John Mecom, Jr.
(recent photo)

Tom Fears

Jim Taylor and Gary Cuozo

Doug Atkins

After years of work by New Orleans businessman Dave Dixon and his associates and the promise of a domed stadium should New Orleans be granted a team, the NFL awarded its 16th franchise to New Orleans on All-Saints Day, November 1, 1966.

• In mid-December, 28-year-old John Mecom, Jr., a Texas oilman, becomes the club's majority stockholder-president.
• Tom Fears, Hall of Fame WR for the Los Angeles Rams, is hired as the first coach.
• The Saints are placed in the Capitol Division of the Eastern Conference with the Dallas Cowboys, Philadelphia Eagles, and Washington Redskins.
• The team sells 20,000 season tickets the first day they were available. Eventually, the number reaches 33,400 by the time the inaugural season begins.

The Saints stocked their roster via the expansion draft as well as the regular college player draft. The only free agents available were players who had been released by their former clubs since in those days drafting a player gave the club exclusive rights until the team cut him.

• Director of Player Personnel Jim Schwenk oversaw the expansion draft on February 9. Since Atlanta had just entered the league the year before, it was exempt. However, each of the other 14 teams had to offer 11 players from its roster. After the Saints selected a player from a team, that club could then pull two players off the list. Then New Orleans chose two more players from each team for a total of 42. "The other teams put every 'dog' they could on that list," said Saints D-coordinator Jack Faulkner. "A lot of those guys didn't stay around very long, and most of them didn't contribute very much."
• The team chose 36 more players from the first common college draft held by the newly merged National and American Football Leagues. The Saints were granted the first and last pick in each round, an excellent opportunity to take players who could contribute to the club for years to come. However, the front office immediately demonstrated the ineptitude that would plague the franchise for decades.
  • The club traded the #1 pick in the draft to the Baltimore Colts for their backup QB Gary Cuozzo. (The Colts took Bubba Smith, future Pro Bowl DE from Michigan State, with the initial pick.)
  • When N.O. finally chose a player at the end of the round, it was RB Les Kelley of Alabama, whom no one had rated that high. Then with the first pick of the second round, they selected Bo Burris, DB from Houston. Neither Kelley, who was moved to LB, nor Burris contributed significantly to the team.
  • With the last two picks of the second round, the Saints did take WR John Gilliam from South Carolina State and DT Dave Rowe from Penn State. Both proved to be good players, although the Saints traded Gilliam to the St. Louis Cardinals after two seasons.

When the smoke cleared, the Saints' roster boasted three future Pro Football Hall of Famers. However, only one of them contributed much on the field.

• FB Jimmy Taylor was taken from Green Bay, where he had been a key cog on five Packer championship teams. Unfortunately, Jimmy's hard-running style had worn him down to the point where he retired after only one season in his native Louisiana where he had starred for LSU.
• Packers' coach Vince Lombardi "generously" contributed his other star RB, Paul Hornung, to the expansion draft. Hornung, plagued by injuries for several years, retired because of a bad back without ever playing a down for the Saints.
• DE Doug Atkins came to New Orleans via a trade with the Chicago Bears. A four-time Pro Bowler, Doug played two seasons with the Saints before retiring.

So a ragtag team of over-the-hill veterans, never-wases, and rookies took the field for the Saints' first game. But that's a story for another day.

After a 66-yard TD run by Willie Ellison was called back for clipping, LA settled for a David Ray FG. Then Gabriel finally came alive in the last stanza with a 29-yard TD to RB Les Josephson to make it 17-13. Then the visitors seemed to have the game won when they took a 20-17 lead with 4:57 on a one-yard plunge by Josephson and rookie Skip Butler's 48-yard tieing FG went wide with 1:55 left. However, the Saints forced a punt, and Archie had another shot from his 30. After seven plays, NO was on the one with 0:03 left following a pass interference call on Jim Nettles. Coach J. D. Roberts decided to disdain the tie. Archie rolled left on a pass/run option and dove for the end zone. When the nearest official raised his arms, 70,915 went wild. The PAT made the final 24-20.

John Fourcade

Jim Mora

Eric Martin

Growing up in New Orleans, John Fourcade dreamed of one day QBing the Saints. He finally made it after he had retired from pro football. It took a player strike to make it happen.

