Unless an unlikely team comes out of nowhere, like the 1999 St. Louis Rams, the 2014 Super Bowl has only a handful of contenders. Last year’s Super Bowl participants, the Seattle Seahawks and Denver Broncos, make the shortlist. The New England Patriots are in the mix, of course, as well as the San Francisco 49ers and the Green Bay Packers.
However, the New Orleans Saints already top many lists of preseason favorites. New Orleans has everything you want in a contender: a great offense, a stifling defense and solid special teams. This team is built to win all three phases of the game.
Drew Brees and the Saints’ offense can score against any team in the league. Tight end Jimmy Graham is a nightmare for defense, running back Mark Ingram is rushing like the Saints envisioned when they drafted him, and rookie receiver Brandin Cooks has the ability to be a game changer. Rob Ryan worked wonders in his first year as New Orleans’ defensive coordinator. The unit went from historically bad to being in the NFL’s top-five defenses, and we’ll see several budding stars on that side of the ball this season.
New Orleans currently doesn’t have a place kicker on the roster, a spot of worry for me right now, but punter Thomas Morstead is one of the league’s best.
The Saints also own perhaps the best home-field advantage in the NFL. Few places are like the Superdome, and few fan bases are as passionate as Saints followers. If the NFC playoffs run through New Orleans, the rest of the conference is going to have a hard time reaching the Super Bowl, but if the Saints have to hit the road, things don’t look so bad.
Last season, New Orleans made history when it defeated the Philadelphia Eagles in a playoff road game. At this point, the Saints have done nearly everything possible in the playoffs. The only available achievement is to win nothing but road games to reach the Super Bowl.
I predict that the Saints will go 12-4 and battle for the NFL top seed. Though the team has a tough schedule, I think the Saints can take anything thrown their way.
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The Mississippi Free Press produced this story through the MFP Solutions Lab, supported by the Solutions Journalism Network. This series digs into Mississippi’s systemic issues and sheds light on responses to them in other communities. Beyond just reporting on problems, these stories interrogate their causes and inspect potential solutions.