Someone's Not So Tough Without Their '12th Man'

Well, well, well, who would have thunk it? Take the tens of thousands of screaming fans who are e amplified by a structural sound stadium designed to make them louder than they actually are and beating the Seahawks doesn't seem like such a tall task. It's weird, everything I heard was that their fans travel as well as their defense. I guess they must have meant that they don't keep each other awake by weeping loudly on the flight over, and it's good thing they don't because their tears ducts would have been empty when it came time to cry about yesterday's officiating. Strange, you hear a lot less about the Seattle faithful flying their "12th man" flags when their oft-utilized "13th man" - the officiating crew - isn't tossing flags in their favor. It's really their own damn fault when you think about it. If only Earl Thomas had thrown in a peck or two while using a referee as a stripper pole then he probably wouldn't have felt so dirty and used afterwards...

​Anyway, were you questioning just how difficult it is to overcome giving up a defensive touchdown in the NFL? Well, you're in luck because I got the answer for you. Actually, in the interest of full disclosure, all I have for you is a modicum of wit and enough experience watching Saints games to be quite familiar with the best ways to lose football games. The real answer lies in the game tape, which shows one team dominating the other in nearly every facet of the game that isn't non-offensive scores. Without exaggeration, the Seahawks ran a dozen plays in the first half. If you walked to the fridge for a beer at the wrong time you could have missed all of their points, yet they still managed to hold a lead at the break. The Saints scored on FIVE straight possessions (granted, far too many were field goals) against one of the best defenses in the league, their beleaguered defense somewhat magically held an opponent to 13 points, and they STILL needed a 6 inch overthrow on the last play of the game to win. If that doesn't speak to how badly an untimely turnover can swing fortunes then I don't know what does. I feel bad for Mark Ingram because it's the first season in which he's lost more than one fumble, but I'll be damned if his benching wasn't necessary considering how hard Tim Hightower has ran in spot duty.

At the end of day, it doesn't really matter whether or not the score reflected the true disparity in play. The Saint won against an opponent that is damn near unbearable to lose to, and they inched ever so closer to respectability in doing so. This team is clicking on all cylinders offensively, finally getting healthy defensively, and has a hardly handicapable 49er's team in the crosshairs. Not to look ahead of any opponent but 4-4 with a realistic shot at winning the division seems like a certainly. Unfortunately, that position is one the Saints seemingly find themselves in annually and the ensuing games generally provide the most depressing results. However, I'll be damned if a win over Seattle isn't enough for me to suppress the thought of impending doom and be blindly optimistic that this team has turned a corner with their shutdown corner on the verge of returning to the lineup.