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Some people are fans of the New Orleans Saints. But many, many more people are NOT fans of the New Orleans Saints. This 2018 Deadspin NFL team preview is for those in the latter group. Read all the previews so far here.



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Your team: Pass is… CAUGHT! DIGGS! SIDELINE! TOUCHDOWN!!!! UNBELIEVABLE!!!!!!!!

Trot Into Summer With a Fresh New Pair of Running Shoes Read on The Inventory


Your 2017 record: LOL who gives a shit, hit me with that play again…


Again!


AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN AGAIN!

What a moment. Doesn’t it make you feel GOOD inside? I feel like life is worth living again. That this happened against one of the NFL’s most obnoxious fanbases only makes it sweeter. I no longer have to taunt you losers with hackneyed gumbo jokes. From now on, Stefon Diggs is all I’ll ever need. Oh! And show me the part where they drag the poor Saints out from the locker room for the PAT.

They actually had to change the rules this offseason to prevent a cursory PAT like that from ever happening again. And do you know why they changed it? Because the Saints are fucking BABIES. Speaking of babies…




Your coach: Sean Payton, who talks trash like a second-rate nickel back and coaches like one too. Here’s Sean sealing his own doom just before Stefon Diggs smashed his idiot team to pieces.


And here’s Sean feuding with Dirk Koetter, for some reason. And here he is pulling a Reggie Miller on Devonta Freeman. This man coaches every game like he’s full of overpriced wine, and that’s because he probably is.



Payton has had one foot out the door (DIGGS) and his bags packed for Dallas for roughly five years now, but then he stumbled upon one of the greatest draft classes the league has ever seen, (SIDELINE) and so he gets to spend at least five more seasons slurping down crawdads and designing plays in flophouses and using the Cowboys as leverage any time (TOUCHDOWN) he needs extra money to impress a new girlfriend. Join us later in the season (UNBELIEVABLE) when he challenges Cam Newton to an arm-wrestling match at midfield.




Your quarterback: Drew Brees, who spends every waking hour wishing he was a troop. There was a split second this offseason when it looked like Brees might entertain the idea of playing elsewhere, but no. (DIGGS) No, he resigned for two more years of hucking pyramid schemes and dad jeans to you, the discerning Louisianan. (SIDELINE) He knows fertile territory for suckers when he sees it.



This man is a surefire Hall of Famer whose command of the two-minute drill is, in my opinion, the best of any quarterback in history (except when he’s playing Atlanta). (TOUCHDOWN) But ultimately none of his heroics will end up mattering to New Orleans because the starting safety doesn’t know when to look the fuck up. (UNBELIEVABLE)


What’s new that sucks: Your owner died! Normally it’s a happy occasion (DIGGS) anytime your local NFL concern finally (SIDELINE) slips out of the hands of a nonagenarian tightwad. Unfortunately for all you (TOUCHDOWN) po’boy-humping banjo pluckers in Saints Nation, the disbursement of (UNBELIEVABLE) Benson’s estate has resulted in an episode of Creole Dynasty. The Saints are currently under the control of third wife and stepmother-who-locked-you-in-a-tower Gayle Benson, but by the time all the lawsuits are settled, they’re probably gonna be owned by a swamp-brained 12th nephew who will make Woody Johnson look like Andrew fucking Carnegie.


On the field, this team is still incredibly fucking stacked and barely had to make any moves to help build upon a roster that went 11-5 last season, only to watch everything come gloriously apart with on the final play. Hey Alvin Kamara, what’dya think of that play? YOU KNOW THE ONE.

“It’s a certain point where you fucking just do everything could do, and shit still don’t go your way. That’s how I felt about that game. I felt like we did everything. We came all the way back, and then shit just happened like that. That’s like some one-in-a-million-type shit.“I couldn’t even be mad. I was mad, of course, but it was like how does that even fucking happen? That’s not even real. It’s almost not realistic, like what the fuck?... So, yeah, fuck Minnesota.”


