NEW ORLEANS – The day after he made the infamous speech that would provide a chilling context to the New Orleans Saints' pay-for-injury scandal, Gregg Williams engaged in a conspicuous display of recklessness that some in the Crescent City still find even harder to forgive.

In the final stages of a rollicking, divisional-round playoff clash between the Saints and San Francisco 49ers which featured more mood swings than a "Keeping Up With the Kardashians" episode, Williams, the Saints' blitz-happy defensive coordinator, refused to sit back and play it safe. Even with the Niners 67 yards from the end zone with 40 seconds remaining, he sent extra pass rushers after quarterback Alex Smith, allowing tight end Vernon Davis to make a pair of indelible catches that catapulted his team to a 36-32 victory.

After the game New Orleans free safety Malcolm Jenkins, burned by Davis in single coverage on the 47-yard reception that set up the tight end's 14-yard game-winner, summed it up succinctly: "We live by the blitz and we die by the blitz."

Suffice it to say that life in the Saints' defensive huddle is much, much different as the 2012 season approaches.

More than two months before he was suspended indefinitely by NFL commissioner Roger Goodell for his role in the scandal, Williams, according to a highly placed Saints source, had been essentially fired by coach Sean Payton, who sought a sharp change in defensive philosophy. In January, Williams' lateral move to the St. Louis Rams was publicly portrayed as his own decision, but the source said Payton had made it clear that the Saints were moving in another direction.

Williams was traveling in Asia and could not be reached for comment. However, a source close to Williams insisted that he had received "offers for contract extensions throughout the 2011 season and up until the San Francisco [playoff] game" and had simply allowed the contract to expire.

[Related: Ex-Saint Steve Gleason corrects HBO on Gregg Williams comment]

At least one New Orleans player believes Payton's decision to replace Williams with recently fired Rams coach Steve Spagnuolo was a move for the better, given the way offenses had adjusted to the Saints' blitz-happy approach.

"Well, yeah, teams knew we were going to be in a blitz 90 percent of the time, and they reacted accordingly," defensive tackle Sedrick Ellis said Friday night following the Saints' 27-24 preseason defeat to the Jacksonville Jaguars at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. "It started to be where everything was three-step drop. I feel like people started to know exactly what was going on."