Los Angeles Rams vs. New Orleans Saints: Q&A with Canal Street Chronicles

The Los Angeles Rams are taking on the New Orleans Saints in Week 2 in a highly anticipated rematch of the NFC Championship.

In doing so, they’re offering Saints fans some potential closure after the controversial loss but also giving the Rams a chance to add insult to...insult.

To get a better sense of the Saints and what they’re looking to gain from Sunday, I linked up with Chris Dunnells from Canal Street Chronicles, the SB Nation community for Saints fans.

Yall over the no call yet?

Of course.

Yall over the no call yet?

Maybe.

Yall over the no call yet?

A little.

Yall over the no call yet?

No.

But really….

Think what you will of this answer, but I honestly believe there is more hanging on the shoulders of the Los Angeles Rams right now than the New Orleans Saints as a result of the no-call. While the NFL refused to publicly apologize or offer any form of formal acknowledgement that the no-call fundamentally impacted the outcome of the game, the new rule change was able to provide some level of vindication for the team, the organization, and the fanbase. Even though the NFL and Roger Goodell didn’t come out and own the officials’ blunder, the NFL was forced to fundamentally alter their rule book to try to increase public confidence in the League that similar blunders wouldn’t happen in the future. That is as close to “closure” as the Saints will get, and I think that helped the players try to put the whole mess behind them.

On the other hand, you have the Los Angeles Rams, the team that a large population of the NFL world believed did not deserve to even participate in last year’s Super Bowl. And did the Rams come in and silence the critics? Did they decimate their opposition and prove that they were one of the two best teams in the NFL? Did they cement in the mind of the sports world that they absolutely were the caliber of team that deserved to play in the grandest of games?

Not exactly.

You asked me “Yall over the no call yet?” more times than points y’all scored in the Super Bowl.

If the Saints have any lingering feelings about the no-call, it’s that they feel cheated out of what was rightfully theirs. They’re angry. They want revenge.

For the Rams, there is likely just a hint of doubt in their minds after their performance in the Super Bowl that maybe, just maybe, NFL fans around the world were right, and the Rams actually weren’t good enough to be there in the first place.

...Yall ready to do it again in the NFC Championship this year?

One game at a time. We can both only hope our teams can put themselves in a similar position against this year.

Thanks to Chris for the time.