McCown says Saints are close to winning

Carolina Panthers’ Ted Ginn (19) catches a pass in front of New…

Each team had three first-half possessions.

New Orleans Saints’ Marques Colston (12) drops a pass as he is hit… On the play downfield that caused Cam Newton to come up angry, where he was hit late out of bounds, the one thing that the referee stated was, “You’re not old enough for that kind of call”.

Cam Newton finished the day 20-of-31 passing for 315 yards and two touchdowns along with a victory with the Carolina Panthers.

-RUSH DEFENSE: C. Historically, the Saints have had trouble stopping Panthers running back Jonathan Stewart. As opposed to the offense, the defense did not give the New Orleans Saints a chance to win.

“We have to know that we’re not that far away”, McCown said.

Under different circumstances, as in if the Saints had won a game before this week, the notion that they went down to the wire with journeyman backup Luke McCown at quarterback might be palatable.

And that’s become ever so apparent with the New Orleans Saints three weeks into the 2015 season. Spiller was not too active in the game on Sunday, but he should continue to get more work after returning from an injury. Brees had stood before the gathered media with his arm in a sling and a tight-clenched jaw. Ingram has rushed for just 77 yards on 25 carries in two games, but the Heisman Trophy victor has hauled in 11 passes for 103 yards. A record of 0-3 is still 0-3.

Blandino said Monday that Hochuli was right in not throwing a flag, because Newton was outside the pocket and on the run when he threw. “I didn’t think you had to have seniority to get a personal foul”. Newton somersaulted his way into the endzone against the Texans, on a play that has since gone viral and definitely given credence to the “Super Cam” moniker. Newton then faked the handoff up the middle and rolled to his left on a quarterback bootleg and scored easily. “It’s unfortunate that we had an opportunity to play better, and that’s the thing that we pretty much got across from our guys”.

The athletic 6-foot-5, 245-pound quarterback faked the handoff into the line and rolled to the left and coasted into the end zone for the 35th rushing touchdown of his career, tying him with Steve Grogan and Randall Cunningham for seventh-most in National Football League history among quarterbacks.

New Orleans got on the scoreboard first, on the very first drive of the game, when Zach Hocker booted through a 30-yard field goal, capping off a 12-play, 67-yard drive, to take a 3-0 lead at the 9:03 mark of the opening quarter, which turned out to be the only points of the period. The start he missed against the Panthers was the first start that he has missed since 2006, when he joined the Saints organization. “I plan to and expect to start on Sunday but if I don’t we’re in good hands with Luke (McCown)”.

“But our margin of error isn’t that good to overcome”.

In the fourth quarter, Newton led the Panthers on an eighty-eight yard drive that took four minutes off the clock ending in a thirteen yard touchdown run by Superman extending the lead to 27-16. Newton and Olsen combined on a 52-yard pickup in which Brandon Browner was beaten badly by Olsen.

The Saints were unable to do anything and had to punt back to the Panthers. “We’ve just got to keep building around them with another solid draft class”. “It’s not worth going 0-3, but at the same time we still have high hopes in this locker room”.

He also questioned the controversy that surrounded the play.

“I was really baffled by what was said to me”.

“I thought (McCown) showed a lot of poise and I was really proud of the way he played”, New Orleans coach Sean Payton said.