Drew Brees' Record-Setting Day Keeps Saints Alive for 1 More Week

Not too long ago, a dirge was playing in the Crescent City.

The New Orleans Saints were dead. So was the Sean Payton/Drew Brees era in the Big Easy. The quarterback was washed up. The coach was on his way out of town, publicly mentioned for coaching jobs in Miami and Indianapolis that weren't even open yet, per ESPN.com's Adam Schefter.

Brees, Payton and the Saints apparently do not care for jazz funerals. Because after the wildest game of the 2015 NFL season, the Saints have reeled off three wins in a row, climbing back to .500 and into the NFC playoff race in the process.

And when I say that Sunday's 52-49 win over the New York Giants was wild, I mean it was wild:

As Will Brinson of CBS Sports pointed out, the defenses in this game were...well, there were no defenses in this game:

If you want to get technical, there were 1,030 yards of offense. The Saints accounted for 614 of those yards. And over 500 of those belonged to Brees.

The 15th-year veteran, who some were putting out to pasture less than a month ago, completed 40 of 50 passes for 511 yards.

His passer rating for the game was 140.5. That's, um...good.

And against the Giants, Brees threw one fewer touchdown pass than he managed in the first seven games of the season combined.

Granted, Brees missed one of those games with a bum shoulder, but seven touchdown passes in one game is sort of a big deal.

In fact, as the team's Twitter feed noted, it ties an NFL record:

Brees admitted after the game that while he's seen a lot over his 15-game career, he'd never seen a game quite like that:

Payton, on the other hand, worked on his comedy routine, according to Conor Orr of NFL.com:

"

Brees had seven touchdowns. We told him the game ball is going to the kicker. (Brees) just got in a rhythm. Guys did a good job separating. He's done a good job practicing playing well, and when you don't see a ball hit the ground in a while ... it's impressive.

"

Amazing what victory does for the mood, huh?

The future Hall of Famer had plenty of help. Tight end Ben Watson continued his "Jimmy Who?" tour, hauling in nine passes for 147 yards and a score. Veteran wideout Marques Colston had easily his best game of 2015, topping 100 yards with a touchdown. Youngsters Willie Snead and Brandin Cooks each caught a pair of touchdowns against a Giants secondary that entered the day awful and left it awful-plus-plus.

However, Brees made it clear after the game that the story was the Saints winning, not his huge day tossing the rock, per Orr.

"It's not about the numbers," Brees told reporters. "Obviously that's cool to look at, goes on the stat sheet, but it's not like I came out today with the intent to break a few records just to shut some people up or whatever."

However, it's also a pretty safe bet that Brees was feeling a bit of the old "I told you so" instead of just feeling old.

After a Week 5 drubbing in Philadelphia dropped the Saints to 1-4, they appeared to be cooked. And make no mistake: Sunday's win did not cure all that ails them. There's a reason Brees had to throw seven touchdown passes. The Saints defense—quite possibly the loosest use of the word defense in the history of the written word—allowed six Eli Manning touchdown passes in its own right.

Entering the day, the Saints and Giants ranked 27th and 31st, respectively, in pass defense. Neither number will improve after their Week 8 shootout.

But in a 2015 season that's been defined as much by more than half the NFL sporting losing records as it has five undefeated teams entering Week 8, Brees and this flawed Saints team are very much in the wild-card hunt as the season hits the halfway point.

So, set down the shovels. Hold off on sending flowers. In the words of a great American author who was very much enamored with that river that runs through New Orleans, the demise of Brees, Payton and the Saints has been greatly exaggerated.

Because thanks to a career day from a signal-caller who has had quite the career, in advance of a matchup with a Tennessee Titans team that's dropped six in a row, the Saints are marching.

Right back into the playoff race.

Gary Davenport is an NFL analyst at Bleacher Report and a member of the Fantasy Sports Writers Association and the Pro Football Writers of America. You can follow Gary on Twitter @IDPSharks.