After an All-State career at Archbishop Shaw High School, Fourcade played four years at Ole Miss (1978-81) where he broke many of Archie Manning's records. However, no team drafted him because of his size (5'11") or his reputation for being undisciplined and cocky. So John began an odyssey that took him to four cities in three different leagues.

• He signed with the British Columbia Lions of the Canadian Football League. He played four games as a backup in 1982.
• 1983 found him with the CFL's Winnipeg Blue Bombers.
• The next season, he joined the Birmingham Stallions of the new United States Football League.
• Then he played for the USFL's Memphis Showboats in 1984 and 1985, the league's final campaign.
• Fourcade signed with the Saints as a free agent before the '86 season but was cut by first-year coach Jim Mora after only five days. At that point, the vagabond QB figured his football days might be over.
• He returned to Ole Miss to complete his degree until May 1987 when he returned to the CFL with the Toronto Argonauts. However, he lasted only five days again.
• Then another league beckoned – the Arena Football League. John QBed the Denver Dynamite during their stretch drive to the first Arena Bowl championship.
• In August 1987, he accepted a teaching/coaching position at John Ehret High School back at his West Bank stomping grounds in the Crescent City.

It was at this point that larger forces intervened to give John another shot with the Saints.

• After two weeks of the 1987 regular season, the NFL Players Association called its second strike in six years.
• Unlike 1982, when nearly half the schedule was cancelled, the owners were ready with plans for "replacement" teams.
• Once the strike was called, Mora and his staff contacted released players and free agents in addition to a small number of veteran players who decided not to honor the strike.
• Fourcade was on his way to the airport to fly to Los Angeles to try out for the Raiders when the Saints called. The chance to QB his hometown team made his decision to change his plans a no-brainer.

After the Week Three games were cancelled, the schedule resumed with Week Four. The Saints hosted the Los Angeles Rams before 29,745 – one of the largest crowds in the league that day.

• Fourcade directed a Q1 17-play drive that ended with his first NFL TD pass for a 7-0 Saints lead.
• John threw another scoring pass in Q2, this one 11 yd to Eric Martin, one of 14 regular New Orleans players to defy the union.
• Still in Q2, the former Rebel engineered a 12-play drive to give the Saints a 27-0 halftime lead.
• Fourcade capped the afternoon in Q4 with an 82-yd TD pass to TE Mike Waters - the longest scoring pass in team history. The final score was 37-10.
• John's final stats read 16-21 for 222 and three TDs. The Saints converted 14 of 18 third downs.

The replacement teams played two more weeks.

• Fourcade played well at St. Louis but the Cardinals prevailed 24-19.
• On the Thursday before the next game, the NFLPA threw in the towel and announced the end of the work stoppage. The strikers would return to their teams after the third replacement weekend.
• After fallling behind to the Bears in Chicago 17-3, the Saints rallied behind Fourcade. He hit Martin with a 14-yd TD strike to cut the gap to 17-10 at the half. The D held Chicago scoreless in the second half while three Florian Kempf FGs gave New Orleans a 19-17 triumph.

Fourcade was one of four replacement players who remained on the Saints roster when the veterans returned. The '87 squad went on to make the first playoff appearance in franchise history. After appearing in only one game in '88, he played in 13 in 1989 as backup to Bobby Hebert. Seven more games in '90 finally ended John's NFL career.

One name guaranteed to make long-time Saints fans wince and curse is Russell Erxleben. Erxleben, Jerxleben. He epitomizes the bad management of the team for the first 15 years of the franchise.

At Texas from 1975-78, Erxleben had arguably the greatest kicking career in the history of college football.

• Russell was the only three-time All-American punter in NCAA history.
• He set the record for the longest FG in history with a 67-yarder against Rice in 1977. UT coach Fred Akers said: "It was like a gunshot. We couldn't believe a ball was going that far." Interestingly, Steve Little of Arkansas, another Southwest Conference school, tied Erxleben's record two weeks later.
• Russell kicked two other 60+ yd FG that season. In response to these bombs, the NCAA changed several rules for the 1978 season, prohibiting the use of a tee on place kicks and marking the ball at the line of scrimmage instead of the 20 after missed FGs from beyond the 20.
• SMU coach Ron Meyer called Erx "the greatest kicker in the history of college football."

