This post isn’t going to be the most concise and well constructed thing I’ve ever written.  Its hard to really describe the feeling you have when you just witness something that in your most level of heads you never thought had any chance of legitimately happening, but nevertheless, here we are.  The team I have cheered for as a child, the team who represents the state where born, raised, currently live and will likely die is going to the Super Bowl.  I hate to get all Bill Simmons on you here, but I just spent the last hour talking to my grandfather, father, and brother, the whole lot die-hard Saints fans, and none of us could really verbalize our feelings to the other beyond remarking more than once that none of us can believe this is happening.

I’ve been combing the internet and flipping through channels to see any photo, any highlight, any soundbite of what I just witnessed.  I think it helps make it real.  You see, I grew up in a geographical location that allows itself to be nearly evenly split between Saints fans and Cowboys fans.  I had to make a choice very early on in my football fandom as to where my allegiance stood.  And thanks to my upbringing, more than likely, I became a Saints fan, the road less traveled for sure since the Cowboys where entering their title run phase of the early 90′s.  It would have been easy to just jump on the bandwagon.  But undaunted and uninfluenced by the lure of actual football success I stood with my replica Bobby Hebert Saints uniform with the plastic helmet and foam shoulder pads and watched my Saints struggle on an annual basis to even look respectable.

Sure there were pockets of hope in the Saints history…the Dome Patrol in the 90′s, the Ditka era and subsequent Rickey Williams Draft, the Playoff win over the Rams in 2000…but every time the Saints somehow found a way to lose (and it usually featured Aaron Brooks running off the field smiling a goofy smile after he threw a debilitating interception).  Tonight, there were times in the game when I thought the same misfortune and bad luck that had plagued the Saints since the franchise’s inception in 1967 would happen all over again.  There were the fumbles early on the the Saints failed to scoop up, Reggie Bush muffs a punt, the defense gets called for roughing the passer on crucial 3rd downs, the offense stalls with 4 minutes to go, Brett Favre has the ball with 2:30 to go.  I and every Saints fan who isn’t fresh on to the bandwagon had seen it all before.  But somehow, this team isn’t like all the others.  They found a way to win a game that, at times, they didn’t seem entirely sure they were ready to win.  Be it by luck, or good fortune, or the fact that Brad Childress was coaching the other team, the Saints got it done, and are going to the Super Bowl.

I know this is coming across as disjointed babble a bit, but Im really at a loss on how to handle this experience.  Im so happy for the Saints, Im so happy for New Orleans, Im so happy for the state, Im glad they brought Deuce back to experience it all, hell, Im even happy for Tom Benson.  Just a surreal feeling.

In three weeks Ill be heading down to New Orleans for the Krewe of Bacchus Ball.  The Honorary King of that parade is Drew Brees.  Its supposed to be a very classy and dignified affair, but I swear on a stack of Mardi Gras beads that, regardless of the Super Bowl, if I get the chance, I plan to give Drew Brees a hug that may cross the line of acceptable heterosexual behavior, and Im totally fine with it because he and the rest of the Saints have given me my greatest football joy ever.

Goodnight all, and Who Dat!