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Many of you know Chef Who Dat (note: click here for essential viewing) and the cavalcade of characters that inhabit section 641 of the Superdome. Here’s the Chef before last season’s Monday Night game versus Atlanta:

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Like many (if not all) stadium secions, the season-ticket holding patrons at “Cafe 641″ have developed a tight-knit community that’s led to silliness, some bike crawls, and now, a cancer fundraiser with a twist. Per the e-mail I received today:

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A Cafe 641 patron and season-ticket holder, Sean Niehus, is raising money for St. Baldrick’s, a foundation that raises money for children’s cancer research. Sean has agreed to shave his head at the annual St. Baldrick’s shave-a-thon AND to grow a mustache. To help him raise money, we’re auctioning off a pair of tickets to the 2010 Saints/Bucs game in Section 641, Row 40, Seats 13-14.

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I like how not only is Niehus shaving his head, but that he’s also growing a mustache in the tradition of Cafe 641’s Patron Saint. Check out his picture, going from long blonde hair to a shaved head and a mustache would be a stark transformation. Gotta give to a guy willing to do that for a good cause.

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Bid’s can be made on the tickets on eBay here or you can donate directly to St. Baldricks by clicking here. And yes, that is Chef Who Dat in a wedding dress on that eBay listing. Not sure how that will help with the bidding.

Photograph by Jonathan Bachman

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The funnest part about the Saints Super Bowl victory has to be the sort of mock hubris the Saints players and coaches have shown as part of their celebration. Whether it’s Drew Brees going mad with power or Sean Payton pissing off Jerry Jones, these are moments for Who Dats everywhere to cherish (after all, when else have the Saints had any sort of reason to act this dickish?)

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If you haven’t heard, Peter King over at Sports Illustrated gives you this story of Coach Payton, a Saints victory dinner and Cowboys owner Jerry Jones’ favorite bottle of wine:

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On Friday night, the Saints’ staff at the combine gathered in a private room at St. Elmo Steakhouse, an 108-year-old Indy landmark, for a final celebratory nod to the Super Bowl win over the Colts. This is a group that likes its wine, and likes to have fun.

At the restaurant, word passed that Dallas owner Jerry Jones would have his Dallas group in this exact room Saturday night for a team dinner. Jones had even phoned ahead, according to a waiter, to make sure a magnum of a wine he loved, Caymus Special Selection cabernet sauvignon, was ready to be served at dinner.

Sean Payton told the waiter he’d like to have that wine, too. The waiter told him: Sorry, sir. We have only one bottle left, and it’s reserved for Mr. Jones.

Payton said he’d like to have the bottle nonetheless. I assume there was much angst on the part of the wait staff at that point. My God! Who do we piss off? One of the most powerful owners in the NFL, or the coach who’s the toast of the NFL, the coach who just won the Super Bowl?

Here came the bottle of Caymus Special Selection, and the Saints’ party drained it.

But drinking Jones’ wine wasn’t enough. Payton gave the waiter some instructions, took out his pen … and, well, the Cowboys party found at the middle of their table the next evening an empty magnum of Caymus Special Selection cabernet sauvignon, with these words hand-written on the fancy label:

WHO DAT!
World Champions XLIV
Sean Payton

That’s the kind of thing Jones will get a big laugh out of. And remember.

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Now on the surface, this looks like Payton having a lot of (deserved) fun. Saints fans will surely get a kick out of Payton rubbing it to the owner of the team that ended the Saints’ bid at a perfect season. But how will the rest of the country receive it? You know, the Boston Red Sox were everyone’s darling team too. And then they won the World Series and now everyone thinks they and their fans are just a bunch of smarmy jerks.

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Regardless of how the rest of the country sees it (and who cares, really?) dealing with a Championship is new territory for the Saints and New Orleans, and it’s really been a lot of fun watching it all unfold.

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Screen grab taken from NOLA.com

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You know, I’ve had my fun taking jabs at NOLA.com and their (lack of) diverse online content, but I must say they are doing a bang-up job covering all things Super Bowl so far. Well, at least I thought as much until I saw them use a four-month-old photo taken by Jonathan Bachman on their front page (thumbnail on the bottom left-hand corner). That is, how you say?, bullshit.