Attracted by the prospect of filling two kicking positions with one player, the Saints drafted Erxleben in the first round of the 1979 draft. He thus joined Charlie Gogolak and Ray Guy as the only punters/kickers taken in Round One. (Sebastian Janikowski has since joined the club.) However, Erxleben's selection at #11 remains the highest any kicker has ever been taken.

The Saints signed Erx to a multi-year contract that reportedly made him the first $1,000,000 kicker in history. The media and many fans questioned the Saints' judgment, and it didn't take long for Russell to give his critics plenty of ammunition.

• Here is Sports Illustrated's description of Russell's first kick in a scrimmage for the Saints.

  The date: July 28. The site: Dodgertown, the Vero Beach, Fla. training complex used by the Saints, who this day are scrimmaging Miami. With a fourth down at the Dolphins' 28-yard line, New Orleans Coach Dick Nolan calls for a field goal. The distance: 45 yards. A fairly prodigious kick for most, but certainly a mere chip shot for the rookie they call "Thunderfoot." Blare of trumpets. Roll of drums.

  The crowd quiets. Center Mark Meseroll crouches over the football. The snap darts back to the holder, Ed Burns, who places it carefully on the turf, laces pointing toward the distant goalpost. Erxleben steps forward. For a split second he seems to hesitate, then his powerful right leg swings toward the football. Surely somewhere out there a representative of the Hall of Fame is waiting to claim this pigskin for posterity. The ball soars upward. Then, like a wounded duck, it flutters helplessly and dives back to the ground, not 15 yards from the line of scrimmage. Cut. CUT!

  Such was the inauspicious debut of Russell Erxleben, kicking star. Afterward, he described it as "the most embarrassing moment of my life." And, much to his chagrin, the embarrassing moments have not stopped. Erxleben has often said that the hallmark of a great kicker is consistency. Well, this summer he has been consistently horrible.

  In the Saints' first exhibition, also against the Dolphins, Erxleben, who placekicks in the old-fashioned straight-ahead style, missed his two field-goal tries, from 32 and 35 yards. And he shanked a punt 19 yards to set up the deciding touchdown in Miami's 14-7 win. In New Orleans' second exhibition, a 13-6 loss to the Chicago Bears, Erxleben had an extra-point attempt blocked and punted three times for a measly 32-yard average. He also kicked off once, but only to the 11-yard line. Still, that was a seven-yard improvement over his lone kickoff the previous week.

• Despite strong evidence that the pressure of his first round status had made Erxleben a basket case, the Saints ignored suggestions to let incumbent Rich Szaro handle the placekicking so that Erx could concentrate on punting.
• In his very first regular season game against the Falcons in the Superdome, Erxleben made both his FGs to help send the game into OT. However, nine minutes into the extra period, the snap from punt formation sailed over his head to the 5. When he picked it up, he made a hurried chest pass into the hands of defender James Mayberry, who waltzed into the EZ to win the game.
• To make matters worse, Erx was injured on the play and never appeared in another game that season.
• 1980 started poorly for Russell also. In the opener against the 49ers, he missed a makeable FG near the end that would have tied the game. Instead, the Saints lost 26-23 on their way to 14 straight defeats and a 1-15 record.
• For the 1980 campaign, Erx punted for only a 39.5 average and made only two of five FG as the team entrusted most of the placekicking to Benny Ricardo.
• 1981 saw Russell raise his punting average only one yard, to 40.5. He didn't try a single FG.
• 1982: Punting average up to 43.0; missed one makeable FG from 20-30 yards. The Saints drafted another placekicker out of Michigan State named Morten Anderson and, by midyear, made him the placement specialist.
• 1983: Erx did all the punting again for a 41.0 average. When his five-year contract expired, the Saints didn't resign him. He appeared in only one more NFL game in 1987 with the Lions.

ESPN's draft guru, Mel Kiper, ranks Erxleben as one of his ten worst draft evaluations in 30+ years.

In 2000, Erxleben was sentenced to 84 months in Federal prison for implementing a scheme to defraud over 500 investors of his Austin-based company.

Longhorn Russell Erxleben

Saint Russell Erxleben

Erxleben and holder Ed Burns celebrate one of Russell's two FGs in 1979

Those are the immortal words spoken by Saints' second-year coach Jim Mora on October 25, 1987 after his team lost a 24-22 thriller to the San Francisco 49ers in the Superdome to bring New Orleans' record to 3-3. Jim's complete statement went like this.

