Coming Back Stronger Part 15

"Drew, sometimes you focus so much on the result that you lose track of the process. You're thinking so much about winning, winning, winning that you forget the process it takes to win." Tom said something else that took me a while to understand at first. "There are certainly times when you can care too little. But there are also times when you can care too much."

Tom was right: we were putting too much pressure on ourselves. We had forgotten that the game of football is simple. Obviously you have to work hard and do whatever it takes to achieve your goals. But there's a point where you have to relax. You have to trust what you've learned and put your confidence in the people who have put you in your position. Once you've prepared as well as you can, it's time to relax and play. That releases the pressure to perform and allows you to be who you were meant to be.

There's a saying I love that goes like this: "The will to win means nothing without the will to prepare." In other words, you need to put as much emphasis on the process as you do on the result. It was time to get back to the basics and remember the process: one game at a time.

The message Coach Payton had for everybody was "Listen up, guys. Forget what everybody's saying. The media is going to try to tell you that no team has ever lost the last three games of the season and then come back and won the first playoff game. They'll give you every reason why resting players is the wrong decision. What you have to do is believe in what we're doing and trust the plan and the process. We're going to get our guys healthy and put ourselves in the best position to win the next game."

It's human nature at 130 to get carried away and somehow think we were ent.i.tled to make it to the Super Bowl. But that's not how things work. We still had to take care of business, one game at a time. If we didn't win the first playoff game, the whole season would have been for nothing. We had a sense of responsibility to prepare and get ready. It was time to block everything else out and focus on the here and now.

This time the here and now came in the form of the Arizona Cardinals.

Chapter Seventeen.

The Road to the Super Bowl.

In the weeks before the playoffs, all we heard from outside the organization was that no team had gone to the Super Bowl on the heels of three regular-season losses. People speculated about which team would show up-the lackl.u.s.ter team from the past few weeks or the dedicated guys who had been finis.h.i.+ng strong the majority of the season. We did our best to zero in on what our coaches were saying and ignore the questions and media hype.

We watched the first round of the playoffs with interest because the winner of the PackersCardinals game would face us in the Superdome. It was a wild game with a lot of back-and-forth, and Arizona eventually pulled out a win in overtime. We knew they had expended a lot of energy on that game, emotionally and physically. But if anyone was up to the challenge, it was the Cardinals. They had gone to the Super Bowl the previous year, and their offense looked outstanding against Green Bay. We had a huge opportunity ahead of us, and it was time to get prepared.

In football and in life, it's amazing how many big results depend on the little things. When you're experiencing success, it's easy to gloss over those details. As the playoffs loomed ahead, we knew we couldn't afford to get sloppy. So we encouraged each other to look at the goal sheets we'd filled out at the start of the season. What were our team goals as an offense and a defense? What personal goals did we set? Each player looked in the mirror and asked, What can I do better? What do I need to do to fulfill my role on this team the best way possible? In any area we were coming up short, we needed to take specific steps to adjust and modify. When we took care of the process, the end result would take care of itself.

One of the little things we wanted to focus on in the matchup against Arizona was letting our presence be felt. Our goal was to make this the most physical game we'd played all season. At that point, it wasn't about the Super Bowl. We saw only Arizona.

Making Our First Statement.

As was the case in almost every big game that season, we got off on the wrong foot. On Arizona's first play from scrimmage, Tim Hightower took a handoff and ran through a big hole for a seventy-yard touchdown. That was a huge boost for Arizona, and we knew we couldn't let them capitalize on it or use it to set the tone for the rest of the game. It was time for our offense to answer the call.

We drove down the field, and with each play our intensity picked up. We tied the score on a short run by Lynell Hamilton. Then, on the very next play from scrimmage, our defense forced a fumble. Darren Sharper picked up the ball and returned it to the Cardinals' thirty-seven yard line. On that drive I found Jeremy Shockey in the end zone, propelling us into the lead. Reggie Bush kept the momentum going with a forty-six-yard touchdown run, and later he had an eighty-three-yard punt return for another touchdown. The Superdome went electric, and it was hard to hear anything in the stadium above the roar of the crowd.

