3 parts Seagram’s Seven Crown Whiskey
1 part 7-up

7&7, bitches! Drink up! You can even pour a little Grenadine in there if it makes you feel all holiday warm & fuzzy. It doesn’t make you an unsophisticated drinker. It makes you sloshed. And isn’t that really what it’s all about?

Exactly.

Can you smell the fear coming from East Rutherford, NJ and Minneapolis right about now? No, it’s not just the exhaust from the Turnpike and the lutefisk from Garrison Keillor’s house. It’s fear. Slowly but surely, the Saints are sneaking up on them from behind. And just like when George Michael sneaks up on you from behind, it’s sure to end unpleasantly for all parties involved.

Against all reasonable odds, it appears that the Saints are gonna turn out to be the monkey on the backs of the NFC’s current wildcard holders going into the final two games. Who saw that shit coming after week 4? Don’t look now, but the Saints are 7-3 over their last 10 games, Drew Brees is back to playing the role of Ric (WOOOOOO by God) Ocasek in the video for The Cars’ 1984 smash-hit single "Magic", and if you wanna get real silly, the Saints are 8-1 under Sean Payton against teams with bird mascots. And next up? The Eagles. Suck it, Timothy B. Schmitt!

It’s about to get reeeeeeeeal interesting up in this bitch. Oh sure, the Saints still have to win both of their remaining games to even have a semi-realistic shot. That’s a given. But we’re Saints fans, and for the most part we’re not perpetually-miserable asshole "realists", so excuse the fuck out of us for assuming that that’s exactly what will happen.

Oh, you want a legit basis for that assertion? How about this? We’ve got Drew Brees and they don’t. How’s that work for ya, champ?

Oh, and we’ve recently upgraded at tailback. (snicker)

Oh come on, I don’t really mean it. I mean, I did laugh my balls off for an hour or longer after I overheard a certain coach whose name I’ll withhold say that "Reggie Bush is made of vaginas and fail." But I don’t really believe that. I’m pretty sure he, like the rest of us, is composed primarily of water and carbon. And trace amounts of fail.

Reggie’s got several monkeys on his back right about now with his partially-torn PCL, which has to be a bitch in the first place. But if that weren’t enough, Reggie’s in one hell of a rock/hard-place situation with this thing. If you play, and it affects your performance, the people who are already growing frustrated by your production not meeting their expectations will just get louder and more obnoxious. If you don’t play, people who already question your toughness and dedication will just get louder and more obnoxious. You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t.

Then he’s got the growing perception that he’s being outplayed by a journeyman back who is a third-stringer and special teams guy by trade. It’s gotta be killing Reggie to think that if he doesn’t get back on the field and put on a show of alpha-maleness, that perception will linger throughout the offseason. It’s show business, baby. It’s all about perception.

Coach Payton has an army of monkeys on his back too. Play Reggie and get him injured worse than he already is and you’re screwed. Play him and give him a substantial number of carries, you better damn well hope he’s able to outperform Stecker, despite the PCL. Sit him and you better hope Reggie doesn’t pull a Joe Horn and throw you under the bus for it in an "I wanted to play, I could have played, but coach wouldn’t let me" kind of way.

And then there’s that damned reverse. That monkey will not be going away until one of two things happen: A) The Saints make the playoffs, or B) The Saints miss the playoffs by more than one game. Until then, the perception is that that one play is all that’s standing between the Saints being "in if the season ended today" and needing help from jerks in other uniforms.

Speaking of which, thanks a lot, Bears. What a bunch of douchebags. Fortunately, reveling in their misery as they freefall into abject crappiness is pretty significant consolation. Screw them. I hope they start Aaron Brooks at QB next year. No, actually, I take that back. I hope they end up rotating between The Sex Cannon and The Neckbeard again. Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of assholes.

So we’re down to hoping that the Redskins or Broncos can take down the Vikings, and/or that Eli soils his pants against Buffalo. The Giants’ week-17 loss to New England, of course, is a given.

For some reason, neither of those things seems overly implausible. Lots and lots of snow in Denver and Buffalo would be nice.

