NEW ORLEANS — Only Dennis Allen could beat the New Orleans Saints' most hated rival 48-17 and somehow come out looking worse to the fans. It was the perfect uproarious ending to our 2023 Saints season of discontent.
When the Saints scored their final touchdown to make the score 48-17 there was a brief fleeting moment where all Saints fans united behind Dennis Allen and thought, “He gets us. He’s as petty and hates the Falcons as much as us! He’s running up the score on Atlanta!”
Except he wasn’t. Jameis Winston and the players went rogue and decided to get Jamaal Williams a touchdown. Jameis said it was a “Team decision.” Will live in our hearts forever. I need a T-shirt with Jameis’ face saying TEAM DECISION, which I will wear whenever I make hilarious life choices.
Dennis Allen looked weak and kind of like a guy not in charge of his team while apologizing to Arthur Smith in his press conference after the game. This is where you probably expect me to pile on Dennis Allen, except I’m not.
Oh, don’t get me wrong, I love humiliating the Falcons, it’s my favorite Saints fan experience, but I’m a fan, not a coach.
Did you notice what Arthur Smith said to Allen as he walked up to him angrily after the game? He said, “Why did you do that to me?” He didn’t say, “Why did you do that to us?”
Coaches almost always talk in terms of “us, we, team.” Why didn’t Smith do the same there? CAUSE HE KNEW WHAT TIME IT WAS. Smith and Allen both knew Smith was getting fired before they shook hands and the Saints just added salt and tabasco to the indignity Smith knew awaited him. Allen was embarrassed his team did a soon-to-be-fired coach like that. That’s as brutal a public ending to a head coaching career as you’ll ever see.
Should Dennis Allen have handled his post-game press conference talking about it better? Sure, but Allen just isn’t very good with the media. As fans we measure him against Sean Payton, who is a media master, so Allen’s media sessions feel so much worse than they probably are. Dennis Allen doesn’t get us like Sean Payton got us, and we are never going to forgive him for it.
Lots of fans want to say the players going rogue will have some lasting impact on the team and foretell disaster for Dennis Allen and the Saints in 2024. A 16-18 record and aging roster did that before Jameis was out here announcing “Team decisions.”
If Dennis Allen doesn’t fix his offensive and defensive lines and find a running game, 2024 will be his final season as Saints head coach no matter if the Saints beat Atlanta without a Jamaal Wiliams team decision TD or if it was 100-17.
There was an actual Saints game on Sunday, and it was glorious. The Saints played a perfect second half but got no help from a pathetic Carolina Panthers team so there will be no playoffs.
The Saints might not have delivered us a playoff game, but they at least delivered hope for the future as the 2023 draft suddenly feels really good. Rookies AT Perry and Kendre Miller combined for three scores. Miller had 73 yards rushing and looked, finally after a season of injuries, like the guy the Saints drafted from TCU. Perry had three catches for 53 yards and looks like he might be the perfect guy to pair with Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed. Chris Olave added a circus touchdown catch of his own to wrap up a solid second season.
It was all fun and games for the Saints after a bumpy start against the Falcons.
The Saints finally found their footing on offense in the last six weeks and Derek Carr looks like a quarterback who they can win with if they have a running game and can keep him upright.
The 2023 Saints season was a strange one. They ended the season 9th in points scored and 8th in points allowed. On paper, the math says they are a 10.5-win team. Seasons aren’t played on paper and the Saints used an easy schedule to absolutely bludgeon bad teams. We can say the Saints could have won more games but it’s not like they gave away many wins. In five of their losses, the Saints failed to have a lead at all.
Of course, the loss in Green Bay ended up killing the Saints' playoff chances after they blew a 17-0 lead, but it also threw a giant monkey wrench into the entire season because Derek Carr got hurt, and even though he never missed any games he wasn’t right until after Thanksgiving.
So what does the future hold for the Saints? Probably besides some coaching staff changes we are in for the quietest Saints offseason in a long time. Just in the last two years; we’ve had Sean Payton retire, Dennis Allen hired, the Deshaun Watson chase, the huge draft trade with the Philadelphia Eagles, the Sean Payton trade to Denver, and the two-month pursuit and signing of Derek Carr.
By comparison, this offseason will feel like watching paint dry.
There is hope. The NFC South is still terrible and why should we believe the Atlanta Falcons and Carolina Panthers have any more of a clue on how to get better than the Saints? Tampa Bay only won the division because the Panthers are currently the ineptest NFL team since Hugh Jackson roamed the sideline of the winless Cleveland Browns in 2017.
I always miss Saints football once it’s over. The offseason is long and cold, and my Sundays feel empty. I’ll have to spend time learning my family’s names and so forth.
Whatever the Saints do between now and September, I’ll talk myself into believing 2024 will be better than the season I just saw. Saints' optimism is one of my favorite things, I love it almost as much as Jameis Winston announcing ‘Team Decisions’ which allows us to point and laugh at the Atlanta Falcons.
Ralph Malbrough is a contributing writer and Saints fan living in Houston. Email him at saintshappyhour@gmail.com, find him on Facebook, or follow him on Twitter at @SaintsForecast or download the Saints Happy Hour Podcast.