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Of course, upon further examination it becomes apparent that the photo they stole from us is really a screen grab from a Saints tribute video that stole the photo from us first. Yes, that totally absolves a major metropolitan newspaper’s Web site from running an unaccredited photo from a credentialed photographer on their front page. Totally.

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Photo lifted from the fine folks at WWLTV.com

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A week after pigs flew through a Hell frozen over, the New Orleans Saints finally landed in Miami to begin on-site training for the Super Bowl. Well, most of the Saints finally arrived, that is. Six of them were already in Miami to attend the Pro Bowl, which they were voted into but (thankfully) had good reasons not to play in. At one point during the NFL Network broadcast, Michael Irvin was speaking to Jonathan Vilma and asked if he feels like he’s missing out on coming off the plane with his teammates. Vilma said it’s more important to disembark with his teammates back in New Orleans with a Super Bowl trophy.

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But what would Vilma and his five teammates do while when the rest of the squad arrived? If you think about it, it does seem like an awkward situation. All year Sean Payton and Co. have been preaching the line about team unity and effort. This Saints’ team is not about one player, or even the six that made it to the Pro Bowl. So how do you reconcile the fact that the Pro Bowlers are already in Miami because they’ve been selected as being more exceptional than their teammates? Dress them up as bellhops and greet the rest of the team when they pull up to the hotel, that’s how.

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As the stories from across the country start to pile up this Super Bowl week, one thing Saints fans will likely hear over and over is how Sean Payton is a “master motivator”. He’s a deeply cerebral student of the game and takes after his mentor, Bill Parcells, in using psychological tactics in all phases of the game. Payton, though, seems to have more of a loose streak than Parcells. This is a guy who played “Stand Up and Get Crunked” to get his players motivated in the locker room as well as giving every Saint a bat with the words “Bring the wood”. And now you see him dress up his star players as bell hops and greet the rest of the team in a move that almost certainly is meant to convey that those players wouldn’t have made it to the Pro Bowl if not for their teammates’ help.

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Now the Saints are all together and have six days to prepare for the biggest games of their lives. For a franchise that’s never been to the big game - and a city still coming to grips with their team’s new-found success - Payton sure is acting like a seasoned championship head coach. Forget that this is the Saints’ only Super Bowl appearance, Payton talks about veteran leadership and poise and he and his players will no doubt repeat the lines “we’re here to do a job” and “we have to finish strong” about one million times when asked how they’re dealing with the media spotlight.

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Being in a small market like New Orleans allows Payton and his players to somewhat fly under the radar nationally. Anyone whose worn black and gold for a game this season knows they have the undying affection of this city, so really, the trick for Payton is to keep his players focused at the task at hand, but loose enough to keep the pressure off. The New Orleans head coach just showed he can mix fun with hard work. Saints fans will love to see the hard work pay off with the party of a lifetime on Sunday.

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Now that the Saints are in the Super Bowl, Who Dats everywhere have to get ready for a seismic shift in the national perception of their team. They are no longer burdened by being one of the few franchises to never make it to the big game and they no longer must think of themselves as perennial losers. Oh, and all that wacky, local fandom that, over the all the years of losing has created some of the most memorable and inspiring fan-created Saints iconography? Yea, the NFL wants that dead.

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WWL is reporting that the NFL has sent cease-and-desist orders to a slew of local merchants selling merchandise with the words “Who Dat” or a black and gold fleur de lis. Per the WWL article:

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“I really thought the ‘Who Dat’ was something that belonged to the people more than to the Saints or to the NFL or anything else,” said Storyville co-owner Josh Harvey.

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According to NFL spokesman Dan Masonson, “Any unauthorized use of the Saints colors and other [marks] designed to create the illusion of an affiliation with the Saints is equally a violation of the Saints trademark rights because it allows a third party to ‘free ride’ by profiting from confusion of the team’s fans, who want to show support for the Saints.”

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Loyola Law School intellectual property professor Ray Arieaux said the ownership of ‘Who Dat’ may be a gray area.

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“Is there some unfair trade taking place because maybe the public does associate that with the Saints? The question is what does the public associate with ‘Who Dat,’” Arieaux asked.

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And the NFL isn’t the only company claiming ownership of the phrase.

