Table of Contents
For those who came while others were leaving:
Beth, Meghan and Connor,
the coaches, players and staff of the New Orleans Saints
and all the brave and generous souls
whove helped to revive
New Orleans and the Gulf Coast
my home team
INTRODUCTION
WHEN THEY REALLY LOVE you in New Orleans, they have their own unique ways of saying so. If a great trumpet player dies, people dont get all mournful. They dance in the streets with brightly colored umbrellas, then slide the dearly departed into a concrete tomb a couple of feet off the ground.
Well, Im not ready for my own jazz funeral. Not yet. But Im pretty sure I have now experienced the next-best thing: riding down St. Charles Avenue on a giant Mardi Gras float, parading with a bunch of guys I love and admire and some of the hottest brass bands on Earth while hundreds of thousands of appreciative people yell, clap, cheer, wave signs, weep openly and call out our names.
They were cheering for their team.
They were cheering for their city.
They were cheering for themselves.
And we were cheering right back at them.
How many people turned out for the New Orleans Saints Super Bowl Victory Parade? Nobody knows for certain. Attendance isnt taken at Mardi Gras parades. Eight hundred thousand? The media estimates went as high as a million. Either way, thats really saying something in a city whose official population is in the mid-300,000s, down a quarter since Hurricane Katrina, a metro area of a million and low change. Basically, nobody stayed home.
I know what I saw from my float as we inched through the crowds: men, women and children, fifteen and twenty deep, a swirling sea of black and gold along the entire 3.7-mile route from the Louisiana Superdome through the Central Business District, out and back down Canal Street, to Mardi Gras World on the Mississippi River.
Thank you! they screamed.
Were back, baby!
New Aaaaw-lins!
New Orleans may not be the swiftest when it comes to amassing Super Bowl victories. But let me tell you: This city knows how to throw a parade. It was hard to imagine anything like this in any other city, this category 5 outpouring of gratitude and love. Babies in tiny Saints hats, giggling and waving. Grown women shouting the universal Saints hello: Who dat? Who dat? Burly men hugging one another. Kids rushing up for autographs. One old man in a Deuce McAllister jersey was standing by a blue police barricade on Howard Avenue, tears running down his face. Three Catholic nuns at Canal and Baronne were so ecstatic they were jumping up and down.
These were the people wed been playing forpeople whod lost so much and struggled so valiantly, literally crying tears of joy. Theyd lived though unthinkable hardship: losing their homes, being scattered across the country, some of them seeing their relatives drown. They came from every neighborhood and every background. Relative newcomers and people whose families have been in Louisiana for centuries. Black people. White people. People in such elaborate costumes, you couldnt tell who they were. All of them were united in triumph now.
Many had brought signs from home. These werent preprinted placards. These were handwritten sentiments, direct and personal. Bless you, Boys!! Only yo mama loves you more than we do! Our City, Victims to Victors. Baylen Brees, will you marry me? Baylen is Drews baby son.
These were the people Jimmy Buffett was talking about when he called New Orleans the soul of our country. They have been so kind to us. I truly have come to treasure them.
The people of this region lived through the most devastating natural disaster in American history. Eighty percent of their city was flooded when the levees broke. Theyd lost their jobs. People theyd known, people they loved had been forced to leave and werent coming back. Government had failed them at every level. The media had grown bored and moved on. And yet these people still had not lost their will to celebrate. Their spirit made me care deeply about a place I had barely known before. Their courage inspired a struggling football team all the way to the Super Bowl.
And here they were, standing shoulder to shoulder on this raw New Orleans night. Everything in New Orleans gets a name in a hurry. This was either Dat Tuesday or Lombardi Gras. Clearly, we were all locked together, city and team.
Reggie Bush looked totally Hollywood in dark sunglasses and a thousand-watt grin, throwing black-and-gold Saints beads and stuffed minifootballs from the running backs float. He and Pierre Thomas shared a microphoneand some impromptu raps for the crowd. Tough-guy tight end Jeremy Shockey turned suddenly bashful as people started chanting his name. Darren Sharper, Tracy Porter and others from the secondary rode a float with a pirate theme. That seemed right, given how often they ended up stealing the other teams ball. Thomas Morstead and Garrett Hartleyour young punter and young kicker, whose combined ages added up to minerode on a float borrowed from the all-female Krewe of Muses. Appropriately, it featured a giant shoe. Garrett kept jumping off the float, hugging and high-fiving the people he passed.
Tom Benson, the teams eighty-two-year-old owner, was the first to reach historic Gallier Hall, where the local politicians were waiting with elaborate champagne toasts. Hail, Saints! Hail, Saints! Drink up! Mayor Ray Nagin called out.
This win is for the people of New Orleans and Louisiana, Mr. Benson said.
A grinning Drew Brees, our phenomenal quarterback and the Super Bowl MVP, rolled through the streets surrounded, as he often is, by his offensive line. Their float had a giant head of Bacchus, the Roman god of drinking and wine. Drew was tossing so many minifootballs, some people in the crowd grew alarmed: Was he putting his carefully repaired shoulder at risk? But Drew was feeling no pain. On this night, the deadly accurate passer, whod hit a record thirty-two of his thirty-nine Super Bowl attempts, was aimingoh, just anywhere.
Hows the Who Dat Nation feel tonight? he called out to the screaming crowd, his question greeted with a giant roar. New Orleans, we love you, baby!
I rode with my assistant coaches on a Smoky Mary superfloat borrowed from the Krewe of Orpheus. Joe Vitt and Gregg Williams and Pete Carmichael and Big Dan Dalrymple and the others. I wanted all of them there. My wife, Beth, rode too. So did our children, Meghan and Connor. I believe in making these things a family affair. After what my family had been through with me, they deserved this ride at least as much as I did.
But the star of our float was the Vince Lombardi Trophy. Id had the trophy with me since Sunday night in Miami when NFL commissioner Roger Goodell handed it to Mr. Benson and he handed it to me. The trophy is a regulation-size, sterling-silver Tiffany football in the kicking position. It is the most prestigious prize we have in our gamesomething most New Orleans Saints fans had never expected to see up close. Id gotten some grief in the media for admitting Id slept with the trophy the night we won. More like Id passed out next to it. Id even joked that I might have drooled on Vince. You know what? Maybe I did. But now, here I was, standing in front of this roaring crowd, holding this seven-pound piece of hardware over my head, hugging it, kissing it, waving it and shaking it for the crowd, pumping the trophy in the air. People understood immediately what it meant. It was an amazing symbol of triumph over adversity, a reminder of how far this team and this city had come. I wanted everyone to get a piece of that silver football.
