Nobody’s perfect, but it’s shocking for so many people to be so wrong about this. According to surveying conducted by NFL Pickwatch before kickoff on Sunday morning, 97% of experts picked the wrong team in Week 2’s New Orleans Saints versus Dallas Cowboys game. The Saints won instead, 44-19.
But it’s easy to see why there was so much confidence backing Dallas from neutral observers. The Cowboys were returning from last year’s playoffs and the Saints weren’t. Dallas was riding a 16-game win streak at home — one of the last quarterbacks to beat them inside AT&T Stadium in the regular season, Tom Brady, was on the FOX Sports broadcast for this game. The Cowboys were the easy pick here.
It goes to show you that the easy choice isn’t always the correct one. Many folks watching from home wrote off the Saints’ big Week 1 win because it happened against the lowly Carolina Panthers. We’re guessing it’ll be tough to write off this one now that the Cowboys team many of those viewers picked to win the Super Bowl got embarrassed just as badly as Carolina.
So what does that mean for the Saints? Expectations are higher now. They can’t rest on their laurels and take it easy from here. Every team left on their schedule is going to hope they aren’t the ones Alvin Kamara is breaking another record against, or that Tyrann Mathieu won’t be picking off their quarterback. Nobody wants to see Derek Carr strutting around their end zone. It’s on the Saints to make all those things happen anyway and continue winning over their doubters.
[lawrence-auto-related count=5]