Super Bowl Capsules: Saints-Colts a Super matchup
MIAMI — Peyton Manning, the Big Easy.
Hardly a stretch for a nickname, you know. The NFL’s dominant player can claim New Orleans heritage, after all. At 6-foot-5, 230 pounds, he’s no shrimp. And as the only four-time league MVP, he makes this quarterbacking thing look simple.
Yet when Manning leads his Indianapolis Colts onto the field next Sunday against the Saints in as juicy a Super Bowl matchup as anyone could imagine, all of Nawlins — heck, pretty much any place in Bayou Country — will be wishing the worst on a native son.
Sorry, Peyton, the Saints take precedence in their quest for a first NFL championship.
Manning, whose father Archie was the first Saints superstar, understands.
"It’s certainly an exciting opportunity for our team to be going back to the Super Bowl down in Miami, and I’m very happy for the New Orleans Saints and, of course, the entire city of New Orleans," Peyton Manning says. "My parents live there, my older brother Cooper lives there. Eli and I have both participated in philanthropic organizations down in New Orleans, whether it’s Katrina relief or just various charities. So New Orleans is a huge part of my life, as well as Eli’s life. My dad’s been a part of the Saints organization for 39 years in some ways. We definitely have strong ties.
"The Saints have had a great year. They deserve it, and I know the city is excited. And the New Orleans Saints players do just wonderful things for the community down there. It’s been a great relationship between the players and fans, and what a great way for these players to reward them with a trip to the Super Bowl."
But it’s Manning’s job to spoil the party, to put some misery into the Miami Mardi Gras for those Saints and their fans. Nobody is better equipped to do so.
Manning once was criticized for failing to win big games, and his career playoff record is just 9-8. He’s won six of the last eight, though, and led the Colts to the championship three years ago, in the rain in Miami. Indy is 16-2 this time around, and it might have been a perfect 18-0 if the Colts hadn’t pulled Manning and other starters in the final two games of the regular season.
Manning set an NFL record for 300-yard playoff games with his seventh in last week’s AFC championship win over the Jets. He has 22 TD passes, five this year, and averages 284 yards through the air in the postseason.
Against two of the league’s stingiest defenses — Indy beat the Ravens before the Jets — Manning was masterful.
The Saints (15-3) aren’t exactly the 1985 Bears. On defense, they’re not even the 2009 Colts.
Still, Manning is cautious.
"You know a team is going to have a Super Bowl package," he says. "There are two weeks to prepare. That’s more things they can change. You have to prepare for the unexpected."
The unexpected? Such as the Aints in the Super Bowl?
Let that one roll around your mind like the good times on Bourbon Street.
The Saints were one of five teams never to get this far; the Lions, Jaguars, Browns and Texans are the remaining outsiders. Clearly, now, the Aints are dead, and a franchise that had no home in 2005 after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans has become one of the most successful clubs in the nation’s most popular sport.
And while Indy has become as much a football town as a basketball haven thanks to Manning and his minions, it’s difficult to find any city as infatuated with — or as dependent on — its team as Nawlins is now.
Times have been hard for the city, which still is in recovery mode from Katrina. Nothing has provided quite the boost that the Saints’ ascendancy has given New Orleanians.
Indeed, a city steeped in a culture all its own shares a very fundamental trait with the rest of America: pride in local triumph. It’s not something Saints fans are accustomed to, but it’s something Drew Brees believes can become habit.
"Winning definitely can be contagious," he says.
The best way to establish such a habit: win next Sunday in the biggest game in New Orleans football history.
"It’s a moment I’ve been waiting for for a long time," Brees said. "The job is not done yet but obviously we’re going to enjoy this. Now we’ve got to finish it in Miami."
Can they? If history is an indicator, why not? After all, the Buccaneers had an even uglier resume and they won it all seven years ago, beating one of the premier franchises, the Raiders.
