SaintsBro

Well, remember this -- by all accounts the team looked pretty terrible, practicing in the rain up in Virginia. File that one away for later....

Then again, they looked pretty much unbeatable on the road up in Indy this weekend, in a quiet half empty indoor stadium. They looked scary good.

I am pumped up for this team, but I sincerely hope they can bring the intensity and fire on the road in bad weather and into hostile environments, because they have 4 outdoor games against tough teams in hostile stadiums on the schedule again this year. And they have 6-7 games at home that I'd consider "tough" or at least worrisome, based on the teams they're facing....

That's not much room for futzing around, or for surprises, or Rip Van Winkle acts where they go to sleep and go scoreless for whole quarters or halves of games... there's not much leeway for a "tough day at the office" scenario this year, where the Saints come out flat and shoot themselves in the foot against a really inferior team.

The Saints look good, but I think the rest of the division has actually gotten tighter, and closer together. The eyeball test says that the Saints ON THE ROAD last year were a completely different-looking animal -- they were tight, nervous and struggling hard against the Bucs, Falcs, Panthers, Patriots, and looked completely lost against the Seahawks.

But if the Saints go losing 5 games on the road again THIS year, in this tougher division, with tougher games at home, then I fear they will be outside looking in, maybe even no playoffs AT ALL. There is not a lot of room for dithering this year. Last year they were a good team at home, but on the road they kinda played "we'll fix the problems and get it put together soon", until there wasn't any room left in the season.