Good man. That’s the absolute correct reaction.

Where was I? Oh right … the team. Well, they brought in ambulatory horrorshow Tom Savage to back up Brees, and they traded away next year’s first rounder to move up in the draft and take Marcus Davenport out of UT-San Antonio. I fail to see how a beefy D-lineman will help this tackle better downfield in late-game situations, but that’s just me. You’re not striking draft gold twice, people.


By the way, I am deeply enjoying every preseason fluff piece about how Marcus Williams is supremely motivated by what happened to him in Minnesota. (DIGGS) You think I don’t know what the Saints are trying to do? (SIDELINE) They’re trying to will the yips out of this man and try to make everyone move on from how badly he whiffed in that game. (TOUCHDOWN) Well I am a truly obnoxious shit-for-brains, and I am NEVER gonna let him forget it. (UNBELIEVABLE) NEVER!

He was also more mature than his 17 years. “There wasn’t anything we had to fix,” Whittingham remembers. Williams refused to cuss and could be heard at practice saying, “What the duck?” (He quickly earned the nickname “Duck Boy.”) When he was introduced to a blitz called “Ass Kill Zero” he called it “Butt Kill Zero.”


Yeah no, I’m not trusting Duck Boy to do jack shit. Oh wait, I’m sorry. I meant jack Shirley Temples. DIGGS FRIED YOUR ASS LIKE OKRA, QUACKERMAN.

What has always sucked: The Saints may have finally lifted themselves back out of mediocrity last season, but that was sheer luck and you and I both know it. In all other instances, this team is still a thoroughly ramshackle operation fueled mostly on boner pills and cheap pirate rum. (DIGGS) This team fired a cheerleader for posting a photo of herself in a swimsuit on Instagram, because you are apparently not allowed to show off your body to the world unless the Saints are making money off of it. (SIDELINE) Team cheerleaders also have to leave a restaurant if a Saints player walks in. (TOUCHDOWN) Being that this is Louisiana, I assume they also have to drink water from designated, separate water fountains. (UNBELIEVABLE) WE’RE JUST COUNTRY DOWN HERE Y’ALL!!!


As for these fans … this collection of slurring diapers you people calls fans… they are river muck. They will gladly raise Cain if any Saints player dares to take a knee for the anthem, but they will fucking cheer the second any corporation moves in to dump 50,000 metric tons of used cadmium into the Mississippi Delta. Take a good look at Louisiana, America, because its patented brand of grifting is now the governing model for the entire U.S of A. Pretty soon all our parks will be turned into refineries, all out beaches will turn to pure tar, all our jails will be de facto concentration camps, and all our rivers will be choked with pill bottles and human waste. NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL A REAL GUMBO!

Diggs. Sideline. Touchdown. Unbelievable. Forever. Suck a dick.

What might not suck: Alvin Kamara is such an absolute god that I drafted him as my fantasy team’s LEAD BACK. That’s right, Alvin. I’m entrusting my team to YOU. Not every player gets that privilege. For many, it’s the ultimate honor. I hope you understand the expectations that come with such an exalted position. Don’t let me down.


Let’s remember a guy who sucked: Brees could play here 20 more seasons and the Saints will still always be, at least to me, the team of Billy Joes Hobert and Tolliver. Once upon a time, this team was hellbent on starting any quarterback who had a name like a race car driver. I miss those days, mostly because it helped shut you people up.

HEAR IT FROM SAINTS FANS!

John:



Fuck.

Mike:



Fuck you, Drew.

Jen:

Asshole.

Alex:

Fuck the Vikings, fuck the Minnesota Miracle, and fuck your stupid fucking shirt.


Patrick:

It’s over...3rd and 10...4th quarter...10 seconds on the clock. It’s over. It should be over. It’s probably over. Ball snapped, 9 seconds, 8 seconds, Rankins is so close, 7 seconds, ball is in the air, 6 seconds, 5 seconds, time slows down. Williams is there, it’s over. Time stops. Time starts. 4 seconds, Diggs stumbles...he doesn’t fall, 3 seconds, I fall, 2 seconds, 1 second, it’s over.