We scored on five of our six possessions in the first half-finally, the fast start we'd been looking for. After seeing Arizona score fifty-one points the week before against Green Bay, we knew how important it was to score early and often.

We put the Cardinals away with a final score of 4514. We had made a statement to any team coming into our house that we were ready. They could forget those last three games of the regular season. We had trusted our process, even though it had been questioned by the talking heads on television and other people who were throwing in their two cents. We had proved something, and now we would be hosting the NFC Champions.h.i.+p Game for the first time in team history.

Destiny Beckons.

Based on records alone, the consensus was that the Vikings and the Saints were the best teams in the NFC. The Vikings had taken some heat for losing to Chicago, Arizona, and Carolina toward the end of their season, and everyone wondered how they would do against the surging Cowboys in the NFC divisional playoff. As it turned out, there was no need to worry: the Vikings beat the Cowboys 343. That win gave Minnesota a date with us in the Superdome.

There's no doubt Brett Favre is a great quarterback. He plays with pa.s.sion and heart every time he steps out on the field. He returned to the game and signed with Minnesota in 2009, and that season turned out to be one of his best ever. He had an all-star cast behind him too-the Vikings had a lot of weapons offensively, and their defense boasted one of the best pa.s.s rushes in the NFL.

Throughout the entire season, no team had scored a touchdown against Minnesota in the first drive of the game. We were determined to change that. After they scored on a run by Adrian Peterson, we answered with a screen pa.s.s to Pierre Thomas that he turned into a thirty-eight-yard touchdown. Was this a bit of foreshadowing about how the game would play out?

The champions.h.i.+p game was close all the way. After we tied it up 77, Favre threw to Sidney Rice for another touchdown. Then I hit Devery Henderson in the back of the end zone to tie things up again, 1414. That's how we went into the half.

In a game as tight as that one, every play, every decision, is critical. One turnover or one key completion can change the entire outcome of the game. In the second half, we got a big boost when Courtney Roby ran the opening kick back into Vikings territory for sixty-one yards. Pierre Thomas had a nine-yard run that put us up 2114. But the Vikings came right back with another touchdown by Adrian Peterson. The score was tied again, 2121.

Our defense came up big with a fumble recovery at the beginning of the fourth quarter. I hit Reggie Bush with a pa.s.s that was originally ruled just shy of the end zone. But after a review it was determined that as he spun around, the ball broke the plane of the goal before he went out-of-bounds. That put us up 2821. We took the ball away again, this time deep in our territory, but we were forced to punt and Favre brought the Vikings back downfield. With about five minutes to go, Adrian Peterson rushed for his third touchdown of the day.

We couldn't manage to score, and we gave the ball to the Vikings again. They began to drive and were gaining quality yards on every play. They were in our territory at third down and fifteen, with about twenty seconds left. They were just outside field goal range, and they needed one more completion to advance the ball and attempt a long field goal that would give them the lead with mere seconds left in the game.

Things weren't looking good for us, but somehow we knew we were going to win that game. The whole team felt like we were going to stop Minnesota. We didn't know how, but we were going to find a way. Then a "destiny moment" happened.

Favre scrambled to his right and threw back across his body to the middle of the field. He has probably thrown that pa.s.s a thousand times, but this time Tracy Porter jumped in front of the receiver and intercepted the ball. That was our moment; that was our opportunity.

We went into overtime and won the toss. Pierre Thomas had a good return that set us up at our thirty-nine yard line. We drove into Viking territory but were stopped on fourth and inches just outside their forty-two. Sean had a tough decision to make: Should we go for the first down? Or should we be conservative and punt? Going for it was risky because if we didn't make it, the Vikings would have a short field. But Sean had been making those gutsy calls all year. We went for it. Pierre Thomas leaped over the line, giving us the first down.