We know the Saints will attack on offense, and getting in a shootout with the Colts is not such a bad idea; New Orleans led the league with 510 points. The Saints, who forced 39 turnovers, must be proactive on defense to match the aggressiveness with which the Colts have performed recently — just as Indy did in its Super Bowl run after the 2006 season.
If Manning gets free rein, he’s likely to have the answer for all those "Who Dats?" they’re proudly screaming in the French Quarter.
It might even be a Big Easy for him.
Colts vs. Saints: the key matchups
Matchups for the Super Bowl between the Indianapolis Colts and New Orleans Saints in Miami:
When the Colts have the ball
The Saints’ chore on defense is obvious yet very complicated — stop Peyton Manning (18).
Manning has been marvelous again this season, winning an unprecedented fourth MVP award, then making the key completions in playoff victories over the Ravens and Jets. Indeed, he found weaknesses in two of the league’s stingiest defenses, completing 67.5 percent of his throws for 623 yards, five touchdowns and one interception. His 104.6 rating is far higher than he managed in leading the Colts to the 2007 Super Bowl.
New Orleans must find a pass rush, and DE Will Smith was second in the NFC with 13 sacks. But the Saints have only one in the playoffs, even though they regularly hit Brett Favre last week. DT Sedrick Ellis (98), DE Bobby McCray (93) and linebackers Jon Vilma (51), Scott Fujita (55) and Scott Shanle (58) need to pressure Manning, or he will use a deep collection of receivers to pick apart the Saints.
Reggie Wayne (87) wasn’t much of a factor in the AFC title game matched up with Darrelle Revis, but the Saints have nobody in Revis’ class. CBs Jabari Greer (32) and Tracy Porter (22) struggled against the Vikings, and against the Cardinals the previous week. If New Orleans native Manning is salivating, it isn’t over Cajun cuisine, but because of the opportunities he envisions for Wayne, his fellow WRs Pierre Garcon (85) and Austin Collie (17) and All-Pro tight end Dallas Clark (44).
Clark versus another All-Pro, safety Darren Sharper (42), will be a juicy matchup. Clark had 100 receptions this season, and Sharper tied for the league lead with nine interceptions, running back three for scores. The ball-hawking Saints forced 39 turnovers.
The Colts will try to run with Joseph Addai (29) and Donald Brown (31) behind a line that was built to protect Manning but is effective enough in the ground game. Center Jeff Saturday (63) and RT Ryan Diem (71) are their premier blockers, but Indy has to win through the air.
When the Saints have the ball
New Orleans scored 510 points to lead the league and has 76 in two playoff games. The Saints have gotten everyone involved, with Drew Brees (9), the NFL’s most accurate passer, throwing for six TDs while not being intercepted. Brees has more mobility than Manning and is effective, even brilliant at times, throwing on the run. When he uses short drops for quick-hitting plays over the middle, Brees can be unstoppable.
So DEs Robert Mathis (98) and All-Pro Dwight Freeney (93) need to get in his face rapidly. If not, Brees will find WRs Marques Colston (12), Devery Henderson (19), Robert Meachem (17), Lance Moore (16) and TEs Jeremy Shockey (88) and David Thomas (85). Shockey has been plagued by right knee problems and Thomas has capably filled in.
Indy will deploy lots of cornerbacks to handle the wideouts, including Kelvin Hayden (26), a hero of the Super Bowl win over the Bears; rookies Jacob Lacey (27) and Jerraud Powers (25), who missed the AFC title game with a left foot problem; and Tim Jennings. What the Colts must avoid is winding up with standout safeties Antoine Bethea (41) or Melvin Bullitt (33) in single coverage on RB Reggie Bush (25).
The dynamic Bush often is a make-or-break proposition for New Orleans, and he’s most dangerous in the passing game. Nose tackle Dan Muir (90), coming off two strong efforts, and active LBs Gary Brackett (58) and Clint Session (55) are the keys to slowing the running attack led by Pierre Thomas (23), Bush and Mike Bell (21).
