Top 10 Saints - Vikings Takeaways

10) For the Vikings... when you are giving snaps to Greg Lewis and Greg Camarillo, you no longer have a deep and dangerous wide receiving corps. Come back soon, Sidney Rice. Bernard Berrian really needs to stop letting Javon Walker wear his jersey.

9) If Garrett Hartley hits either field goal, my Saints +5 pick would have been a whole lot more lucrative. Or, well, at all. Prick.

8) Betting the over was more or less a loss from the second quarter on. For as little pressure as the Vikings got on Drew Brees, and as banged up as their secondary was coming into this game, it's really surprising that the Saints weren't able to put up twice the points they did in this game; "credit" big drops by Marques Colston and Robert Meachem.

7) Adrian Peterson looks a lot more ordinary when his offensive line is reshuffled and not very effective. At least he didn't put it on the carpet in this one, or look like he was in any danger of doing so.

6) In Pierre Thomas and Reggie Bush, the Saints have two backs that look like they have a ton of talent, but only in space. If you need a back to break a tackle, the Saints don't have one.

5) You are not allowed, on national television, to note that Brett Favre didn't have cohesion with his wideouts or stamina in his performance, because he doesn't work hard enough in the off-season. Which you'd kind of think would be a necessary part of playing a ferociously competitive game at an advanced age. But Brett's such a kid out there!

4) It didn't really matter, since his defense got him no stops at the end of the game, but Brad Childress learned everything he knows about clock management from Andy Reid. It was not a long lesson.

3) The Giants let Jeremy Shockey go to great sturm und drang from their fan base. No one noticed when they lost Visanthe Shiancoe. And he's clearly the better player. The lesson: no one knows anything.

2) On some level, I haven't been looking forward to the start of this NFL season. Part of it is that I'm not sold on how good my team will be this year; Kevin Kolb's got some growing pains to go through, the defense isn't experienced enough yet, and I can't shake the feeling that the weak 2009 draft will doom them once the injuries hit. And when the rematch of a classic NFC championship game is a 23-point snoozefest that ends with kneeldowns? Not exactly encouraging.

1) At what point does New Orleans get to be just another city that has a football team? Because I'm pretty sure the people who live there are well and truly tired of being everyone's pity party and second team by now. They won the Super Bowl; they are supposed to get to gloat and be insufferable. Let's give them that right, OK?