New Orleans Saints

The Saints have several key 2013 additions to help the team rally from a disappointing 2012.

In today's edition of our New Orleans Saints Black and Gold Today show, host Larry Holder points out all of the positives at the start of OTA's for the team this year. Nakia Hogan comes on to talk about those positives and how the Saints will construct their new D-Line.

NFL draft could be moved out of New York in the future

He'll be paid about $8 million per year with the New Orleans Saints

He was selected to eight Pro Bowls in 13 seasons

December 30, 2012; New Orleans, LA, USA; New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees (9) throws against the Carolina Panthers during the second half of a game at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome. The Panthers defeated the Saints 44-38. Mandatory Credit: Derick E. Hingle-USA TODAY Sports OTA’s are officially underway for the New Orleans Saints. This means there are a few tidbits of information that are worth going over today as camp progresses. There is also some news coming out of the league office that Saints’ faithful may not be all that pleased with. Let’s take a look. New Orleans is Contender to Host Super Bowl in 2018 Per NOAL.com’s Pat Yasinskas: A potential bidder for Super Bowl LII in 2018 includes New Orleans. The Times-Picayune’s Jeff Duncan writes “New Orleans is expected to go ‘all in’ for the event, which would highlight the city’s yearlong tricentennial celebration.” Sean Payton is Pleased with 100 Percent Turnout Rate at OTA’s  Per Saints official website: “In the last five weeks, I think we had a really good turnout, we are at 100 percent (participation) right now with the offseason program. Tomorrow (Tuesday) we start with the OTAs (Organized Team Activities), it’s good to see these guys and last week we had the rookies in. That’s kind of a crash course for those guys to bring them up to speed as quickly as possible. But everyone is here so we are looking forward to getting started. Tomorrow is the first time we are really kind of doing some football team activities and I think guys are excited about that. The weight room and the conditioning element have gone very well.” NFL May Offer Cash Incentives to Players During Games at Pro Bowl Per Canal Street Chronicles’ Dave Cariello: Oh hey, great idea! But something feels familiar about all of this. Rewarding players with cash incentives for particular plays on the field? Seriously I swear I’ve heard this before. Damn I just can’t put my finger — HOLY $#!+ IT’S F***ING BOUNTYGATE! Those bastards have stolen our scandal and now they’re using it to fix their crappy all-star game! Yeah okay, I know I said just last week that we need to start putting the past behind us but c’mon this is ridiculous. Let’s be honest. The whole game show concept is just a pay for performance program in a more respectable package (Heeeeeere’s your host, Gregg Williams!) and incentive is just another word for bounty. Like Who Dat Dish? Let us know on Twitter @whodatdish or  on Facebook.

Once again, after almost 500 votes in the election to choose the next member of our New Orleans Saints Mount Rushmore replica, we still don't have a clear cut winner receiving a majority vote. So we're going to hold another runoff election. How Everyone Voted: Choosing the Second Member of Saints Mount Rushmore This time there were three names that separated themselves from the field in the initial election. I've rounded up those top three vote-getters - Sean Payton, Archie Manning, and Deuce McAllister - and put them all in a new poll below. This is it, all answers are final. The winner of this poll will officially become the third face on our mountain sculpture. Unlike our initial poll, this one will only be open for 24 hours so make sure you get your vote in. Once we have our winner, we'll remove his name from the list and begin the voting process all over again with a new poll to determine the fourth and final member. Whose face should be the third one included on our Saints Mount Rushmore? Vote now! More on the Mount: Saints Mount Rushmore: An Introduction Choosing the First Member of our Saints Mount Rushmore Choosing the Second Member of our Saints Mount Rushmore Poll Whose face should be the next one included on our Saints Mount Rushmore? Sean Payton Archie Manning Deuce McAllister 21 votes | Results