Special teams
Saints PK Garrett Hartley (5) isn’t likely to face a more stressful kick than the 40-yard field goal he made to lift his team into the Super Bowl. Unless, of course, he’s asked to replicate that feat next Sunday.
Hartley missed the first four games of the season for using a banned stimulant and has benefited from the guidance of veteran John Carney, who stepped aside and became a kicking consultant when Hartley returned.
Indy has the opposite situation in veteran Matt Stover (3), who has replaced the injured Adam Vinatieri (4), the most successful Super Bowl kicker ever.
Stover doesn’t have long range, but is plenty accurate. Tight situations rarely have bothered the 20-year veteran.
Rookie punter Thomas Morstead (6) has been steady for New Orleans and comes off a strong game. Indy rookie Pat McAfee (1) also has performed well. Both can boom deep kickoffs, too.
Bush is the most dangerous returner. He broke free to score on an 83-yard punt runback against Arizona, but his muff against Minnesota nearly cost the Saints the game. Chad Simpson (35) had a 93-yard kickoff return TD during the season.
Indy’s kick coverage teams are superior to New Orleans’.
Coaching
For anyone who argues that Jim Caldwell inherited a championship-caliber team when he replaced Tony Dungy, remember that it took Dungy five seasons in Indy to reach a Super Bowl. Caldwell is the fifth rookie coach to take his team to the title game.
Caldwell learned well from his mentor, and being the hand-chosen successor to Dungy made the transition easier. That doesn’t mean Caldwell didn’t have significant issues to deal with, beginning with the offseason retirements of key assistants Tom Moore, the only offensive coordinator Manning has worked with, and line coach Howard Mudd. Getting them back on staff as "consultants" settled Manning’s mind, and the introduction of newcomers Collie and Brown, plus the development of Garcon, went smoothly thanks to their presence.
Perhaps most important, Caldwell’s approach and demeanor are similar to Dungy’s, meaning the adjustment wasn’t overwhelming.
Sean Payton is the architect of the Saints’ on-field turnaround from stumbling nomads to offensive powerhouse and NFC champions. Brees was his hand-picked quarterback, and together they’ve gotten the Saints to their first two conference title games and, now, the Super Bowl.
Payton’s brilliance at offensive strategies and ability to recognize talent have been critical in New Orleans’ rise. Yes, he got lucky with Colston, a seventh-round draft pick, and undrafted free agents Pierre Thomas and Lance Moore. But he and general manager Mickey Loomis used trades and free agency to bring in such key contributors as Shockey, Vilma, Fujita and Shanle.
Oh yeah, and Brees.
This season, Payton diverted some of his salary to hire defensive coordinator Gregg Williams. While the Saints aren’t exactly staunch without the ball, they are improved, and they have a knack for takeaways.
-- Barry Wilner
Saints euphoria sweeps New Orleans past Katrina
NEW ORLEANS — On his feet, his insides roiling like a butter churn, Percy "PJ" Williams Jr. pulled his leather Saints helmet over his face and closed his eyes.
"Look! Look! Watch this game, baby!" his wife gushed.
"I can’t do it!" PJ blurted, hiding his face. Over and over again he cried: "Please, Lord, let this guy make this field goal ... Please, Lord, let this guy ... Please, Lord ..."
The scene: Jan. 24, Section 302 of the Superdome, row 14, seats 15 and 16. Two die-hard Saints fans. The play: Overtime, and Garrett Hartley readies for a 40-yard field goal to send the Saints on their first trip to the Super Bowl.
Snap. Kick. Victory. Then, the roar.
Everywhere around the city of New Orleans, people cried, or screamed, or both. Nuns danced. Grannies, toddlers, waiters, yogis and jazzmen — all of them donned black and gold. Friends embraced. Shoot, even strangers embraced. Behind PJ, a man and woman wept together.
For a moment, PJ himself was speechless. All he could do was listen to the roar.
