Despite What They Say, Saints Want It All

ATLANTA -- It was a lie from the start. Yes, the New Orleans Saints are obsessed with trying to go undefeated. No, they won't say it, because they can't say it.

None of that matters, though. The truth is everywhere.

And the truth? The Saints wish to win every game in 2009. After that, they plan to continue their streak through February 7 of next year -- you know, in Miami , where the NFL will play its final game of the season.

Even so, the Saints kept perpetuating their lie last week, and that was despite Robert Meachem becoming the latest New Orleans player to show that this is one of those teams of destiny. The No. 3 wide receiver turned a Washington Redskins interception into a Saints touchdown with a miracle you really had to see to believe.

Actually, you can go back two games ago when the Saints nearly smacked the arrogance out of Bill Belichick and his New England Patriots.

Come to think of it, you knew the Saints were fibbing with their "We're only taking one game at a time" mantra long before that. How about when they roared past the New York Giants by 21 points for a 5-0 record? Well, I'm guessing the Saints' lie began even before that. Try after the Saints hinted of greatness to come for Drew Brees and others involved with a brilliant offense when they shredded a good Philadelphia Eagles team on the road by 26 points. The Saints were just 2-0 at the time.

Whatever the case, the Saints' lie was exposed for good on Sunday outside of the visitors' locker room at the Georgia Dome. That's where somebody asked Saints head coach Sean Payton the inevitable after his team reached 13-0 with a 26-23 victory over the Atlanta Falcons, their always pesky rivals in the NFC South.

So, um, coach -- with three games left (the Cowboys and Buccaneers at home, and a trip to Carolina ), are you thinking 16-0?

Seconds into that old mantra ("I honestly, we, uh . . . "), Payton was interrupted by a loud voice approaching in the background.

"YEEEEHAAAAAA!"

This wasn't just any screamer dressed in a black suit, white shirt and Saints tie. This was Tom Benson, who happens to be the Saints' owner. He spent the postgame challenging the NFL record for smiling without stopping, swinging his hands in the air and slapping players on the back. He looked like a guy who thought the franchise that has been famously brutal since he purchased it in 1985 was finally living a charmed life.

"Destiny is what you make of it. ... There's no magical force field around us that says, 'Hey, you're going to win all your games.' "
-- Saints cornerback Randall GayIn other words, as much as Saints cornerback Randall Gay tried to make it sound as if this wasn't a team with a bunch of players who thought they were special along the way to football's Never Never Land, nobody who knows the difference between a wicked witch and fairy godmother was buying his shrugging.

"There's no destiny here," Gay said, also shaking his head, even though the Saints just won another game despite a bunch of obstacles.

They won despite blowing a 23-9 third-quarter lead to a Falcons team missing gifted players at quarterback (Matt Ryan) and running back (Michael Turner), along with starters on the offensive line (Harvey Dahl) and at cornerback (Chris Houston). They won despite the Falcons gaining 392 yards in total offense to their 391. They won despite Payton losing his mind in the red zone inside the final three minutes by going for a fake field goal instead of kicking the thing to go ahead 29-23.

The fake field goal didn't work.

And just like that, the Falcons were only a field goal away from forcing overtime, instead of a touchdown away from trying to win against the mighty Saints with their shaky backup quarterback (Chris Redman).

"You do something like that [going for a fake] when you have confidence in your defense," Payton said. "We were up three, and my thought was, 'We can go up 10 here.' Certainly, you risk not getting the three points and going up a full score, but nonetheless, we felt pretty comfortable with the look we were getting, and they stopped it. But it's good that the defense helped bail me out."

No surprise there. I mean, who would expect anything less for a charmed team?

One play. That's all it took to show that the Saints hadn't lost their pixie dust along the way from Louisiana to Atlanta. With 1:18 left to play in the game, and with the Falcons sitting at the New Orleans 46, facing fourth-and-2, Redman threw a pass on a follow route to Jason Snelling. One yard later, Snelling was splattered on the artificial surface by Jonathan Vilma, the Saints' middle linebacker and team captain.

Vilma also killed a potential rally on the Falcons' previous possession with an interception.
Then there was the Saints' offense, with Brees continuing to be Brees, which is to say he was outstanding. He finished with a passer rating of 122.5, completing 31 of 40 passes for 296 yards and three touchdowns. There even was the hint of a coming-out party for Reggie Bush, an afterthought in his fourth NFL season. He caught two of Brees' touchdown passes, and most of his six carries for 33 yards were clutch.

Sounds charmed to me.

Then again, Gay had a point about this destiny thing.

"Destiny is what you make of it, because if there really is destiny, there is no need for us to practice this week," said Gay, 27, who played in two Super Bowls with the Patriots before joining the Saints before the 2008 season. "We could just say that we're just going to go out there [next Saturday] and blow out Dallas. You know that's not going to happen.

"Destiny is what you make of it. If we go out there and work hard, practice hard and play like we know we can play, we make our own destiny. There is no magical force field around us that says, 'Hey, you're going to win all of your games.' "

Maybe. Maybe not.