NFL: Saints, Chase Daniels Top Cardinals 17-10 in Hall of Fame Game

The NFL is finally upon us. After all the offseason moves, the OTA’s and training camp we finally have football back and even if it’s just preseason ball, it’s ball nonetheless.

One of the biggest, if not the biggest stroyline coming into this season is bounty gate and the New Orleans Saints pay-for-play system that was discovered by the NFL. Sean Payton, Jonathan Vilma and a cast of other were handed stiff penalties and the question instantly posed when all of that went down was how well would the Saints play in spite of this.

The answer is — eh.

It is just the preseason so everything needs to be taken with a serious grain of salt. Drew Brees only threw five passes before handing the ball over to the backups and that went for the rest of the team. But even though Brees was only out there for barely any of the game, he still managed to get things off to a great start going 4 for 5 and 41 yards.

The quarterback that should get the attention is backup and former Missouri starter Chase Daniels who in Brees place went 15 for 20 and threw for over 200 yards and a touchdown.

The touchdown came on a four yard pass to Tavaris Cadet. Mark Ingram scored the first points of the game in the first quarter, barreling in from a yard out.

As impressive as the Saints backup quarterbacks were, the Cardinals had mediocre debuts from their rotation of signal callers. Starter Kevin Kolb completed just one pass while the rest of the group that went under center combined for just 10 completions on 21 attempts. Arizona sort of made up for the lack of throwing production by rushing for over 100 yards combined on the ground.

Alfonso Smith took the brunt of the production rushing for 43 yards and touchdown.

The big question on everyone’s mind though is how did the Saint’s defense play? The answer is: it’s the preseason so it doesn’t matter. Had they given up 40 points, that would seem like it mattered but it still would be barely relevant. We’re talking about backups playing here. But even though it was just reserves most of the time, the Saints defense looked good. They held the Cards to just a touchdown before halftime and got to the quarterback 3 times with Corey White leading the team in tackles on the night.

If nothing else, take away from this game that the countdown to actual football has begun. This time next month we will be prepping ourselves for the Cowboys and Giants on Thursday and then a full slate of games the following week. As for the preseason, teams like the Cardinals have some kinks to work out and the more teams that kick off their exhibition schedule, the more we will find teams that aren’t quite ready to compete.