It wasn’t the roar of the hurricane he remembered so well, tearing the roof off the Dome. It wasn’t the roar of his neighbors, the people he helped with an M16 rifle slung on his back — the barefoot children crying, elderly slumped in wheelchairs moaning, families sweating in the stadium’s dark, waiting for relief.
On this night, the 33-year-old soldier and Saints season-ticket holder opened his eyes to the roar of a lifetime: The Saints had kicked away the Katrina blues, patched a city’s scars, and put New Orleans in the Super Bowl — touching off the biggest party the Gulf Coast has seen since maybe the end of World War II.
Saints 31, Vikings 28.
At the end of season 43, the football gods had finally smiled on his hapless Saints.
— Few of the 71,276 people at the NFC championship last Sunday night had the same kind of perspective or same raw emotions that PJ did, living from nadir to zenith in New Orleans.
On Aug. 29, 2005, the day Katrina hit, his Louisiana National Guard platoon of MPs was sleeping on the floor of the visitors locker room, almost directly under the season-ticket seats he’d bought a few months prior.
Williams and his men had the mission of manning the biggest, smelliest, weirdest lifeboat ever seen as they watched their hometown, and homes, drown. A few days later, he’d take a flatboat to his childhood home in Hollygrove, float over the fence in the front yard and dock on his porch.
Now, he was hollering: "The Saints are going to the Super Bowl!"
Later, he reflected on it all: "Every time I walk up to the Dome, we walk up through Gate A, I look down, I remember seeing people come up on boat, it brings chills.
"Little children, they didn’t have no shoes, so they tied MRE bags around their feet. We had some people looting and stuff. One guy had 30 brand new tennis shoes. We took them off him and distributed them to people who needed shoes."
Running on two hours of sleep a night, Williams pushed the sick and elderly in wheelchairs out of the Dome to the relative comfort of the nearby basketball arena; on patrols, he walked the Dome 40 times a day ("a good hump") amid the sea of people.
"To see people in such need, people of all walks of life coming, this was their life raft, this was their foothold on life and now, strangely, it’s the same thing, but just in reverse. This is New Orleans’ foothold, right there, this is a way of healing a city by winning," Williams said. "Any other city would have folded. This is the mentality of this city. We have lemons, we’re going to make lemonade."
— Obviously, New Orleans and the Saints didn’t fold in the wake of Katrina.
But at one time it sure felt like they could.
When you ask Bob Remy, the unofficial Saints historian and official statistician, about that 2005 season interrupted by Katrina, he strangely draws a blank.
A man who’s filed away just about every Saints newspaper article, team guide, stat and ticket or press pass since the first game at Tulane Stadium in 1967 has a hard time recalling what happened when the Saints went homeless.
"It’s all a blur," Remy said, poring over the meticulous, day-by-day calendar he keeps of Saints seasons, and his own affairs.
He laughed. "Look, I ordered a washer, dryer and refrigerator on the day of the Giants game." That was the team’s first "home" game after Katrina on Sept. 19. With the Dome torn up and waterlogged, it was transferred to the Meadowlands.
It was also the day Remy missed his first home game — ever. His sports memorabilia-packed suburban home was flooded with about a foot of water and he had to rebuild.
That 2005 regular season started with him in a hotel in Jackson, Miss., on Sept. 11. He walked down to the hotel lobby. The game, Saints at Panthers, wasn’t even on the TV. He headed to another hotel.
"There I was, sitting in the lobby by myself, watching the game. Never forget that," Remy said, a tear struggling at the edge of his eye.
At 72, Remy can say he has seen just about everything there’s been to see in Saints history. With his horn-rimmed glasses, he was there in the first line of men in trench coats, ties and flattop haircuts that stretched down the block, on March 6, 1967, to buy the first Saints season tickets. He was third in line.
Much of the nearly 43 years since hasn’t been pretty.
It took the Saints two decades just to get their first winning season, and it wasn’t until 2000 when they won their first playoff game. The Saints were so bad fans wore paper bags over their heads in 1980 and called them the "Aints."
