Saints win!
Saints win!No matter what, we always have this time of joy, unity and pride.
It's like a glorious euphoric waking dream-- Christmas morning when you're five sorta stuff. I should be hungover and exhausted, but I'm perky and alert, and feel like two new men. The world is alive and bursting with new possibilities... and I'm not even a lifelong Saints fan! But I swear, if a leprechaun riding a unicorn knocked on the door and asked me directions to da Quarter, it wouldn't faze me a bit. "It's all the way down St. Chuck.... No-- the other way. There ya go. Have fun!"
That was a helluva memorable game-- not so much for the highlights, though there were a few, but for the sheer
contingency of the contest. I know every play seems important in a big game, but there were so many incredible near misses and barely-made-its in that one; so many times when the funny shaped pigskin sprung loose and danced on the carpet in front of scrambling big men in tights... and then, to make things even crazier, you get the zebras heavily involved-- making crucial rulings and spots, then reviewing slo-mo replays of athletes struggling against each other at full speed, perservering through pain, warring for inches. The score was close the entire game, the result anything-but-certain. And then the dramatic structure of the evening turned familiarly sour at the end of the 4th quarter, as the offense stalled and Brett Favre drove the purple helmets on a last minute game-winning drive. But it was not to be. There was a penalty, and Favre was intercepted on a dangerous cross-the-body pass (which, it should be noted, he has routinely completed throughout his career). Uncertainty was alive and well.
Nothing came easy for either team last night... that unpredictable football had been bobbling and wobbling and bouncing funny all game. It seemed to practically
embody the contingency of the contest. Either that, or a wild rodent was trapped inside. Then our young placekicker gets an opportunity, and casually steps back and blasts a
never-in-doubt field goal to win the game. That thunderous kick would've been good from
60 yards out. It left his foot on a line drive and whizzed straight between the posts. No dramatic arc, no curving left or right. No scintilla of doubt. Just a lightning quick kill shot. Bam! Then,
Whoop dere it is! Just like that.
After a grueling, tight overtime contest: how the hell did
that kick happen so easily?
Anyway, here are a couple compilations of local responses to the magical Saints victory.
Noladishu: Saints reaction roundup
Liprap's Lament: the way we live
Also, here are a few select links with Saints-related material for your pleasure:
Chef Who Dat: Super Bowl portrait-- beautiful, tasteful. Must see and enlarge.
Rogers' rants: gets into the spirit by posting a fan image. (It's "tasteful" in a Beavis & Butthead "I like it when I can see the bottom of her thingies" sort of way.) Also, Rogers paints the
Dead Pelican black and gold, which is cool.
Maitri's Vatulblog: celebrates the win but uploads a picture of an ugly Saints cheerleader that momentarily harshed my buzz. I suppose it's tasteful in a "I'm a silly freak" sorta way.
night is half gone...: informs us that Chris Owens actually cancelled her show to watch the game. Owens has been a Saints fan ever since she performed in Ephesus for Paul of Tarsus. But she didn't cancel a show for him, so this is news.
Cold Spaghetti: posts some nicely-written reflections on the season like this one
These are strange and beautiful days in New Orleans, and they must be seen to be believed. ...Last week, when I went down to experience the mania over the Saints’ undefeated season firsthand, I found myself not sure whether every street was a dream. Some moments made me laugh, and others were so full of a desperate love that I had tears in my eyes.
Wounded Bird: shares a nice quote from a commenter about the 'dreamlike atmosphere' in the city.
Library Chronicles: poetically describes a photo he took of Superdome celebrations after those industrial-strength confetti sprayers had done their work.
===
Update:Cliff's Crib: Perfectly explains why the nature of the Saints win "flipped the script" on the Fates (don't skip this post):
If you follow the team you should realize like I do that the game last night played out exactly the way it needed to in order to close all the open wounds of things that went wrong.
Three Pipe Problem: finds a winning quote
“I would say humbly, this would be Mardi Gras, New Year’s Eve, the 300th anniversary of New Orleans and the invention of television all wrapped up into one.”
Slimbolala shares a scene:
As we drove home from our friends' house after the game, the city was wild, an ecstatic jubilant communal frenzy: honking and shouting and fireworks and (literally) dancing in the streets. I stood out on the corner until some ungodly wee hour, talking with neighbors and strangers, all happily recounting the details (or occasionally quieting to a stunned reverie: "We're going to the Super Bowl...").
Also, I forgot to thank Dilly and Berto for forcefully applying some eyeblack on my face, in order to turn the game around. They did this by wiping their faces directly on my face.
---
If someone can send me a link to the photo of the saints and Buddy D. flags that adorned the Lee Circle column, I'd appreciate it. (
Update: Our New Orleans Saints has an
enhanced image.)
Who Dat!
Labels: Les Bon Temps, Saints
14 Comments:
Jesus that game was intense. Could not believe how hard that was. Anyway today feels like one of those New Year's Day hangovers so I'm making black eyed peas. Maybe it'll bring luck.
That WAS intense... I've been asking around to see who was on-call in local ERs. I want to know if rates of MIs went up during the game... I know my blood pressure was through the roof! Love that you were perky this morning... so was I! Completely ready to blow off work for a few hours and enjoy a New Orleans moment or seventeen on Oak Street.
All around lovely post, mon cher Oyster, and not because you linked to my blog. Yours is a post from the heart, and you're not even an native! I'm amazed that certain of NOLA's adopted children get the place, while, at the same time the born and bred don't.
I have friends who moved north of the lake after Katrina, for which I can't blame them, but they moved without a look back and without missing New Orleens. WTF? I been missing new Orleens for 50 years.
Excellent post! Thanks.
"Contingency" is a great word for this game. The play that exemplifies that was Pierre Thomas' heroic leap for a first down on fourth-and-one in OT. He got absolutely creamed at the apex of the leap but just would be denied. The rest is history!
check out the podcast of rickey and eric over at wist (hour one).
he says he felt like he had played in the game.
hats off to that nfl.com clip.
they had each teams radio announcer calling their teams plays.
if joe buck ever get's his nose surgicaly removed from favre's ass he might want to take note of that balance.
to all of you cats who went to the game and watched it latter on the dvr , check out a cheap piece of hardware called the radio shark that turns your laptop / desktop into a radio dvr.
great post erster , thank you for the links.
p.s.
this morning i also had the most bizzare clear headed hangover of my 50 year life.
i felt like dali was programming wwltv this morning.
rob reading the news with a helment on his head that didnt fit , sally getting all giddy when a photog. gave her an empty film box with confetti from the dome floor, and wand rouzan singing a sick version of let's get crunk.
mardis gras is off to a great start this year.
re: radio shark.
just saying that the radio call of the game is head and shoulders above the network call of the game.
it also saves the file as an mp3 file so you can listen to it on a mp3 player or burn it to cd.
Radio calls are often better than network calls because the radio guys have to be more descriptive. I found an interesting thing out on my thanksgiving road trip to Maryland though. Our radio guys are better than the radio guys in most other places. I listened to the radio broadcast of the LSU-Ole Miss game, the Colts-Texans game (I believe) and I even got the calls from the home broadcasters on a Hornets away game. None of them held a candle to the guys who call our games down here in New Orleans. It is just one more flavor that we add here to our sports gumbo.
I was inspired by my wife after the Cardinals game to put a little video together once the Saints beat the Vikings. She had brought up the Will Smith song about going to Miami. It is on my blog but you can also find it here. It was a bit of a rush job but I like it :)
thanks, man.
thanks.
I loved sharing the moment with you.
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