Evan:

Me, sometime between 1 and 3 p.m. CST, Jan. 14, 2018: “I really won’t be mad about whatever happens today as long as we don’t lose in like, the most agonizing way possible.”


Becky:

Some of our dipshit fans think Williams was paid off to blow that tackle in the divisional game. How dumb of a fan base do you have to be to think a rookie corner would intentionally sabotage his team’s chances at a Super Bowl?


John:

I’ve seen that Facebook map. They are the most popular team in Alabama. I can’t think of a more damning statement than that.


Bill:

In the last four seasons we went 7-9 three times and 11-5 once. I’m not a math wiz so you tell me which one of those is an outlier.


Justin:

Marcus Williams missed Stefon Diggs and nailed me right in the nuts. I still feel this pain at least once a week. A guy (you) who puts his registration sticker on his front license plate didn’t deserve that win as a fan. That colossal fuck zone of a play helped me take my mind off of Sean Payton calling three straight swing passes to RBs seven games a year. Saints suck.


Colin:

My dad took me to my first Saints game when I was 9 years old. The expansion Browns came into the Superdome on Halloween 1999 with an 0-7 record. The Saints ended up losing when Tim Couch completed a 56-yard tip drill Hail Mary as time expired. That was my introduction to this dog shit franchise. Three of our last four playoff losses all have fucking nicknames.

Ben:

Our new owner’s business experience is a thirteen-year career swindling uptown women through her interior design business. She was sued 18 times and even arrested. I can’t imagine a more perfect résumé for an NFL owner: make someone else pay for the home and watch the gravy train of cash roll in.


Jabari:

We traded away next year’s 1st round pick for a project DE. Can’t wait for that to bite the front office in the ass when Brees v2 is taken in the mid-to-late 20s in the upcoming draft.


Jeff:

If the Saints win two games to start the season, every trust fund Bard graduate who moved to here to teach us balding locals the meaning and magic of New Orleans will become Saints Superiest Fans. Both the guys and gals will buy up the entire stock of gold sparkly hot pants from Beauty Plus, leaving the local prostitutes, whom they claim to morally support, out to dry. We are a stupid team in a stupid sport with a fanbase of racist suburban fans and owned by the last woman standing in a real life game of Billionaire Survivor played by the family of a man who tried to move the team out of our city and into Texas after the storm. We have to pass a ridiculous self-congratulatory statue of Tom Benson that he erected of himself in front of the Dome in order to get inside for each game. I flip it off before every game that I’m sober enough to remember. There’s nothing magical about the Saints. Like most of the city, it’s an illusion, money driven and racist and we are just the yahoos who are eye candy for the next wave of suckers brought in. And that’s fine. If they can embrace that and not think anything means anything deeper, you’ll maybe survive.


Jonathan:

The end of that playoff game was a gut punch worse than anything I’d ever experienced in my many years of sports fandom. About 10 minutes after it happened, I realized that when this WYTS comes out, I would be forced to relive this so-called ‘miracle’ all over again come August, and now, sadly, that day is here. Also – my friend and I lit our cigars with a white lighter at the two minute warning of the second half and my dumb ass asked him if that was unlucky, and his dumbass replied, “Nah we got this.” Fuck cursed lighters for ruining our season and fuck Roger Goodell just cause.


George:

The deification of Tom Benson. Fuck that: The Saints have to pay overtime wages to the former personal assistant of late owner Tom Benson, according to an NFL arbitrator who this week ordered the team to cough up nearly $400,000. The arbitrator ordered the Saints to pay $100,000 in overtime to the ex-aide, Rodney Henry, as well as a fee of about $105,000 that Henry’s contract guaranteed him if he was dismissed by someone other than Benson. Arbitrator Harold Henderson had previously rejected Henry’s claims that he had been fired from his post in retaliation for, among other things, complaining to a superior that Benson’s wife, Gayle, had made racially derogatory comments about him while he was working. We’re dealing with an ownership that is about one-tenth of a degree better than Jerry Richardson. Fuck Sean Payton, and fuck Mike Ditka until New Orleans finally falls into the Gulf.