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Yes it seems that the NFL is quick to jump into the fray when there’s Super Bowl-type money to be made, claiming ownership of a phrase that most likely originated on the radio. After all, how else would you explain the NFL waiting until this post-season to start cracking down? Either the NFL doesn’t watch its own games (unlikely) or didn’t care about local merchants profiting off of Who Dat merchandise because the Saints were never that good to begin with (most likely).

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This also speaks to a much bigger issue that Who Dats everywhere should start to take into account. As beloved as the Saints are, and as wholesome and pure people would like to believe their connection to the town is, the team and the NFL are corporate entities in the business of making a profit.

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“But the Saints are different! They’re the new America’s team!” some might say. True, the connection that the Saints have with this city is unique, but that has more to do with the whims of mother nature and the teams’ heartfelt response to relief efforts. And yes, the Saints and Carnival may be balancing the City budget, but that doesn’t make this situation any different than any of the hard-luck teams that came before and the profit they generated (for themselves) after historic wins.

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And if you’re still holding out judgment on this and think that the NFL will look past their greedy corporatism for the sake of the fans, realize that their is a precedent for such actions. Just look at the Boston Red Sox and how they treated their long-suffering fan base after winning their first World Series in almost 100 years. Touching, really.

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See that picture up there? That picture was taken within a second of Garret Hartley’s game-winning field goal kick split the uprights and sent the Saints to the Super Bowl. Of all the pictures I took on Sunday, this has to be my abosolute favorite. The hands in the air, the complete and utter joy on the faces of the fans and - the best part - the two men in front who have yet to react, still digesting the fact that their team is in the Super Bowl.

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Sorrow, disbelief, doubt, distress, joy, and elation; the finals minutes Sunday’s game ran a complete gamut of emotion and it was almost unbearable to watch Saints fans go through them. Follow the jump to check out all the emotions.

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Read the rest of this entry »

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Of all the multitude of reasons to look forward to this Sunday’s NFC Championship game in the Dome, this may be just a footnote, but it’s what makes New Orleans great. Supasaint along with all the Saints mascots featured on this calender (and many, many other Who Dats) will be second-lining from the Coors Light tailgate on South Rampart down Girod St. all the way to the Superdome starting at 4 p.m.

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Do it up, New Orleans.

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Screenshot lifted from WallStreetJournal.com

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I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that the Wall Street Journals’ core readership is not made up of NFL football fans. Or, at least, not fans of teams that play in New York, Minnesota or Indianapolis. How else to explain this ridiculous Jason Gay column?

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May I root against the New Orleans Saints?

No, you may not. Rooting against the Saints is like rooting against Elin Nordegren. They’re the Sentimental Team of the Century; if Dick Enberg were calling the NFC championship game, he’d need a trailer truck of Kleenex. Even if you forget everything that New Orleans endured during Hurricane Katrina—and how could you?—they’re the Saints, the former Aints, one of the most hard-luck franchises in the history of hard luck. Not long ago, newborns came into the world in New Orleans hospitals with tiny grocery bags on their heads.

If the Saints win this weekend, we expect the Louisiana Superdome to levitate off the ground, stop at Parkway Bakery & Tavern for a roast beef po’boy and fly straight to Miami for the Super Bowl.

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Yes, the Saints are indeed a feel-good story (especially for every Who Dat in the country) and this franchise has come a long way since it genetically altered newborn babies some years ago (or that’s how the story tells it, anyway), but have the Saints really reached a point where non-Who Dats would be remiss to root against them? A little competition never hurt anybody.

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Oh, and I get that the point of this article is to be funny. But it’s not. Also, it begs the question: why is the Wall Street Journal trying to be funny at all? They don’t have a dedicated sports or comedy section (sports is found under Life&Style) and they cater to people looking for serious news. Don’t they have way more important things to write about?

The local pro-pigskin team was in some sort of competition this weekend and many revelers took the street. Whether or not all of these things are related is still uncertain. Hit the jump for a TON of pics. (Oh, and unlike it has been all season, yours truly took these pics. Apparently Jonathan had better things to do.) Read the rest of this entry »

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Photo lifted from NFL.com

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They weren’t. At all. Was there ever a doubt how this game would turn out?