We kept moving the ball and got to the Viking twenty-two, well within field goal range. It was up to Garrett Hartley to make the kick, and no doubt he was having flashbacks to a game earlier that season. We were playing Tampa Bay, and he'd missed a critical fourth-quarter field goal. We'd a.s.sured him that we win as a team and lose as a team, but he'd taken it hard. And now here he was getting ready to kick again-oddly enough, from almost the exact location as he'd been against Tampa Bay.

Now the kick was magnified a thousand times. With this forty-yard field goal, we go to the Super Bowl. Without it . . . well, we didn't even want to think about that possibility.

Garrett stuck it right down the middle.

He told me after the game that the night before he had woken up at 2 a.m. and called his father to describe the dream he'd had. In his dream, he'd made a game-winning kick from the right hash thirty yard line. Now that is a vision! There's no doubt in my mind that the adversity he'd faced against Tampa a month earlier had given him the strength and focus to nail this one-in his dream and in reality.

The fans went wild. Confetti flew. People screamed and hugged each other with joy. Brett Favre came up to me to shake hands. He had put his heart and soul out on the field that day. He'd been knocked around pretty hard, and he looked spent. It's a bit artificial to try to have a meaningful conversation with an opponent in the midst of so many cameras and so much noise, and when the gravity of the game hasn't even set in yet. But I was able to tell him how much I admire him and what an honor it was to share the field with him. Just knowing I was able to experience that moment with one of the greatest of all time, in a setting like that, was a memory I'll treasure for a long time.

Mission Miami.

This dream was forty years in the making for the city of New Orleans. The fans had ridden the ups and downs of every season since 1967 but had never made it this far. And in the years since Katrina, the journey to the top of this mountain seemed loaded with even more meaning.

It had been four years of firsts. We snagged our first NFC South division crown. We hosted our first playoff game. We made it to an NFC champions.h.i.+p for the first time. In 2009 we were the number one seed for the first time ever. On top of that, it was our first time hosting and winning the NFC champions.h.i.+p. And of course, it was our first Super Bowl.

With each one of those firsts, people felt like they were part of something special. After all the losing seasons and the heartbreak of Katrina, their loyalty to their team and their city was paying off. I received a note from a man who had been a season ticket holder for forty-three years. He said he'd lived through the days of people wearing paper bags over their heads at games and calling the team the Aints. "Well, we ain't the Aints no more," he wrote.

The support from our fans wasn't confined just to the Superdome. They went with us as far as they could on our journey-and I mean that literally.

For our away games, we fly out of a private air terminal on charter flights. Traveling to and from the terminal, we have to drive down a half-mile-long frontage road off the highway. Starting in 2006 and continuing through 2009, fans would park along that road after an away game and wait for us. Win or lose, it didn't matter-we could count on them being there. It became a block party of sorts, and they brought food, played music, talked, wore their Saints jerseys, and had a good time. As we drove by, we'd roll down our windows, honk, and wave at them.

In 2009 the block party became supersized. As our winning streak continued, there were ten thousand fans waiting for us, then twenty thousand, and eventually as many as thirty thousand. It took us about ninety minutes just to make it down that half mile. It was like a parade-people surrounded our cars and leaned in to get autographs and touch us. They handed us songs they'd written about the team that incorporated players' names into the lyrics. They even threw baked goods like pralines and cookies into our windows. They showed their appreciation in every way imaginable. After a while, though, the crowd got too big, and there were safety concerns. The police put up barricades to keep people off the road, but that didn't stop us from honking and waving.

Now those fans were willing us on to "Mission Miami." No fans deserved it more.

Buildup to the Big Day.

Coach Payton warned us about the two weeks leading up to the Super Bowl. He had been there before, when he was an offensive coordinator with the Giants and they made it to Super Bowl x.x.xV. Still, there was no way to truly prepare us for the whirlwind we were about to step into.

Most people don't realize that you have responsibilities to the league leading up to the game-the NFL requires an hour's worth of media every day. And usually that media time is in the middle of the day, so you have to structure your schedule around it. On the Tuesday before the game (which is typically a day off during the regular season), pretty much the whole day is taken up by media. We do the team picture in uniform and then get interviewed by reporters.

