At the time of this penning, I’m sitting in a house in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, with 21 other extended family members, 6 dogs and a bird.
A quaint beachside jewel, Bay St. Louis sits just east of New Orleans with great assets — power, water and an adequate supply of gasoline. Sixteen years to the day after Hurricane Katrina, our Hurricane Ida evacuation landing is ironically an area nearly wiped off the map by Katrina.
As they say, every storm is different and Saints head coach Sean Payton can identify with the challenges of unexpected travel. He said he went down for the team breakfast at their Dallas hotel in the days after their evacuation and found a ruckus in the dining room. That’s because he found an impromptu game of touch football. The game didn’t feature any Saints players, but their kids. The Saints didn’t evacuate to the Dallas Metroplex alone. The players brought their family members and pets along as well.
Many of us can relate.
The Saints are a group used to dealing with adversity and traveling together. Sometimes they make travel decisions themselves in advance, but many times those choices are made for them on the fly. Hurricane Ida is a perfect example of such a situation. Looking back at past trips taken by this team, Payton has said the “extra” time together created a closer, more cohesive and focused football team. Positive things often followed.
In 2019 the Saints played Weeks 2 and 3 across the country, with games against the L.A. Rams and Seattle Seahawks. Rather than a flight home before shipping back cross-country, the Saints decided to elongate their stay out west for an extra week. Traveling, living, eating and practicing together for a week for the first time as a roster of 53 players. Prior to that game against the Rams the team announced Payton had agreed to a 5-year extension, so the trip was off to a good start. But later that day the Saints lost a game and something far more important: Drew Brees. The starting quarterback had injured his thumb and would need surgery.
Back in New Orleans, Saints fans suddenly pondered an uncertain future. The Saints were undeterred. They moved operations north to the University of Washington campus, where they'd practice for a week ahead of the game in Seattle. The Saints could work in the middle of the day as colleges often practice early in the morning or late in the afternoon. The week went smoothly. Teddy Bridgewater started and the Saints not only beat the Seahawks 33-27, they did it with swagger.
With Bridgewater the Saints won their next 4 games, eventually going on to finish the year 13-3.
One of the wins during that streak was at TIAA Bank Field against the Jacksonville Jaguars. I’m not saying that means anything … but it is worth saying. Did all that happen because they stayed on the west coast? Of course not, but Payton has since said that during the round-the-clock time together, the team acquired a sharper focus on football without the distractions of life at home. Of course, 2019 wasn’t the first time the Saints decided to go “all in” for long road trips.
The team lost its first two games to begin the 2017 season and faced a road trip to Carolina, then a trip to London to for a matchup with the Miami Dolphins. At 0-2, the season felt close to being over before it really ever began. Back then, most teams came back home between a road game and London, but in 2017, when the Saints left for Carolina, they packed heavily. They were flying out on Sept. 23, and knew they wouldn’t be back home until the early morning hours of Oct. 2. The Saints beat Carolina, a huge road and division win, then flew straight to London, where they practiced and lived the European experience together round the clock. Next came a dominating win over the Dolphins, two results that kicked off what would end as an 8-game winning streak, an 11-5 season and the first of four consecutive NFC South titles.
The defensive star of that London game, who also enjoyed his best season as a pro was cornerback Ken Crawley. After a stint playing with that Dolphins team, Crawley is back and could start alongside Marshon Lattimore early in the season if he can nip a nagging hamstring injury. The Saints also traded for Texans cornerback Bradley Roby, but he’ll be unavailable until Week 2, and signed longtime Falcons cornerback Desmond Trufant.
Another of the wins during that 8-game winning streak? Yep, it came against Aaron Rodgers and the same Green Bay Packers team the Saints will “host” in Jacksonville this week.
Again, I’m not saying experience guarantees results. But it does guarantee the Saints know what they can do when adversity hits. Let’s see what happens now.
Be safe, and I hope to see you in Jacksonville.