Jessica:

Of course the only decent defense we have had in a decade would still find a spectacular way to once again waste Drew Brees’ talents and end up on the wrong side of the highlight reel for the next 11,000 Sunday Night Football montages. The thing of it is, having already been punched in the gut by Beast Quake, Vernon Davis’ goal-line catch, and let’s go ahead and throw in John Carney’s missed extra point in Jacksonville while we’re at it, I just felt numb when this one happened. I imagine it’s like dying in a blizzard where the elements are so relentless that you’ve long forgotten what cold feels like and have no fresh nerve endings left to give. You can relate as a Vikings fan, right?


David:

Every single Saints fan on the planet knew the Vikings were going to drive down the field and kick a field goal to win. The Saints, however, knew that wouldn’t be memorable enough, so they shit the sheets so bad we’ll have to suffer through watching flat-earth truther Stefon Diggs run that horse shit touchdown in at least a couple thousand times a season until the planet is annihilated by the sun expanding to a size larger than Mark Mangino’s waistline. You know what really sucks about being a Saints fan? All the fucking highlights other teams have against the Saints that will never stop being shown. The missed XP vs JAX, the Marshawn Lynch run, the Vern Davis TD, now this bullshit Diggs TD. I’d almost give up the Saints’ one Super Bowl victory to Thanos snap all of those lo lights out of existence. You know what’s also REALLY obnoxious? Having two of your best friends be Vikings fans and immediately start talking shit. Fuck the Vikings, fuck Goodell, fuck this team for whiffing out on two Super Bowl appearances they could have had last year and 2011, fuck this team for wasting the career of the statistically best QB of all time, and fuck me for supporting this franchise. And fuck you Drew, gumbo is delicious.

Brett:

The Saints suck because certain current and former local officials have been engaged in a war on strip clubs in a mind-bogglingly stupid attempt to turn the French Quarter into some horseshit “family friendly” local version of Times Square/Disneyland. I mean, what the hell is New Orleans — which Ignatius J. Reilly accurately and lovingly described as the “flagrant vice capital of the civilized world” in A Confederacy of Dunces — if it doesn’t have strippers? Hell, freaking Omaha has strip clubs! People have been coming to New Orleans literally for centuries to eat themselves silly, get drunk, and get laid and now suddenly we want to pivot and cater to families? Fuck families! Let them go to Orlando or Atlanta or St. Louis or some other homogenized American hellscape laden with Olive Gardens and shopping malls. If New Orleans doesn’t have strippers, it doesn’t deserve anything, much less an NFL football team.


Kyle:

For the first time in my collegiate years, all four of my roommates (a Steelers fan, a newfound Rams fan, a Patriots fan, and me, the resident Saints fan) had our NFL teams in the playoffs. With a battered Minnesota Vikings team looming, I told my roommates that I thought the Saints would win the NFC, and possibly the Super Bowl. Naturally, the battered, backup-led Vikings team I underestimated goes up 17-0, which makes me finish a few vodka lemonades earlier than I anticipated. I give up at halftime and stagger over to my apartment complex’s hot tub, where I sigh dejectedly for a few minutes. Curiosity gets the best of me and I check my phone, only to see several score updates. This stupid fucking team got my hopes up. I hurry back to my apartment just in time to see the last three minutes of the fourth quarter. Then the Diggs catch happened, and I tore my shirt in two. I have never done this before. Sadly, my roommates witnessed my drunken frustration and they didn’t talk to me for the rest of the weekend.


Submissions for the 2018 Deadspin NFL previews are now closed. Next up: Pittsburgh Steelers.

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