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So I'm watching the NFL Network show "Playbook," and they are previewing the NFC South. They get to the Saints and have soooo many things to say. Let's see if I can rememeber...

Hosts:
Solomon Wilcots
Mike Mayock
Paul Burmeister
Glen Parker
These are not direct quotes, but they are paraphrasing from the hosts of the show. I was a little surprised that they were as harsh as they were, but I agreed with everything they said. Do you think they have an agenda? Maybe they just see a realistic picture of what the New Orleans Saints have been doing for the past few years.

By the way, they said that the Saints should look at Burnett with the #16 pick. I didn't really agree with that. However, some of the footage they showed of him showed a hard hitter.

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The guys on playbook are Saint haters, they never have anything good to say about them and the only one that ever has S. Sharp is gone.

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I don\'t think they\'re hatin\' on the Saints as much as they\'re wary of them. They don\'t like looking like fools, and when they were on the Bandwagon, the Saints made them look like they were clueless in their picks.The only real consistency the Saints have shown has been the ability to be inconsistent. IMO, some of the players believe they\'re much better than they actually are which explains why they are so erratic...HEAD CASES!!!!!

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How can you argue with anything they said -- its all true -- AB looks brilliant one play like a rookie the next play. We wasted 2 number ones on Sullivan -- looks like a bad move so far -- We are relatively inactive for star caliber players in the offseason preferring to go with players with potential -- our coaching is suspect =- I don\'t see an agenda I see them calling it like I see it -- a team with a tremendous amount of talent that consistently plays below their capabilities

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im just saying it would be nice to hear something positive every now and then. (you know like how they shine sun up the browns, bengals, and alot of other subpar teams butt)

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Is that why Parker proclaimed that Brooks would have an MVP type season last year (he made the prediction before the season began, and did some severe backpeddling midway through the season).

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No i did\'nt know that. I guess thats why he ripped him so bad. Maybe he was just a year off.

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Saints fans....take those GOLD-colored glasses off and face the truth! These guys aren\'t vested Saints fans like us. They are able to see the team more objectively than we ever could. Sure they don\'t follow the team as closely as we do, but most people can see that what those analyst said is 100% true. I don\'t want them to say anything nice about us because they feel obligated to say so.

Now that being said, I do think that Cris Collinsworth on CBS has it in for the Saints.

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There\'s only one way to shut up all the critics... START MAKING BETTER DECISIONS AS AN ORGANIZATION! I hate the way the Falcons are building under Blank& Mora&McKay... We are going to be cellar perennial cellardwellers if we don\'t get better quality scouting,coaching,and management! The first year of Haslett\'s reign in N.O., they were aggressive and dictated to teams they played... Here we come!!!- now they\'re too busy looking for \"the right type of players\"... the hell with that!!!!! Get the best football players you can when you can and coach them to win!!!! We haven\'t been the same team since Zook left!!!!

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Did I write this script? Have they been reading my posts? Seriously, I thought I was reading something I had written. Hammer meet nail.

Hey Billy - what\'s up with the media agenda?

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I\'d agree with most of it, except thisI\'d have to say it starts with coaching way before its laid at the feet of Brooks. Brooks doesn\'t play defense, Brooks doesn\'t jump off-side 5 times a game. Brooks doesn\'t tackle Deuce 5 yards behind the line, Brooks didn\'t implement the 2-TE set. Brooks doesn\'t call the most predictable plays I\'ve ever seen.


While I\'m no fan of Rick Meuller, to his credit he got some good ones too. Deuce, Will Smith, Bentley, Holland, Karney, Watson, Charles Grant, Darren Howard, Bockwoldt.
I think the Sullivan disaster is clouding the picture. We\'re probably as successful as most other teams, but we still have a huge black eye from the Sullivan fiasco.

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Well put Danno.

I agree, what is with this \"bad draft picks\" deal? I certainly agree that the Sullivan pick sucks, but after that WTF? It isn\'t bad enough to warrant such a sweeping statement (at least not over the last few years).