That probably doesn't sound like a big deal to most people, but when you're routine oriented like I am and you're getting ready for the pinnacle game in your sport, it's enough to make you sweat. I don't just have a routine I follow on game day; I have a routine I follow the entire week before a game. That preparation includes things like lifting weights, watching film, going to practice, throwing the ball, and going to sleep at a certain time. I don't let anything get in the way. With the new Super Bowl week schedule, I had to adjust and figure out alternate times to fit everything in.

Plus, there was the family aspect to consider. Brittany and Baylen were in the hotel with me, so I modified my routine to spend time with them. That discipline of being with my family is good for me-it keeps things in perspective and prevents me from overworking. My job is important to me, but I never want it to compromise the time I spend with my family.

I called a couple of friends before the game and asked their advice on how to handle the Super Bowl hoopla. Kurt Warner wears a Super Bowl ring, and I appreciate his outlook on life. His advice to me was to embrace the whole experience. A lot of guys see the media and the attention as intrusions, but he told me I had a great story to tell. As a team, we'd had an unbelievable season, and there was a lot to be excited about.

"Don't see it as a ch.o.r.e," he encouraged me. "Just embrace it." Kurt gave me some practical tips, like having the offensive line dinner early in the week before the crowds descended. Normally we had dinner with the big fellas on Thursday night, but that week we scheduled it for Monday instead. Finally, he encouraged me to enjoy the experience with my teammates and with Brittany and Baylen.

Kurt's words helped me go in with the mentality that all the requests and questions were an opportunity to highlight other players who don't get enough credit and to talk about our great fans and the city of New Orleans. To my surprise, I had a number of opportunities to talk about my faith as well.

Then I spoke with Trent Dilfer, another Super Bowl winner. He counseled me to come up with a routine around the new schedule and stick to it. He also advised me to pace myself, especially early in the game, and to savor the moment whenever I could.

When game day arrived, I tried to make things as normal as possible. We ate breakfast together as a team and then met at 10:00. The meeting typically lasts about an hour, and then from 11:00 until 3:00, we're on our own. The coaches don't want us out on the town, so that means we're in the hotel. This is a glimpse of what my pregame routine is like: I come to the room, study the game plan, walk through or visualize plays, and then order a sandwich and watch a movie. That's what I've found works best to get me mentally prepared for the game. On Super Bowl Sunday, instead of watching a movie, I spent time with Baylen and Brittany. I was as prepared for that game as I'd ever been, and it was a treat to just be with my family.

I never watch any of the pregame hype. I don't want anything the announcers say to influence what I'm thinking. It doesn't matter if the critics think we're going to win or lose-the important thing is for me to get my head in the right place. I would need my focus in this game more than ever.

Game Time.

Sean's description of the Super Bowl-that it's "made for TV"-turned out to be on the money. The pregame lasted forever. We returned to the locker room and then sat for an eternity. Normally you prepare for the game, head onto the field, flip the coin, and play ball. But in the Super Bowl we came out of the locker room and waited. Then we watched the other team come out and waited some more. Queen Latifah sang a couple of songs, and the Walter Payton Man of the Year Award was presented. Carrie Underwood sang the national anthem, we watched the flyover, and they broke down the stage at the fifty yard line. It was nonstop distraction. We had to work to stay focused.

I was grateful for Trent's advice to pace myself. Sean reiterated that sentiment, warning that it would be easy to get pumped and then come cras.h.i.+ng down thirty minutes later, before the game even started. You haven't taken a snap yet, and you're already exhausted. You just can't maintain that emotional high.

Finally we went onto the field for the coin toss. It was time to play Super Bowl XLIV.

As much as you prepare, you can't escape the b.u.t.terflies. The Colts had a little edge in that department since most of their players had been in this spot in 2006. For most of the Saints, it was our first time in the game, and it took until late in the first quarter to finally breathe and say, "Man, it really is just a football game, like any other game." I love the scene from Hoosiers where the team from Hickory is playing in a huge arena. The coach has them measure the foul lane and the rim height, and they see that the floor has the exact dimensions as their own gym. Sure, there was a lot of hype surrounding this game in Miami, and there were 106 million people watching. But the field was still a hundred yards long just like in other games, and we were throwing around the same eleven-inch pigskin.