But you know what? Maybe I’m just too stupid to live, but ever since that reverse, I’ve just got this feeling in my gut. I’ve got the feeling that the football gods have been toying with us all year… keeping us humble… testing our resolve. Last year was far too easy for us Saints fans. That’s not how we roll. Repeated kicks to the crotch are the price of our fanhood. But I’ve just got this feeling that the reverse was the last one for a while… at least until the playoffs. But until then, getting there will be our reward.

Maybe, in the end, "Earn It" is what it’s all about after all. For the Saints, and for us.

Either that or I’m full of shit.

Full of shit opens as a 17-point favorite.

Maybe it’s all about monkey-killing. Hey, who can ever really tell what it is those wacky gods want from us? Monkey-killing seems as plausible a demand as any. Any chance the Saints bring the voodoo priestess back for this week’s pregame festivities? Can you think of a more effective monkey killer than voodoo? Isn’t voodoo pretty much based on monkey-killing? At the very least, it couldn’t hurt. I’ve never heard of monkeys actually thriving in a voodoo-filled environment.

All I know is I hope Heather Rothstein has tickets. Word on the street is that the first 15,000 women through the gates will be receiving complimentary tee shirts with various unsavory, not-suitable-for-tee-vee slogans on them.

"Lick my husband’s balls, Donovan!"
"Coach Reid’s tits are bigger than mine!"
"Glenn Frey blows goats!"

and my own personal favorite…

"Hey Coach Reid, Joseph Smith was a false prophet!"

Anyway, something tells me this is all gonna work out. The Eagles ought to be phoning it in this weekend, having been eliminated from playoff contention last night. The Bears would be phoning it in too, except they can’t even seem to find their phone. I think The Neckbeard threw it into the stands sometime last night.

If it starts snowing in western New York this week, and/or snowing in Denver next week, there’s our omen. That’s when we’ll know that the football gods have our backs after all, what with the two sets of footprints in the turf and such.

Meantime, not that this post needs any filler material — hell, it’s already plenty long enough, and is already chock full of filler material — but after this Pulitzer-worthy masterpiece from yesterday, how can we not give the last word to our friend and mentor, Peter Finney, in yet another installment of moosedenied’s most pointless feature, The Pete Finney Filibuster!

His first name is Aaron. But don’t hold that against him. He’s not that Aaron.

Aaron Craver, you ask?

No.

Well, actually, yes. He is not Aaron Craver either.

But he is also not Aaron Brooks.

That was my point. He’s not Aaron Brooks. That’s the point.

He’s Aaron Stecker. The greatest Aaron in Saints history.

Oh sure, you won’t find him at #1 on any all-time lists of Saints players.

Not if the list is sorted alphabetically by first name, anyway.

He’d be third. Right behind Brooks and Craver.

But what if you sorted the list by jersey number? What then?

He’d be tied for 27th.

But this isn’t about jersey number or first name. This is about heart. This is about being the consummate professional. This is about being the consummate team player. This is about toiling in obscurity and then stepping up when called upon.

Where would Aaron Stecker fall on a list like that?

We’ll never know. They don’t make lists like that.

Heart. Clutch. Teamplayerness. None of these are official NFL stats.

But they should be.

Back in 1990, I asked Jim Mora about when a head coach realistically knows that it’s over.

His reply? "Not yet."

Indeed, coach. Indeed.

But if it’s not over yet, then when will it be over for the 2007 Saints?

Will it be when they’re mathematically eliminated?

That would be my guess.

But they’re not mathematically eliminated. Or, as coach Mora would say, "Not yet."

So what does this mean for the Saints’ current head coach, Sean Payton?

It means he still has a chance.

Drew Brees agrees. He too understands that the Saints are not yet mathematically eliminated.

The Saints are fortunate to have a guy like Drew Brees under center.

And, by that, I mean a guy who has a firm comprehension of basic math.

But will that be enough?

The Saints have two weeks left to find out. Stay tuned…

You put the boom boom into our hearts, Pete. You send our souls sky high when your columns start. You jitterbug into our brains. It goes a-bang bang bang ’til we SWALLOW A BOTTLE OF DRANO!