To be able to see some real NFL football we still have to wait patiently for a couple of months. Until then, everybody tries to get busy following other sports: that’s the only way to survive until September, I guess. You can choose (well, you don’t necessarily have to choose) between baseball, basketball, hockey and list goes on. As far as I’m concerned, my focus shifts to the world of poker. The World Series Of Poker are approaching and that’s how I came up with the idea for this piece. I wondered, are there any poker pros who resemble any New Orleans Saints players? Here’s the result of my speculations. So let’s…“Shuffle up and deal!” Marques Colston & Jason Mercier Quiet and lethal. These are the two words that immediately pop up in my mind when I think about those two guys. They are never ostentatious or pretentious in any way, they just work hard and when it matters the most they get the job done. Plus, they both came out of nowhere: Colston was a seventh-round pick in the 2006 NFL Draft (No. 252 overall) while Mercier defeated about 700 players and won his first major title in the first live tournament he played (NLHE Main Event of the European Poker Tour – Season 4 – in San Remo, Italy). Since the beginning they put up great numbers year in and year out. Mercier collected a couple of final table appearances in the EPT and in the NAPT circuits, won two WSOP bracelets in 2009 ($1,500 PLO) and 2011 ($5,000 PLO 6-max), finished in 4th place at the WSOPE Main Event in 2009 (£10.000 NLHE) and made nine final tables plus thirty-one WSOP money finishes. He dominated the EPT High-Roller events, became a PokerStars Pro in 2009 and won two WCOOP events (World Championship Of Online Poker) in 2010 ($1,050 NLHE) and 2012 ($10,300 8-Game High-Roller). Colston missed just one 1000-yards season in 2008 (when he played only 11 of the total 16 contests) and is currently the Saints’ all-time franchise leader in receiving touchdowns and total touchdowns with 58. He holds the record for most receptions in a player’s first two season (168) and he got his ring in SB XLIV, when he recorded seven receptions for 83 yards. Is there anything else that one should add? I think that numbers are doing all the talking for these two great players. Drew Brees & Doyle Brunson Okay, this was easy. Two good old gunslingers from Texas, they both achieved amazing results throughout their careers. It would take too long to list them all here. About Drew Brees…well, I don’t think there’s anything else I can say that the readers of this piece already know about DAT man, so I’ll move on to “Texas Dolly”. The ten-time WSOP champion turned the poker world upside down spreading the Texas Hold’ Em phenomenon and proving that poker is a skill game and not necessarily connected with criminal enterprises. In 1978 he published a book that is the all-time top-selling poker book, “Super System”; it is considered the bible of poker and its enormous success led to the publication of “Super System II” in 2004. He’s nowadays one of the most influential figures in the poker business and probably still one of the best face-readers in modern poker. They are tough too. The “godfather of poker” was a good basketball prospect at college but his career ended due to a serious leg injury from which he never fully recovered; he never gave up and instead of being a basketball pro he became a poker pro. The same kind of mindset helped Brees to heal from the devastating shoulder injury he got back in 2005: some doctors said he had little-to-no chance of playing pro football again and four years later they saw him in Miami, raising the Lombardi Trophy. Brees and Brunson are extremely talented players who take advantage of their natural abilities and their developed skills (through hard work and love for the game) to excel at what they do. They are the perfect example that if you work har

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Making the Pro Bowl more watchable has long been a goal of the NFL, which is why it was a topic of discussion at the league's spring meeting in Boston this week. As it stands now the game is boring, the players give minimal effort and nobody watches it. But Albert Breer reports that the league has some ideas to make things a little more interesting. Albert Breer of NFL Network reported that the league is considering elements that would make the game more like a game show, such as having incentives paid out during the game. Oh hey, great idea! But something feels familiar about all of this. Rewarding players with cash incentives for particular plays on the field? Seriously I swear I've heard this before. Damn I just can't put my finger --- HOLY $#!+ IT'S F***ING BOUNTYGATE! Those bastards have stolen our scandal and now they're using it to fix their crappy all-star game! Yeah okay, I know I said just last week that we need to start putting the past behind us but c'mon this is ridiculous. Let's be honest. The whole game show concept is just a pay for performance program in a more respectable package (Heeeeeere's your host, Gregg Williams!) and incentive is just another word for bounty. The Bountygate Effect: Blaming Bountygate for Everything Isn't it more than a bit hypocritical that Roger Goodell and the league spent an entire year making sure the world knew that pay for performance systems would not be tolerated but are now willing to incorporate it heavily into the Pro Bowl? Isn't it laughable that Roger Goodell once said, "The bounty rule promotes two key elements of NFL football: player safety and competitive integrity. It is our responsibility to protect ... the integrity of our game" yet the league is okay with throwing it away, y'now just this one time. Breer added that the NFL doesn't "feel the need to keep the integrity of what a normal football game is." I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried. It's like they think we're freakin' morons. The NFL needs to get its act together and figure out once and for all exactly what message they're trying to send their fans regarding incentive payments because the NFL is currently sending this particular Saints fan mixed signals. You could imagine why I might have a serious problem with that.