Drew Brees Is the Staple of the New Orleans Saints' Success

Everyone knows that the Saints have a highly explosive offense. 

There are theories out there that try to explain exactly why New Orleans' offense is so good.  Brees is a great quarterback and he has superb receivers.  Reggie Bush and Deuce McAllister are excellent backs.  Sean Payton calls an outstanding game.  None of these theories are completely true.

The Saints are as good as they are because of one player: quarterback Drew Brees.  He is the driving force behind the Saints' success.

Brees came to the Saints in 2006 as an unrestricted free agent.  When he arrived the Saints were coming off a terrible 3-13 season in which opponents outscored them by 160 points.  He soon proved that the Chargers were fools for letting him get away. 

Just think of how dynamic the Chargers' offense would be now if they had Brees under center playing the way he is now and LT taking hand-offs.  Now that would be scary.

He threw 356 completions for 4,418 yards and 26 touchdowns to 11 interceptions in '06.  He had four main weapons that year—running back Reggie Bush and receivers Marques Colston, Joe Horn, and Devery Henderson.

Last year Brees completed 440 passes for 4,423 yards and 28 touchdowns to 18 interceptions.  His main weapons were Colston and Henderson and receivers Lance Moore and Terrence Copper—a different set of threats.

This year he's on pace to complete 428 passes for 5,372 yards and 32 touchdowns to 16 interceptions.  His main weapons this season are Bush, Colston, newly-added tight end Jeremy Shockey, and Henderson.  Another different cast of threats, though this one is close to the supporting cast he had in 2006.

The thing is he's playing without Shockey and Colston, his two most dangerous threats, right now.  Yet he's still dominating.

It's not his receivers.  They're not making him look good.

It's not that the running backs have done such a great job of balancing the run with the pass that Brees is getting a huge field to work with.

It's not offensive coordinator Doug Marrone's genius play calling.  All he does is tell Brees to run plays that send all the receivers deep, but keeps Bush back to either take a short bail-out pass or block for Brees.

It's Brees' talent, his skills.  He always puts the ball just where it needs to go. 

Do you have any idea just how hard it is throwing a ball just over a receiver's shoulder and into his hands when the receiver is running as fast as he can down-field?  But it's hard not only to make the pass but to judge where you need the aim the throw! 

The whole process is one of the hardest things to do not just in football, but in all of sports.  And Brees has the pinpoint accuracy and cannon of an arm necessary to do it perfectly nearly every time.  That's why he's one of the NFL's best quarterbacks.

In addition, he doesn't even need the threat that he might leave the pocket and dance his way through defenders for a first down to help keep defenses honest about how the play him!  He still dominates even though the defense is playing the pass!

The New Orleans Saints have a potent offense, to say the least and most of this killer offense is the passing game. 

The reason for the passing game's complete dominance is not its seemingly talented wide receivers, its incredible running game that keeps opposing defenses honest, or brilliant play calling from the offensive coordinator (they don't even have the latter two). 

The success of the Saints offense is squarely on quarterback Drew Brees' shoulders.  Without him they would be nothing.