Drew Brees
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Drew Brees weighs in on the New Orleans Saints quarterback competition
Nearly five years have passed by since Drew Brees last put on his #9 jersey. For 15 seasons, Brees provided the New Orleans Saints with both consistency and understated excellence at pro football’s most important position, but with his retirement at the conclusion of the 2020 NFL season, New Orleans has since been riding on the quarterback carousel, just waiting for that sucker to stop spinning.
The Saints will play their first preseason game of the year over the weekend, and there still isn’t much clarity as to who will be the starter on September 7th, when the regular season begins. Spencer Rattler, Tyler Shough and Jake Haener have been treated as equal participants in this race by head coach Kellen Moore, and while Haener is presently viewed as the long shot of the three options, he’s the one quarterback on the Saints roster who Brees sees he seems himself in.
“It’s a pretty unique situation, if you just look at the youth across the board,” Brees said, per NOLA.com’s Jeff Duncan. “Obviously, there was a lot of excitement in drafting Tyler Shough, and I felt like Spencer Rattler did some great things last year. And Jake Haener, his (playing) style, his stature, everything reminds me of a lot of myself. … So we’ll see how the competition shakes out.”
Is There Some Drew Brees to Jake Haener’s Game?
If anyone other than Drew Brees would’ve made the comparison between himself and Jake Haener, they would not so politely be asked to march their backside out of New Orleans forever, but because it’s Brees, the second-leading passer in NFL history, who said it, it’s at least worth looking at what those similarities may be.
Brees isn’t wrong when he says that there are similarities between his and Haener’s stature. Brees was only 6-feet tall and was only a big bowl of jambalaya over 200 lbs. Similarly, Haener is just 6-foot-1 and probably needs a few beignets shy of that 200-pound mark. At the Combine, Brees had slightly bigger hands and longer arms, while Haener narrowly topped Brees’ numbers in the vertical jump, broad jump and the three-cone drill.
You see that I’m grasping at straws here, right?
Presently, Brees has over 80,000 more career passing yards and 570 more touchdowns than Haener, so maybe for the time being we go ahead and table this discussion, yeah?
Is Spencer Rattler or Tyler Shough in the Driver’s Seat?
With Haener falling behind both of his quarterback counterparts in terms of reps, it’s fair to suggest that Kellen Moore’s decision will come down to either Spencer Rattler or Tyler Shough. Though Rattler has been considered to be the better of the two throughout camp, Shough had a strong showing during practice on August 7, and may have played himself into a dead heat with Rattler.
“Might’ve been Tyler Shough’s best practice session to date as Saints QB as he ran the 1s on Day 1 in L.A,” Mike Triplett of NewOrleans.Football said. Louisiana Sports’ Ross Jackson added, “Shough saw the same number of reps as Rattler but with the first team and took more passing attempts. He’s clearly settling in. He also found places to use his legs and made some really great reads both in the passing and run game.”
Heading into their first preseason game of the summer on Sunday night, there has been no indication who will be getting the start. On the Saints’ first unofficial depth chart, the starting quarterback is listed as, “Spencer Rattler or Tyler Shough or Jake Haener.”
Unfortunately for Saints fans, peak Drew Brees won’t be walking through that door any time soon.