It's taken all of two weeks to go from the NFL downtrodden to the NFL darlings -- a 2-0 start with a 91-29 scoring margin will do that for you.
But the ease with which the Saints have won their first two games comes with its own new set of challenges. How do you keep that edge, the chip on the shoulder that players so often talk about, when the noise around your team starts being about how great you are?
“I think we’ve been kicked around a little bit too much to where like we just don’t even care what people think," QB Derek Carr said.
"Right now we’re the greatest thing ever if you ask anybody, and to us it’s like, when we go in there we’ve always believed in each other," Carr continued. "I’ve always believed in that defense. They’ve always believed in our offense … and we’ve communicated that to each other and we grind and we grow together."
Hopefully that's true. When I asked Tyrann Mathieu a similar question ahead of the showdown with the Cowboys, he said the team was in a position where they felt like they had to prove themselves every week, and he was just fine with that. He's been on both sides of that fence, spending multiple seasons within the Chiefs organization and going to back-to-back Super Bowls in 2019 and 2020.
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"I think it’s equally difficult," he said. "Obviously, when you win, everybody wants you, everybody has a target on your back and then it’s like, when you’re losing or you’re capable of winning, people find reasons to dismiss why you won.”
No one is dismissing a 44-19 drubbing of the Cowboys at AT&T Stadium, but there are certainly still skeptics. The Saints were 2-0 last season, though they took a vastly different path to get their with one-score wins over a pair of Titans and Panthers squads that combined to go 8-26 and fire their coaches.
The good vibes continued for the first three quarters of Week 3, but a shoulder injury to QB Derek Carr turned what should've been a confidence-building win into a devastating collapse after leading 17-0 in the 4th quarter. That kicked off a stretch of 7 losses in the next 10 games, along with frequent and loud questioning of the head coach and quarterback. There was some notable in-fighting and as well as external dissatisfaction, even as Carr got healthy later and the offense got humming later in the year. The team went 4-1 to close out the year complete with a 48-17 drubbing of the Falcons to close out the season, but a lot of folks weren't convinced. That was shown in clearly in the analysis of the team, with the Saints appearing almost universally in the bottom 10 of power rankings from most major outlets.
That's turned quickly into praise and a meteoric rise up those same rankings. The Saints are the first team since the Packers in 2020 to score 40-plus points in their first two games of the season, and it's the first time since 2018 that the Saints have scored 40-plus in three consecutive games dating back to last year. Carr's hot start has him leading the NFL in touchdown passes and quarterback rating, and he'll be a legitimate MVP candidate if this type of production continues throughout the year. For the Saints, though, it's about not getting too high or too low and trusting the process.
"It’s a constant game of management," head coach Dennis Allen said. "You know, when things are going bad, you know, there’s a tendency to think the sky is falling and everything is awful, and when things are going well there’s a tendency to kind of think that you can do no wrong and you have to fight both of those."
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As always, though, things can change quickly in the NFL. Just ask the Eagles, a team that was riding high with a 10-1 start last season after a run to the Super Bowl, only to see that turn into a nightmare with losses in 6 of their final 7 games, including a 32-9 drubbing in the first round of the playoffs by the Bucs in Tampa. That Eagles squad has had an equally frustrating start to this season, beating the Packers in Brazil in impressive fashion and appearing to have the game won in Week 2 against the Falcons only for Kirk Cousins to lead a 2-minute drill for a go-ahead score and Jalen Hurts fail to counter in a 22-21 defeat.
Both teams walk into the Caesars Superdome on Sunday with a chance to further their own narrative, or reverse it. However you want to phrase it, don't take the bait, keep working hard and see what happens. That's the only way to find sustained success in the NFL.
"Nobody should be eating any cheese in Week 2 of the season going into Week 3," DA said.
The Eagles and Saints kick off at noon Sunday at the Caesars Superdome. Catch all the action on WWL and Audacy.