By Pat Yasinskas

In just the second week of the season, the New Orleans Saints have a chance to make franchise history.

They have never started 2-0 in consecutive seasons, but they can do that with a victory against San Francisco. The Saints started 13-0 last year. But the Saints have started 2-0 only six times in franchise history.

One other positive statistic for the Saints: They’ve won their last five meetings with San Francisco, and each of those have come since the Saints left the NFC West in 2002.

And a final New Orleans note from ESPN Stats & Information: Drew Brees completed 75 percent of his passes in the season opener. That’s the 15th time he’s completed that high of a percentage of his passes since joining the Saints in 2006. In that same time frame, San Francisco quarterbacks have had only five games where they’ve completed 75 percent of their passes.

Thanks Pat for another great story. Story located at.

By Pat Yasinskas

Matt in Miami writes: Hey Pat, what do you think about the Saints using a 3-4 a lot against the Vikings?

Pat Yasinskas: I thought it was interesting. We saw that at times last season, but it seemed more prevalent Thursday night. Not sure if that was just part of Gregg Williams’ game plan to throw the Vikings off or if it’s something we’ll see more of this season. I think it’s a nice thing to do in certain situations, but I don’t think the Saints have the personnel (particularly at linebacker) to really use the 3-4 on a regular basis.

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By Brian Peterson, Star Tribune

By JIM SOUHAN, Star Tribune

NEW ORLEANS – For months, the Vikings’ opener at New Orleans, in a rematch of an epic NFC title game, in the home of a city believing the Saints offered proof of its rebirth, felt as consequential and symbolic as Christmas.

Turns out it was more like Halloween — a holiday signifying little, featuring loud costumes and leaving half the participants with queasy stomachs.

Ugly and overhyped as it was, the Vikings’ 14-9 loss to the Saints doesn’t mean much. Losing on the road to a championship team early in the season is hardly fatal. It was just another Fleur de Loss in “The City That Doesn’t Sleep In Its Own Bed.”

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O.. great picture of Ellis sacking Favre.

By Pat Yasinskas

NEW ORLEANS — They unfurled a Super Bowl championship banner in the Superdome on Thursday night. But did the New Orleans Saints roll out a Super Bowl team?

Well, it sure didn’t look like it on first glance, but that might be a bit misleading when you give it a second and third look.

Carve it up however you want, because aside from one impressive opening drive, this wasn’t last year’s formula of Drew Brees throwing darts all day or Gregg Williams’ opportunistic defense scoring points or helping create them or the special teams pulling off miracle plays.

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Cam Martin’s Pregame flyover.

Welcome to the premiere edition of the Page 2 Pregame Flyover, your source for aerial reconnaissance of every NFL game — even the ones in domes. We’ll unleash the full power of this column Friday, when we preview the first weekend of the 2010 season, but for now let’s focus on tonight’s Kickoff Game in New Orleans between the Saints and the Vikings. It’s a strange matchup the NFL has chosen to start this new campaign, considering Football Outsiders predicts neither one of these teams will even make the playoffs. I mean, really, who wants to start the season watching two lame ducks? Ya know, other than the people going to Sunday’s Cleveland-Tampa Bay game? Well, at least the fans in New Orleans get to watch a parade and listen to some music.

What to look for in the pregame show: The Dave Matthews Band and Taylor Swift — two favorites in every NFL locker room — will be headlining a concert at Jackson Square in New Orleans. Matthews and Swift are known for being safe and consumable for mainstream America; it’s when Matthews ends his shows — and perhaps his driver dumps the contents of his tour bus latrine onto unsuspecting sightseers — that things can get a little edgy.

Read the rest of the story here.

by AP

NEW ORLEANS — Tailgating began near sunrise around the Louisiana Superdome though the New Orleans Saints’ season-opening NFL game with the Minnesota Vikings wasn’t scheduled to start for more than 12 hours.

As the Saints prepared to open the defense of their Super Bowl title, the city was in Mardi Gras mode: schools set to close early and concerts and a parade planned in the French Quarter. Even City Hall closed for the day.

Faren Verdin of Houma, La., said he, his cousin Joseph “Sac” Verdin and their wives, Jenn and Melissa, were up at 4 a.m. to get ready for the 70-minute drive.

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By Pat Yasinskas and John Clayton

Repeating as Super Bowl champions has become one of the hardest things to do in the modern NFL. Of the 15 Super Bowl champions before the New Orleans Saints, only two were repeat customers.

In fact, it’s not uncommon for Super Bowl champions to stumble the next season and not even make the playoffs. Are the Saints, who had one of the greatest feel-good stories in Super Bowl history, the next team to take a fall?

Or can the Saints break the trend and repeat?

In the final installment of our Great Debate series, ESPN.com senior writer John Clayton and NFC South blogger Pat Yasinskas take two very different stances on whether the Saints can repeat.

Click here to read the story.

By Brian Murphy
brianmurphy@pioneerpress.com

METAIRIE, La. — The disrespect card has become such a cliché in professional sports that players and teams routinely deal it to manufacture motivation instead of just shutting up and performing.

To be sure, the Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints are not martyring themselves this week as they prepare for their NFC championship game rematch with the Vikings, who did everything last January to punch their ticket to Miami and a showdown with the Colts — except hold on to the football.

Nor are the Saints deaf to the chatter emanating from Minnesota for seven months that the Vikings, who dominated every statistical category, lost that game more than New Orleans won it.

They simply do not care.

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By D. Orlando Ledbette
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

2. What if Drew Brees has another mega season?

Over the last decade, the NFL has been littered with defending Super Bowl champions. Five of the last 10 champs have missed the playoffs all together, the 2008 Steelers the latest victims.

Over the last 11 seasons, only one team has been able to repeat as Super Bowl champions: the 2004 New England Patriots.

Brees, fresh off setting the NFL record for completion percentage (70.6), is back to see if he can turn in another mega-season and help the Saints defend their title. Until last season, the Saints had won only two postseason games in their 43-year history.

The Saints needed to improve their run defense, which gave up 122.2 yards per game and ranked 21st in the NFL. They’ll get a stiff test early when they face Minnesota’s Adrian Peterson to open up the season.

Read the entire story here.

By Pat Yasinskas

ESPN.com’s inaugural 2010 regular-season NFL Power Rankings are out, and let me make one thing very clear as I get ready to head to New Orleans for Thursday night’s opener between the Vikings and Saints: I did not have a vote.

Somehow — and this is beyond my comprehension — the defending Super Bowl champions are No. 2 in the rankings. How’d that happen? Well, three voters did the only prudent thing they could and gave the Saints their No. 1 vote.

The fourth voter ranked the Saints No. 5. Yes, No. 5.

For the record, that voter is John Clayton and he and I will have a little discussion about this Wednesday when we roll out the final segment in our Great Debate series.

Read the rest of the story here.