The Saints Are Officially Back (For The Next 6 Days)

Ah, the ultimate Catch-22 of facing Cam Newton. On one hand, he'll forever be considered an MVP caliber quarterback (due to that one time he won MVP) so you want to consider it a good sign of things to come when you make him look like a bum while holding him to just over a 150 yards through the air and turning him over three different times. On the other hand, he's still an overrated, wildly inconsistent passer who played the vast majority of the game without his top two weapons in the passing game so it doesn't exactly undue the damage that was done by the Patriots a week earlier.

The instinctual plays made on the ball that resulted in all three interceptions make me want to believe that this particular defense does have more talent and cohesiveness than those that came before it, but I'll keep my optimism cautious until I see at least one more repeat performance. The ways in which Sam goddamn Bradford and Tom Brady defiled the Saints' secondary won't soon be forgotten - especially since they so closely resembled the nightmare that has been reoccurring since 2014 - so they are going to have to do a wee bit more than slap around Scam to regain the trust that they managed to lose faster than their first two games. Kenny Vaccaro looked like his benching lit a fuse under his ass, Ken Crawley proved - at the very least - it was a mistake to have him standing on the sidelines, and P.J. Williams finally followed through on years of unfulfilled promise by making a game changing play. Now, if they can repeat that while someone more accurate than Cam Newton is throwing the football then we'll really have something to get excited about. 

The offense, on the other hand, was a welcomed improvement. Surely their versatility had more than a little to do with the fact that they weren't one punt away from being down three scores at any given time, but they still seemed to develop a rhyme and reason that wasn't there in previous weeks. Hopefully the return of Willie Snead will only to stand to increase their effectiveness and give Michael Thomas a long overdue break from the bracket coverage he's almost exclusively been facing. The running game finally produced some big plays, and Drew Brees looked like Drew Brees we've come to know instead of the beleaguered veteran that was resigned to marching helplessly off the field for the umpteenth time after being let down by his teammates. As if it were a question. the offense shouldn't be as much of a question going forward.

Hypothetically speaking, this should all bode well for a team that looks to be returning their #2 wide receiver and their stud of a rookie corner against a team that's coming off a decisive loss to a roster that was built to lose. However, letting a Dolphins team that hit rock bottom get back up off the mat would be par for the course for the Saints as of late. For that reason, I'll stay level headed. The funeral for Sean Payton's tenure has been temporarily put on hold, but - for now - we'll continue to let the parlor hold onto the deposit. 

The win felt good, and Cam Jordan's postgame zingers served as quite the cherry on top, but - until further notice - there's not too much to take away from it other than a much needed victory...

Saints DE Cam Jordan on Cam Newton: "Clearly he’s trying to be more of a pocket passer, and I’m OK with it -- perfectly fine with it."

— Josh Katzenstein (@jkatzenstein) September 24, 2017

Cam Jordan joked about Cam Newton's "Coachella onesie" after Saints' win. When told it's a RompHim, Jordan said, "Man, we romped him."

— Josh Katzenstein (@jkatzenstein) September 24, 2017