Saints The day Aaron Brooks beat Brady & Peyton Manning (‘02 Pro Bowl) (1 Viewer)

[ndcc]

According to Jake Delhomme, on ESPN 1420 about a year ago.... Aaron Brooks never had the motivation to be the best. He was the type that relied solely on his talent. He didn't study film, he wasn't first in last out. He didn't feel like he needed to do any of that because he thought he was already the best he could be. He had one of the best arm's in the league, and the athletics to escape trouble. In his mind that was all he needed.

What kind of character leads someone to drag someone in the mud when they have no opportunity to defend themselves.

I really liked Jake. But if he went on record like this (which I take your word for it), my respect for him just dropped a couple of notches.

 

[kcirdor]

well that's just sillly. he didn't throw him under the bus. He told the truth when asked questions.

 

[ndcc]

well that's just sillly. he didn't throw him under the bus. He told the truth when asked questions.

Really?

The average person wouldn’t appreciate it if a coworker gave a subjective assessment to the media without an opportunity to defend themselves.

Jake could have skirted the question or avoided it entirely.

JMO

 

[kcirdor]

Subjective? He gave facts. Not opinions.

 

[tenordas]

I remember watching that QB challenge on one of the ESPNs. I was stoked!

I don't know if what said Delhomme is true, but that kind of thing happens an awful lot.
As a performer and teacher of vocal music, I can tell you I've run across many a talented voice who wasn't as good as another singer who didn't have as much of a naturally beautiful instrument, and it was because the one with less natural ability was always doing the work to be the best they could be personally while the the more naturally gifted one assumed he/she was already the bee's knees.

Having said that, I was always a fan of Brooks, even during the disaster that was the 2005 season. He got us our first playoff win, and I was a fan, period. When he left the Saints, IIRC, he held every Saints career QB record except one, and he was second in that stat.
Haslett got us that win, too, but he wasn't a good coach. I'm not talking X and O knowledge; it's just that he wasn't good at motivating his players to elevate themselves to get their best game out of them.

 

[SaintsSpringBayou]

He had a ton of talent, just crap coaching. I don't fault him for anything he did or how he felt about being a Saint. I would've loved to see how far his career could go with CSP as his coach.

 

[El Caliente]

Yeah I would put him at #2 or #3 in terms of All Time best Saints quarterbacks. He did more than Bobby Hebert (who I would argue had more talent around him than Brooks). Manning is such a question mark as he really could have been an all time great but he had no talent surrounding him. He was a master chef turning chicken sheet into chicken salad on a weekly basis. If you were to put Manning in this Sean Payton offense I don’t think you would have anyone rated above him in NFL history (let alone Saints).

 

[Winter]

I remember that year a story about Joe Horn telling Ronde Barber (on the 2nd matchup) “I’m going to score on you.” And he proceeded to score on him.

That season was rough. Do you remember Kyle Turkey saying “Today they weren’t the Bungles, but we were the Aints”.

After the Bengals loss I turned everything off for the rest of the season. I couldn't even watch the Carolina game because I just knew we would somehow blow it.

 

[ndcc]

Subjective? He gave facts. Not opinions.

The only way to adamantly say that Jake gave FACTS and not opinion is to cite verifiable references and sources. If it was only Jake’s account, he may be convincing in the interview, but it cannot be construed as fact.

I wish SuperChuck500 would weigh in on this one.

 

[wwepatriot]

They lost so much for Aaron to succeed after 2000 season.

Ron Zooks was the biggest loss, but then they kept that useless Rick Venturi around and that made it impossible for Brooks to succeed as it put so much pressure on him to keep throwing. Randy Mueller was dead weight as well. What cost the Saints even more is how Joe Horn come up injured come playoff time, even under Payton in 06.

 

[Saintman2884]

I'm still not over 2002... We started 6-1. Beat the eventual SB champ Bucs twice and then lost 3 in a row to end the season and missed the playoffs. We lost to the 3-10 Vikings, then the 1-13 bengals and then the 6-9 panthers... What could have been.

Always liked Brooks. He made Saints games very exciting. The feeling we could score at any moment.

I think the catalyst for that 3-game losing streak towards the end of 2002 season started with the now-devastating, heartbreaking last-secong loss to Minnesota in Superdome in a contest we should've won but we allowed Culpepper to throw a short TD to Moss on 4th down and after the Vikes decided to go for two and win, one of the most, agonizing, forking painful fork up plays occured where the entire Saints D-line, all the fat arses sitting around clueless and with no football instincts, allowed Dante to fumble the snap, pick it up and run it in without being touched by any one of those fat, overweight forkers on our D-line. NOTHING FROM NOT SINGLE ONE OF THEM AND WATCHING IT ON YOUTUBE, I don't think they ever saw him or knew where the ball was.

The Vikings have never been an easy team for us to beat, irregardless of what respective records are when we play. Their more of a bitter, conference rival and more intimidating than Atlanta has or ever could be. I respect them and their organization far more then I ever could the Falcons but they've beaten us more times in postseason than any other NFC team and our sole postseason win over them, 2009 NFCCG, was the football equivalent of a nasty, bitter, bruising 15-round heavyweight title fight. You don't sleep on them. You don't become complacent, overconfident in how you sense your team's depth, overall talent and record makes you better team in preparing to play them.

A lot of good, very great NFL teams fell into this same trap becoming overconfident in the weeks leading up to play Minnesota in the past, regular-season or playoffs. We and Niners did in 1987, they owned the old NFC Central in the 1970s, they used to play in an outdoor stadium that was so cold and imposing that it made Green Bay's "Frozen Tundra" seem like a nice kids, ice-skating rink. Metropolitan Stadium home games from late November-mid January were like playing football in Antarctica. Howard Cosell once famously referred to it as "The IceBox" for over 20 years.

 

[Saintman2884]

Yeah I would put him at #2 or #3 in terms of All Time best Saints quarterbacks. He did more than Bobby Hebert (who I would argue had more talent around him than Brooks). Manning is such a question mark as he really could have been an all time great but he had no talent surrounding him. He was a master chef turning chicken sheet into chicken salad on a weekly basis. If you were to put Manning in this Sean Payton offense I don’t think you would have anyone rated above him in NFL history (let alone Saints).

Whenever I see these prospective, hypothetical, "What if Archie had a decent supporting cast or maybe a better defense during his career, how much better would've he have been?" scenarios, the one, contemporary 1970s QB whose career probably best closely resembles what Archie might've done with better team is Bert Jones of old Baltimore Colts. He was in many ways, an Elway-prototype a decade early but his natural talent, powerful arm, and elusiveness as a scrambler is very similar to Manning's and if Jones doesn't suffer a career-altering injury in a 1978 preseason game vs. Detroit when he was injured on a late hit out of bounds, he probably takes the next step and leads the Colts to continued success and perhaps Colts never leave Baltimore, in spite of their, old crumbling stadium and their inept, drunken, irresponsible owner Robert Irsay. Bert Jones was a 2× Pro Bowler, named 1976 NFL MVP. I do believe that may have been the sort of career trajectory Manning may have had for a few seasons with a better HC who made stronger defense a priority and not forced his players to learn a complicated, sort of outdated defense that works if you have the right players and about maybe 3-4 years to learn and improve upon it.

You can't hire a DC and then expect him to totally revamp an overall good, but Middle-of-the-pack defense and implements a 46 defensive scheme and think by next season, that same defense will be angry, carnivorous monsters sacking QBs 8--9 times a game. Especially even more so now with how prevalent WC and Spread offenses have come and evolved to counteract the 46 effectiveness.