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OK, so when Tim Hightower scored that 70-yard touchdown on the opening play of the game, fans in the Superdome got a little restless. But the Saints’ responded emphatically. The offense responded by scoring on six of their first seven possesions. The defense responded by forcing a fumble, nabbing an interception and knocking Kurt Warner (briefly) out of the game. The end result, of course, was a blowout of epic proportions in a game that was only exciting to watch for Saints fans (not that they’re complaining).

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Just get ready for next week, when The Most Important Game In The History Of the Saints will be played. For now, on to the post-game feast:

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Hot Gumbo:

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• Drew Brees - The past month or so when Brees was putting up mere pedestrian numbers is all but forgotten now, isn’t it? He was 23-of-32 for 247 yards and three touchdowns. He spread the ball effectively (six receivers notched catches) and, surprisingly enough, did it all by completing just one pass of more than 26 yards (the 44-yard flea-flicker touchdown pass to Devery Henderson).
• Reggie Bush - Sweet heavens to Betsy that fella had a helluva game! In a performance tha should shut up his detractors (present company included) for at least the time being, Bush turned in the performance of his career: 217 all-purpose yards and two highlight reel touchdowns that all but destroyed any hope the Cardinals had of winning. Just check out this run. It’s almost like he’s trying to earn all that money he’s making!
• Sean Payton - First words that come out of his mouth when he reached the post-game podium: “So much for being rusty.” Payton has plenty of reason to get all egotistical and smarmy, the sporting press has been recently questioning his team’s effort, talent and desire following three-straight losses to end the season. He respodned by calling one of the best games of the year. It was balanced (34 runs, 32 passes), creative (again, that amazing flea-flicker) and exposed the Cardinals’ 23rd-ranked defense for the weak unit that it is.
• Darren Sharper - Oh where oh where had Mr. Sharper disappeared to in the last few weeks of the season? It seemed as if the Saints could no longer rely on him to come up with the big play like they used to. Then there he was today, recovering that Arizona fumble in the first quarter that threw all the momentum to the Saints.
• Saints Defensive Line - Will Smith had an interception, Bobby McCray knocked Kurt Warner out for part of the game and, despite registering just one sack, never let the Cardinals passers get comfortable. As for that first play, “you don’t win or lose a game on the first play,” Jonathan Vilma said.
• Gregg Williams - Because I could list almost every New Orleans’ defensive players here, why not put the guy that put them in the position to win. His game plan did what the Packers’ second-best pass defense couldn’t do last week: contain the Cardinals’ passing game. Though Cardinals passers combined for 266 yards, Arizona did not have a passing touchdown and had just two pass plays go over 20 yards. Oh, and after Hightower’s 70 yard rushing touchdown to start the game, the Cardinals had just 31 rushing yards. That’s very good.
• Marques Colston - Six catches for 83 yards, a touchdown and more than a few of them jaw-dropping. Eat up, Marques!
• Devery Henderson - Just four catches but they were for 80 yards and a touchdown. That’s good enough for Gumbo.

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Spoiled Crawfish:

• Tim Hightower - I bet he thought he was going to have a hell of a day after taking the first play of the game to the house. But as they say, it’s not how you start the game, it’s how you finished. He had just 17 rushing yards after that.
• Larry Fitzgerald - If only for the fact that every passing play seemed like a disaster waiting to happen with him on the field. Oh, and his dad cut in front of me in line at halftime in the media dining room. Not cool.
• Matt Leinart - Replaced the injured Warner at the end of the first and second halves and didn’t completely fall apart. That was disappointing to see, really.
• Anyone Who Picked Against the Saints in this Game - You know who you are.

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Room-Temperature Abita:

• Kurt Warner - Granted, he plays for the other team and, for a second there, it seemed like he was going to go pass-for-pass with Brees. But just being able to come back and play after that crushing hit by McCray earns this man a beer.
• Deuce McAllister - He led the team on the field and acted as honorary captain for the coin toss. It’s a shame he had to do it all without getting to even put on pads.
• Brad Pitt - Hey! Look! He was on the sidlines! With a goatee! Can he be the mayor now?
• Post-Game Media - For spending so much time trying to figure out why Reggie Bush came out of the tunnel holding a baseball bat (If you want to know, Payton gave out a bunch of them with the words “Bring the Wood” on them to represent what the team’s mentality should be for the game) even after Reggie Bush explained it. Twice. And they say journalism is dying.