We'd prepared our whole lives for this moment. We knew how good our team was. We trusted that there was a bigger plan than what we could see. All we had to do was trust one another and play our game with great effort and full confidence.

On our first possession we went three and out. Our philosophy was to take a shot with the first third-down call of the day if we had the right matchup. We did, but my blood was pumping and I overthrew Robert Meachem by a hair. We just needed to calm down, find our rhythm, and get our legs underneath us. Peyton Manning drove the Colts down the field and hit a few pa.s.ses, and they scored a field goal. We did a little better on our second possession, picking up a first down and moving to midfield, but the drive stalled and we had to punt again. At the end of the first quarter, Peyton found Pierre Garcon in the end zone. That put them up 100.

This was not the quick start we'd been hoping for. Being two scores behind the Colts is not where you want to be, especially since their defense thrives off of opponents feeling like they need to be too aggressive and then overreacting. We needed to stay the course, trust the game plan, and execute to perfection. We belonged here.

Before the game, Coach Payton had given us some key words of advice: "Don't look at the scoreboard until the end of the game." We could come back. We simply needed to focus on each play, each series, one at a time. It didn't matter if we were up or down. Just trust the play and react.

We kicked a field goal on our next drive to make it 103, but we knew we needed more momentum going into halftime. We got the ball back and methodically drove down to their three yard line. We had first-and-goal from there after a big catch from Marques Colston, and I figured we would punch it into the end zone. Three plays later we were still a yard and a half short. Sean made a critical decision. On fourth down, instead of attempting the field goal, he took the risk to try for a touchdown. The Colts defense stopped us short. We all agreed with the call-we just didn't get the job done.

Now the momentum s.h.i.+fted to the Colts. We'd had the chance to tie it up, and instead we came away with no points. There were less than two minutes left in the half, and Peyton Manning is one of the best in the league at the two-minute drill. Surprisingly, Indianapolis wasn't able to convert; our defense held strong. We still had three time-outs, and we called one after both their second and third downs. They went three and out, and we had the ball with thirty-five seconds left. We drove downfield and hit a field goal as time expired, swinging the momentum back in our direction. We needed that s.h.i.+ft to give us the guts to pull off what we were planning for the second half.

All week Sean had been talking about the onside kick play. "It's not a matter of if we're going to call an onside kick; it's when." So when he called it in the locker room at halftime, we knew it was coming. We were ready. Sean wasn't scared to call an aggressive play like that himself, and he also instilled in us the confidence that we could pull it off. He not only tells you, "We're gonna do it," but he also says, "It's gonna work." When the second half started, it gave us an edge. They don't even know what's coming.

Our special teams executed the kick well, and there was a mad scramble for the ball at the bottom of the pile. There was never a thought in our minds of What happens if we don't get the ball? We were getting that ball. It was a scrum all right. But we got it.

When we get an opportunity like that, our offense knows we have to turn that recovery into points. And that's exactly what we did. I hit several pa.s.ses right in the middle of their zone, and Pierre Thomas took a screen pa.s.s and did what he does best-bobbing and weaving through defenders and breaking tackles before finally leaping into the end zone. We pulled ahead, 1310.

The energy had s.h.i.+fted in our direction. And best of all, we had kept the Colts offense on the sidelines.

There was still a lot of football left to be played, though. With a combination of pa.s.sing and running, Indianapolis put together a ten-play drive and went ahead 1713 with a little more than six minutes left in the third quarter.

Now it was our job to respond, and we drove down for a field goal to bring us within one point, 1716. The Colts mounted a drive that took them into the fourth quarter. They made a crucial fourth down and two from our forty-six, but then their drive stalled. They set up for a fifty-one-yard field goal, but the ball sailed wide left. We would be getting the ball back with pretty good field position.

With the Colts' powerful offense, we needed to take advantage of every opportunity to score touchdowns. They had the ability to grind down the clock, and we couldn't risk coming up short at the final gun.

