WhoDat!656

The New Orleans Saints had a very good bounce-back season in 2013, winning a road playoff game and re-establishing the Saints franchise as one of the best in the NFL. But it all began exactly 47 years ago today with a kicker, yes a kicker. As seen in the below tweet, the Saints first ever player to join the franchise was a “kicking specialist” who moonlighted as a fullback.


Today in Sports History 1967 ~ Paige Cothren became the first player to sign with the New Orleans #Saints. pic.twitter.com/pap8zu45hL

— Before I Was Famous (@BeforeFamePics) January 27, 2014

Paige Cothren never made the team, he had been out of the league for sometime when he signed with the Saints, but he will forever be the first Saint ever.

The Times-Picayune did a feature on the first Saint in franchise history a few years ago, when asked about being signed by the Saints only to be cut, Cothren said, “If I would have made the team it would have been better.”

Cothren was a very accomplished kicker while at Ole Miss, setting the national collegiate record for most field goals in a game and in a season. “That was before the ‘soccers’ took over kicking,” Cothren said. “I had all the records simply because I was the only regular field-goal kicker.”

He may have never played a single snap for the Saints, but he will forever be the first Saint.

47 years ago today, the first New Orleans Saint was signed

"A Veteran is someone who, at one point in his life, wrote a blank check made payable to "The United States of America" for an amount of "up to and including my life."