enjoy without being good at them.
Jimmy Demaret

themightyduck

Ah, but you\'re forgetting one thing, Cheramie:

New England\'s head coach: Bill Belichick
Dallas\'s head coach: Bill Parcells
St. Louis\'s head coach: Mike Martz
Baltimore: Brian Billick
Philadelphia: Any Reid

Can we all agree that all of these coaches are Super Bowl caliber and that these teams win because of good coaching?

You still think that Haslett\'s \"brilliant coaching\" can put us above .500 even with two crappy coordinators?

Danno

I\'ll stand by my 10-6.
6 losses. Seattle was probably the 3rd or 4th best team we\'ll play this year.
After 1 week our opponents strength looks like this...

1. Minnesota
2T. Kansas City
2T. Denver
4. Seattle
5. at Carolina 1
6. Carolina 2
7. at St Louis

Notice anything about the top 3 teams we still have to play?

We get all of them in the Dome, and they all struggled on the road last year.

My faith in Haz has practically vaporized, but the talent is there on both sides of the ball. I think we win 8 games on talent alone, and a couple more based on the other team screwing up.

saintfan

A Carolina sweep? Did you post this before or after Steve Smith broke his leg.

Man...he broke his leg. Bad luck for the Panthers eh? LMAO

ScottyRo

No, not Martz. When the Rams went to the Superbowl with Martz as HC, they did it in spite of him, not because of him. He had a superior team and lost because of his arrogance. He doesn\'t deserve to be on a list of called \"Superbowl caliber\".

CheramieIII

Hey TMD, so if Haz brings the team back and they make the playoffs and lose the NFC Championship game, would you put him in the same company, as those other coaches? I was only trying to make a point that it happens and Reid and Martz are not in my opinion great coaches. Reid has had talent for years and rendered it worthless every year and Martz, what ScottyRo said.

spkb25

my prediction depends on our next three games. we should win all of them. and look good doing it. if we win all of them n look good ill go with 10-6. if not we will be 8-8

CheramieIII

I think we will win those games, but with the Saint\'s you never can tell. We will probably lose all of the next 4 , except Minnesota, that\'s usually the way the Saint\'s do it.

We have a chance and everyone can see it, to win the division this year. Tampa Bay sucks worse than we do, Atlanta was lucky to beat the 49ers and looked worse than we did in winning the game. The Panthers are my only concern and we don\'t have to play them for a while, but with the fact that we have a weak schedule outside of our conference and get Tampa Bay and Atlanta twice, it only stands to reason we should be at least 10-6.

Golf and sex are about the only things you can enjoy without being good at them.
Jimmy Demaret

WhoDat

They struggle on the road??? Kinda like Seattle, huh? Were any of those teams worse than 2-6 on the road last year, b/c that\'s what Seattle was. We suck at home, in case you haven\'t figured that out yet.