We methodically moved the ball downfield with a solid mix of runs and high percentage pa.s.ses. We were at the two yard line when Jeremy Shockey ran a quick slant and I stuck him right in the chest with the ball, away from the defender. He leaned across the goal line, putting us up 2217. While you usually just go ahead and kick an extra point after scoring a touchdown, in this situation there was no question: we were going for a two-point conversion.

Sean called a sprint-out pa.s.s to the right to Lance Moore. I stepped up to the line and immediately recognized that their defense was bringing all-out pressure. Just what we wanted. After getting the snap, I took five hard steps to my right. I looked up to see Lance sprinting toward the front pylon of the end zone. My throw wasn't perfect, but Lance made an incredible catch. Then he had the presence of mind to turn and get the ball across the goal line. As soon as he did, Colts defensive back Jacob Lacey kicked it out of his hands. The official on top of the play signaled that Lance didn't have full control and called it incomplete.

Lance has some of the best hands on the team. I looked at him and said, "You caught it, didn't you?"

"Yeah, I caught it!"

I went to the sideline. "Coach, he caught it."

After talking with Lance and some of the other coaches, Sean threw down the challenge flag. The replay showed that Lance had full possession of the ball and it crossed the goal line before it was dislodged. The officials reversed the ruling on the field; we were up 2417.

That was huge. If we hadn't scored those two points, the Colts could have taken the lead with a touchdown. Plus, the overturn of the call got us pumped up. With each play, we were feeling more and more like this was our game, like this was meant to be.

The Colts were on the march. The clock read 5:35-still enough time to come from behind. They were driving well, completing pa.s.ses, getting first downs. They'd proven they could do this in the past-we'd seen Peyton Manning lead his team downfield at pivotal points and score to tie or win many times. From the sideline, I wasn't watching the game like a spectator. I was mentally preparing what we'd do if the Colts scored a touchdown. If that happened, we would need to get the ball downfield quickly and kick a field goal to win. I rehea.r.s.ed possible plays for a two-minute situation in my head as I sensed the clock winding down. Three and a half minutes to go.

Suddenly I heard an ovation, and I looked up to see Tracy Porter running toward the end zone. He had stepped in front of a pa.s.s thrown on third down and five. Boom, he caught the ball and ran it back for a touchdown. The crowd went wild. I couldn't believe it. Our defense had done it again, and now we had a 3117 lead.

There was still enough time on the clock for the Colts to make things interesting. At this point they could possibly score and attempt an onside kick. I would not allow myself to lose focus-I was going to be ready for whatever might happen. They mounted an incredible drive to our five yard line. On fourth and goal we stopped them with forty-four seconds to go, and the offense rushed onto the field to take one final knee and run out the clock.

As I ran out to the huddle, I looked around at the field and the stands. One thing I've learned over the years is that you have to take time to enjoy the moment and the fruit of your labor. Those moments don't come very often, so when they do, you have to soak them in so you can remember them the rest of your life. We had worked too hard and the journey had been too long to let this pa.s.s. The fans were cheering louder than I'd ever heard them before. On the sideline, the guys were embracing each other and jumping up and down with joy. The Colts knew it was over. Time ran out. Our time had come. The Saints were the Super Bowl champions!

I gave all my linemen a hug-every one of them. They had given such a dominant performance. I had been sacked only one time during the whole game. You can talk about the MVP trophy all night, but without those guys doing their job, I wouldn't have had a chance to make those plays. "I love you guys," I said. "We did it."

It's those moments, those relations.h.i.+ps, that remind you, Man, this is what it's all about.

Back in 2006, when we'd made our failed run for the NFC champions.h.i.+p, Joe Vitt had said, "When we win a champions.h.i.+p together, we will walk together forever. n.o.body can ever take that away from you. There will always be a special bond between the men in our locker room because we'll know we did this together."

He was right. No matter what happens from here on out-ten years from now, twenty, thirty, or even fifty years-we can look back to that moment and those guys who made it happen. That season will be a part of us forever.