Raiderdamus: The following is a work of satire and humor about the Las Vegas Raiders. It may contain offensive language and imagery and as a result it should not be read by anyone.
Greetings, Raider Nation! It is I, the World’s Greatest Hermit, the Sultan of Sages, and the finest football-focused humorist on the Internet. “Humorist” is, of course, a word meaning “a comedian who is not funny.” I come to you today exultant, fresh off a correct prediction of a Raiders victory over the lowly Houston Texans. The Raiders have a long way to go in their quest for the playoffs, and I have many more weeks to make sure your Saturday is full of laughter and joy. And if not those things, then at least you can call me names on Twitter, and that should make you feel better.
Raiderdamus’ Saturday Foretelling: Raiders vs. Saints
Las Vegas will begin their two-game stint out East on Sunday, facing two teams that are not particularly good. In the spirit of tradition, I’ve once again asked the Great Beyond for his opinion regarding the upcoming game. Here is the message I received:
“See, I told you the Raiders were going to play with their food. They played down to Houston’s level for three quarters until they remembered the Texans suck. Anyway, who you got this week? The Saints?
There comes a time when the fans of a particular team look at the decisions made by that team and assume that the team must know something they don’t. Jets fans believed this even as their team flubbed draft after draft until they figured it out in the last three years. Fans assume these guys are in charge of a football team, so they must know something about how to run a football team.
Fans assume that, since they themselves have a job they are at least competent at, the people running their favorite football team must be competent as well. The Saints are proof that this is not true and that the people running football teams are just as big a pile of idiots as you imagine them to be. Saints fans may believe their team to be a top-quality franchise because they lucked into Sean Payton and Drew Brees after the Chargers discarded him. I tell you, nay, the Saints are as garbage as they ever were.
Futility In Football
When we think of futility in football, the Browns often come to mind. But in the 50s, the 60s, and the late 80s, the Browns were good. Prior to Brees, the Saints had existed since 1967 and had never been good. It is a popular thing amongst Browns, Lions, and other fans of similarly crappy teams to wear a paper bag over their heads at the stadium. Saints’ fans literally invented this.
The Saints were nicknamed the Aints because it was commonly understood that they “Ain’t ever gonna win jack s***.” And in fact, they did not, until the 2009 season, in which local hero Peyton Manning threw a touchdown pass to Tracy Porter, lifting the Saints over the Colts in the Super Bowl. For many years, Saints fans filled the Superdome each week because it was the only place in New Orleans you could be assured of not getting shot.
The Saints knew in recent years that Brees was on the doorstep of retirement. But did they draft a young blue-chip quarterback in preparation for this, as the Packers did so many years ago? Did they bring in a hotshot offensive coordinator to keep the machine running smoothly? No and no. Instead of doing the smart things, they promoted failed Raiders head coach Dennis Allen and brought in failed Buccaneers quarterback Jameis Winston, with the belief that having eye surgery would suddenly make him a good quarterback. Now that Jameis is injured, they are rolling with Andy Dalton. Ask Cowboy fans how that goes.
Raiderdamus: The Moses Of Quarterbacks
Andy Dalton is the Moses of quarterbacks. If you want your team to wander the desert for forty years, he’s your guy. He may lead you in the direction you want to go, but he will not take you there. Winston is more like Bill Clinton. Early on, he got by on charisma, talent, and luck, but his inability to treat women with respect led to his downfall. Later on, you see him on TV as a sallow, empty husk of his former self, and your children ask you, “Who is that?” And you can only say that he used to be someone important.
Winston is proof that you are only young once, but you can be immature forever. The Saints also have Taysom Hill, who is more like Air Bud. You can look at him and know he’s not supposed to be out there doing what he’s doing, but dammit he’s doing it, and there’s nothing in the rules that says he can’t, so people just roll with it.
Despite this wealth of talent and experience at the quarterback position, the Saints were one of the teams that pursued Deshaun Watson this offseason. It used to be that if you willingly employed one well-known sex offender, you were the Pittsburgh Steelers. Now if you’re keen on employing two, you’re the Saints, and if you employ thousands, you’re the Catholic Church. Saints owner Gayle Benson famously made the Saints PR department assist the Archdiocese of New Orleans in preparing their defense of the approximately 57 priests accused of unspeakable crimes in 2018. She must have wanted to keep them out of prison so they could play quarterback for the Saints.
The Saints are used to be being on the wrong side…
The Saints are used to being on the wrong side of the law. In 2009, the Saints played Brett Favre’s Vikings in the playoffs, and anyone who watched that game surely noticed that the Saints were really giving Favre the business down there. That was no coincidence, as it was found that the Saints and defensive coordinator Gregg Williams had set up a bounty system, giving out cash payments as a reward for injuring opposing players, of whom Favre was the first who noticeably was targeted.
The trauma caused by the beating Favre took caused him to later send dirty pictures to a cheerleader, star in bad Wrangler jeans commercials, and steal money from the poor for a new volleyball arena. The Saints had apparently tried to do the same thing to Kurt Warner a week earlier, though if they’d simply waited a year, Father Time would have done him in for them.
The league threw the book at the Saints as best they could, suspending several coaches (including Payton) and front office people. The Saints have not been alleged to have deliberately injured anyone since then, except one guy who tried to get into Alvin Kamara’s elevator on Pro Bowl weekend in Las Vegas. As divine retribution for their lack of decorum, God put Tom Brady in Tampa Bay, Nickell Robey-Coleman on the Rams, and Stefon Diggs on the sideline, touchdown Vikings.
If the Saints were at full strength, it would be conceivable that they would beat the Raiders, as the Superdome is one of the most difficult places to play in the NFL. But these Saints are nowhere close to full strength, and even if they were, they still stink right now. Chalk one more up for the road team.
Raiders win, 30-23.”
*Top Photo: Hash Sports