We lost that game because Sean Payton made a horribly foolish decision to start Andrus Peat freshly back from injury over Nick Easton who had been doing a very solid job in Peat’s absence.
If you’ll recall, Peat got injured against Atlanta in that insanely frustrating game where the Falcons ran inside stunts and Peat was a turnstile and allowed the middle to collapse in seconds. Drew got sacked 6 times and we got blown out.
Peat is out and then Easton comes in and the situation instantly improved.
Right before the Wild Card game - Payton decides to bench Easton in place of the returning Peat - and what do you know - the Vikings start running inside stunts and Peat can’t block it and the middle is a jail break. Drew was under duress the whole game.
Then to make matters worse - once it’s established that all we have is Taysom Hill playing out of his mind on offense - Payton decides to take the ball out of his hands and stop feeding the hot hand.
Payton had some real head scratchers in his time here but that 2018 WC game was the top for me. Even above the failed double reverse against the Bucs in 07.