Fans grumbled, and, it being New Orleans, people talked about a "curse." Maybe, they said, it was because the Dome was built close to, some say atop, the former Girod Street cemetery.
Against that dismal background, the 2005 season was the team’s lowest point, Remy said.
The team was relocated to San Antonio. It lived out of hotels and did weight training at Gold’s Gyms. They went 3-13 and for a while practiced at a high school. San Antonio’s mayor said he’d set up talks with team owner Tom Benson about moving the club to Texas. The future of the Dome was in doubt.
It got so bad, Benson swatted at a television camera at the Saints’ first game back in Louisiana on Oct. 30 at Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge. Then, he issued a statement saying he wasn’t going to games in Baton Rouge because he feared for his life. Rock bottom.
By the start of the 2006 season, though, the stars had begun to align.
The Dome was fixed up. Coach Sean Payton and quarterback Drew Brees had been brought in. Heisman Trophy winner Reggie Bush was obtained by a stroke of good fortune in the draft and the Saints sold out their season tickets.
That year, they got to the NFC championship, and lost.
— Standing in his back yard under a blue sky, Remy explained the euphoria.
"When we were going through the poor years, it’s a beautiful day like this, and it’s in the third quarter, and they’re losing 35-3, half the people are gone, the other people are drunk in the stands, and I got two small children at home, my wife’s at the park with them. You get my picture? And you say, ‘Why am I here?’ We had so many of those Sundays.
"You say to yourself, ‘Let’s make our way through this.’ And of course, it all does (pay off) on Sunday night."
Ever the keeper of Saints history, Remy, tipsy on beer like everyone else, and his stats crew went down to the field after the game. He kneeled at the 30-yard line, pointed down at the hash mark where Hartley planted his foot. Snap. He’ll frame that photo.
New Orleans is changed. Stunned. In the throes of love and hope.
At the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club, Kenny "Kool Breez" Battiste, a deejay by profession, shakes his head. "It’s like they said: We’d never have a black president, we’d never make it to the Super Bowl. Now, we got a black president and we’re going to the Super Bowl!"
At the Impressive Hair Design, a neighborhood barber shop, old friends met up for the first time since the game and hollered Tuesday morning.
"Who Dat nation!" ... "Black and gold to the Super Bowl!"
"The violence is going to stop!" Fabian Pace shouted. "No love. But the love is coming back. We need this win. We need this sense of hope. Just when we thought there was no daylight. It’s not a black and white city. It’s a black and gold city!"
Farther along on the street, Beverly Netter, a retired hospital worker, said she’d frame her Times-Picayune newspaper from the day after "the kick."
"We kick butts!" the elderly woman said, grinning.
"Who Dat! Who Dat!" Catherine Tate, her friend, said. The Saints, Tate hoped, would inspire the young, the "lost generation," in her words. She was thinking about her 17-year-old grandson shot down and killed: "He loved sports."
In the French Quarter, Ray and Karen Baker waved from their balcony, where a banner reads: "Announcing: Hell freezing over," a reference to the late Saints sportscaster Bernard "Buddy D." Diliberto, a legend in these parts. He said the Saints would make it to the Super Bowl when hell froze over. He was the first to wear a bag over his head.
Karen, 66 and ardently religious, said: "I believe he (Drew Brees) has been empowered by God to lead us out of the wilderness. I really do."
Out at Musicians’ Village in the 9th Ward, where rows of homes were built after Katrina for displaced musicians, one with the help of Brees and students from his old fraternity house at Purdue University, trumpeter Shamarr Allen played his instrument, adorned with a fleur-de-lis and Brees’ signature.
"Forty-plus years, it’s time. It was written for it to happen," Allen said.
"If you take a look back and remember that the Saints had to play in Mississippi (a preseason game in 2006) and practice in a school yard," he said, searching for the moral of the story, "it’s one of those things that make you realize, man, look how far they came in a short period of time. My situation is bad, but it can always get better."
