It’s all gone, and we all know why it’s all gone.
The Saints had a lot of honor once upon a time. The organization started developing into the darling of the NFL right around the time it picked up Drew Brees off the free-agent scrapheap in the 2006 offseason. The Saints became an outstanding football field, and Brees and others grabbed attention with their good deeds off the field.
When the Saints won the Super Bowl following the 2009 season, they were America’s team. Rooting for them just felt right.
The good times are a distant memory now. And in retrospect, they don’t look all that good. That’s the kind of effect a killer scandal can have.
We’re never going to look at the 2006-2011 Saints the same way ever again. The awkward part is that the Saints are going to look largely the same after the whole “Bounty-gate” thing as they did before. head coach Sean Payton has been suspended for a year, GM Mickey Loomis has been suspended for eight games and assistant head coach Joe Vitt has been suspended for six games, but they’ll all be back. They’ll all be back because Saints owner Tom Benson has backed his guys. He hasn’t fired anyone.
He needs to. And not just anyone. Everyone must go. Benson needs to clean house. Payton, Vittand the rest of the Saints’ coaching staff has to go. Since Loomis had a hand in the Bounty-gate scandal, he can go, too.
The NFL wants to take its product into a new era where players are safe and where nobody is trying to amplify the inherent violence of the sport. The now-infamous audio recording released on Thursday and first reported by Michael Silver of Yahoo! Sports made it clear that this is exactly what former Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams was doing, and Payton and the rest of his coaching staff allowed it to happen.
The argument is that Williams’ damning pregame speech is nothing out of the ordinary, and the very same is true of the Bounty-gate scandal as a whole. Williams got what he deserved, but Payton and the Saints have been victimized by a witch hunt.
Yes, they have. But the purpose of this witch hunt was to make an example that needed to be made. The league needed to send a loud and definitive message that it is not going to abide certain operations moving forward into the future, and the Saints presented the league with a perfect excuse to send that message.
It’s all about the future of the league, folks. In the grand scheme of things, whether or not the Saints have been disrespected and/or unfairly persecuted doesn’t matter. Their best interests are not as important as the league’s best interests.
The Saints need to realize that. They need to get on board with where the league is headed. As long as Payton and his staff remain under their employ, the Saints are not on board with where the league is headed. Keeping them around is an act of defiance.
By refusing the change, the Saints are essentially remaining the very same witch the NFL hunted down and punished. First they demonstrated what organization villainy looks like. Now they’re demonstrating what organizational arrogance looks like.
That’s not what the Saints should be doing right now. Instead, what needs to happen is this: Benson needs to come out and wave a white flag. He needs to confirm that his employees broke the rules, got caught and that something must be done about it. Then he needs to turn around and hand out some pink slips.
Firing Payton and his staff won’t be easy. But if Benson can bring himself to accept the fact that Payton is responsible for giving the organization a black eye, letting him go will be that much easier. In any other line of work, firing a man who has damaged the integrity of his company so badly would be a no-brainer.
There are arguments to be made against the idea. What’s going on in New Orleans is mainly Williams’ fault, not Payton’s. Moreover, what happened under Payton’s watch is probably happening in every other organization as well.
And besides, how can the team possibly hope to re-sign Brees to a long-term extension if his head coach and BFF is given the axe? At the very least, keeping Payton around is an absolutely necessity from a business standpoint.
The counterpoints: the guy in charge is always responsible, just because every other team might be doing it doesn’t make the bounty program okay, and firing Payton will not make the Brees situation any worse. It’s already a mess, and that the Saints’ own fault.
In the grand scheme of things, it’s not about Brees’ best interests, and it’s certainly not all about Payton’s best interests. It’s about how the Saints can move on and put Bounty-gate completely in their rear-view mirror, thus submitting to the NFL’s plans for the league going forward.
The only way the Saints can do that is by putting Payton and his staff in their rear-view mirror.
Slowly but surely, the organization will regain its lost honor.
Leave a Reply