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Well, you have to include second rounders that don\'t play(Henderson, Stinchcomb), Rodney Leisle hasn\'t done anything(5th rounder coulda had Chad Lavalais or Erik Coleman stud SS NY Jets) or bum knee Cie Grant from the 3rd round, Or James Allen 3rd round or Keyou Craver 4th round. But the big onus is on the first day players who don\'t even see the field. Not so sweeping once you look at that. And maybe they heard Haz\' statement about not paying attention to the draft after the 2nd or 3rd round(I forget which he said). That\'s not too bright for a head coach to say.

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And add to the first day picks what they gave up to get Sullivan. And how high they went after Donte(even though I loved it when they got him and it could still turn out well), but he had injury issues in college. I hope that\'s behind him now though after playing a full season.

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is it that we draft the wrong players--or that our enviroment doesn\'t lend itself to them becoming better players?

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Both - but more so the later than the former IMO. That has to do with coaching, as Danno put it, which I totally agree with. I was taking the inconsistency comment to mean performance on the field... in which case it is hard to rival AB. Maybe Riley can.

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I also seen the show. and couldn\'t figure out why i was angry. was it because they was hammering my team or was it because the truth hurts?
As far as Burnett goes, he is a great athlete, but i think he has injury questions.

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burnett does have injury questions-but those are similar to cadillac\'s (one time thing I think--well, knee and shoulder)...

last season he looked great against auburn\'s offense and alabamas (the three games I remember)..

the other thing is he was team captain and is said to have outstanding instincts..also, he plays with a swagger that we could use.(he alos played on one of the best defenses in one of the premier conferences-unlike crowder and thurman...who\'s defenses underachieved).

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Well, to attempt an answer, I think we pretty much generally all agree that New Orleans for whatever reason is not a place where talent grows, is nourished, is developed or can truly prosper, save for exceptions like Joe Horn. Hell even Deuce was overweight last year. We also pretty much agree if a guy has character issues, they won\'t get better here. That being said, I do not think the Saints draft the \"wrong\" guys, I think they drafted certain guys in the wrong spots.

For example, when we picked Donte, I knew we were gonna pick Donte, I knew the Saints wanted him, and I was happy with that. But 13 was too high, and I also knew that. I was hoping they would trade back or such but for whatever reason that didn\'t happen and so they reached for him. Not saying it won\'t in the future, but it hasn\'t paid off yet. And Sully, well, I knew, half of New Orleans knew, even the experts knew they moved up to get Trufant. Had to. No choice. Well, they made the wrong choice for a guy they could have stayed put and taken, and still had another first round pick. Henderson is a good pickup for a team that has time and patience to let a player develop, not here. Stinch could have been had in the 3rd. We can make a long list of the players we could have had. Talent evaluation seems to be sorely lacking here, and not meaning they can\'t judge talent, but they can\'t seem to accurately judge the value of that talent. Will Smith was a good pick, but he was a no brainer. BPA, and all their top players at \"need\" positions were gone and Howard was in a contract year. But then they botch that with Devery when we could have had Dontarrius Thomas at LB or Sean Jones at safety or Madieu Williams who now plays safety for Cincy and is pretty good.

The comments also by Haz that he stops paying attention after the first or second round or 3rd round whatever is also extremely disturbing to me. He basically does not care who is brought in after a certain point and that\'s just not good enough for me. How can you win like that? It\'s one thing to trust the scouts, another totally to be totally oblivious to what they are doing or saying or how they are basing their judgments after a certain point.

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I too was happy about Donte when they took him. I still think (hope) that he will be a good pick.

Charles Grant was a great pick in my opinion, good judge of talent. I often wonder if that is what caused them to take Sullivan and even Stinchcomb. They struck gold with Grant, a lineman from UGA. Some other teams didn\'t have him graded that high. If I\'m correct, that was the last year Randy Mueller was involved in the draft. The next year Haz and co. took two other lineman who were from UGA and not as high on some other team\'s lists. This time they failed by reaching entirely too high to get players that just weren\'t up to snuff.

I still hope these players turn out to be productive for us, but I believe the assessment of Saints talent evaluation and draft choices being questionable is accurate.