-- Cain Burdeau
Kicking or coaching, Carney pleased to be with Saints
METAIRIE, La. — Perhaps an NFL club will give John Carney a chance to kick field goals again next season, when he’ll be 46.
Morten Andersen lasted that long, as Carney pointed out when he re-signed with the New Orleans Saints in August.
For now, though, Carney will have to make the best of his second Super Bowl in a coaching role. Officially, he’s the Saints’ kicking consultant, and he can live with that.
"In whatever position or role they’ve asked to fill right now, I feel very excited," Carney said. "I’m blessed to be a part of it."
When Carney re-signed with New Orleans during training camp, there was no guarantee he’d remain with the club for more than four games.
He was brought in because 23-year-old kicker Garrett Hartley was given a four-game suspension for using a banned stimulant. Hartley said he used Adderall to stay awake during a long drive from Dallas to New Orleans in the offseason, not realizing that the prescription drug was on the NFL’s banned substances list.
Although Saints coach Sean Payton wasn’t pleased, Hartley’s roster spot was safe. He’d solidified his status as New Orleans’ kicker by making all 13 of his kicks and displaying a powerful leg after being signed midway through the 2008 season.
As for Carney, Payton had no concrete plans regarding how long to keep him.
"Initially, and I’ll be honest, it was signing John because of the looming suspension with Garrett and let’s see how he does," Payton said after Saturday’s practice.
There were reasons to believe Carney might stick around a while. A season earlier, the New York Giants brought him in as a fill-in for injured kicker Lawrence Tynes. Carney was so steady the Giants kept him all season and he was selected for the Pro Bowl.
This season, Carney wound up playing 11 games, going 13 of 17 on field goals and hitting two of his three attempts from 40 yards or longer.
Payton said he wouldn’t be surprised to see Carney kick again next season if a team needed him.
"I’m sure he could," Payton said. "(It’s) just a matter of how long he wants to kick for and where he sees his career going. He’s had an amazing run of it though and has had good health and a lot of things that he’s worked hard for.
"We realized how valuable John has been just to a young player, let alone a young kicker," Payton added. "John’s kind of got that calming, steady influence about him and I think he’s good for a lot of us, not just the kickers."
Carney kicked his first NFL field goal in 1988. He went to his only other Super Bowl as San Diego’s kicker during the 1994 season.
This season, even as Carney competed to hold his kicking job as long as he could, he eagerly mentored Hartley and rookie punter Thomas Morstead, who also handled kickoffs.
"He was very gracious and encouraging all the time and just trying to help whenever he could," Morstead said. "I can’t imagine that you see that too often with guys competing, that sort of teamwork. He’s a class act."
Initially, Carney was expected to handle kickoffs during Hartley’s suspension. But when Carney saw how powerful Morstead’s leg was, he brought it to special teams coach Greg McMahon’s attention.
"I just was kicking off on a whim just to show I could do it and (Carney) immediately was like, ‘Coach Mac, look, it’s not even close between us,"’ Morstead recalled.
Carney then offered Morstead tips on how to approach the ball and helped him with technique.
"He just kind of helped polish me a little bit, a lot of just basic stuff that I needed help on," Morstead said.
Even after the Saints gave the kicking job back to Hartley, they kept Carney on the roster as long as they could. Injuries ultimately forced Payton’s hand. He waived Carney to sign players at other positions, but asked the veteran back as a consultant.
In the NFC championship game, Hartley got the glory after drilling a 40-yarder in overtime to lift the Saints over Minnesota and send the club to its first Super Bowl. Later, Carney stood outside the locker room, looking content as he signed an autograph for a fan in a wheelchair and spoke with several nuns who were guests of the club.
"I’m just extremely excited for Garrett and excited for the entire organization and city," Carney said. "It’s been a long time coming and whatever I can contribute to this team this season ... and whatever role they put me in, it’s been exciting and I just feel very fortunate to be a part of this ride."
-- Brett Martel