Could've, would've, should've is the difference in what I'm talking about. The good teams don't say could've, they get it done. They're better than we are. We're not good enough. We shouldn't even be thinking about beating this 49ers team. We shouldn't be talking about it because the Saints ain't good enough.

And you guys shouldn't write about us being a playoff team and all that bullstuff. That's malarkey! We aren't good enough to beat those guys and it was proven out there today. It's that simple: We're not good enough yet. We've got a long way to go; we've got a lot of work to do. We're close, and close doesn't mean bullshit. And you can put that on TV for me.

LB Sam Mills later said: "I think it was something that shook the guys and woke everybody up. It made the guys think, 'Hey, we've gotta get the ball rolling.'" LB Vaughan Johnson agreed. "It did something for the team. It did something for the players too. Coming close doesn't get it. And he made the point ... very clear."

Thus began "the most magical two months in Saints history."

• Mora's team won their final nine games of the season, including a 26-24 victory in San Francisco on November 15. Previously, no Saints squad had ever won more than three in a row!
• However, the 12-3 record wasn't even good enough to win the NFC West as the 49ers finished 13-2.
• Nevertheless, New Orleans made the playoffs for the first time in its history. They hosted the Minnesota Vikings in a wild card game on January 3, 1988.
• Unfortunately, the playoff-hardened Vikings took the crowd out of the game quickly, forging a 33-10 halftime lead on their way to a 44-10 romp. This led some journalists to joke that it had taken the Saints 20 years to make the playoffs, and 20 minues to get out of them.

Reference: The New Orleans Saints: 25 Years of Heroic Effort – Book 2, Christian Serpas

Jim Mora

Sam Mills

Billy Kilmer, UCLA

Billy Kilmer, Saints

Billy Kilmer, Redskins

The Saints' #1 pre-Archie hero was Billy Kilmer, who QBed the club from 1967-70. "Ol' Whiskey," as Kilmer was called by his teammates, had overcome large obstacles to play in the NFL.

• At UCLA he led the nation in total offense as a running/passing TB in his senior season, earning All-American honors. He also played basketball for John Wooden's Bruins. Kilmer finished fifth in the 1960 Heisman voting.
• Billy was the #1 draft choice of San Francisco in 1961. He played sparingly at RB as a rookie but did score four TDs against the expansion Vikings.
• He played a larger role in the 49ers' shotgun offense in 1962. However, with two games left in the season, he fell asleep at the wheel on his way home from a hunting trip and crashed into a ditch. He lay unconscious with a broken right ankle for more than an hour. Doctors figured that he would have a permanent limp and would never play football again. They considered amputation because of an infection caused by the stagnant water in the ditch.
• Kilmer missed the '63 season but returned for limited action in '64. He missed all of 1965 and saw spot duty in '66. Not surprisingly, the 49ers made him available for the the '67 expansion draft. Faced with slim pickings, the Saints decided to take a chance on him despite the fact that he had no experience as an under-center QB.

Billy faced an uphill battle to make the Saints roster.

• Starting training camp as the third-string signal-caller, Kilmer worked his way to the opening day starting job with his play in the preseason games. However, he split time with Gary Cuozzo, starting only four contests.
• In Week 10 in a 48-21 loss to Philadelphia, he threw two TDs in relief of Cuozzo. He also connected with "Flea" Roberts for a team record 96-yard completion from the Saints' three to the enemy one.
• The following week, coach Tom Fears sent Billy out for the second half with the Saints trailing the Falcons 21-10. He promptly led NO on a 53-yard drive to a TD to make the score 21-17. Then, with just over fourminutes left in the game, he marched the Saints from their own 3 to the game-winning TD on a pass to TE Kent Kramer with 48 seconds left. Billy cemented himself as a favorite of the 83,437 fans in Tulane Stadium and countless more listening on the radio.
• Billy relieved again in the final game at Washington after a scoreless Q1. He threw two TD passes to Danny Abramowicz, including one of 80 yd, as the Saints won their third game of the maiden season, 30-14. So satisfied were the Saints with Kilmer's play that they traded Cuozo to Minnesota after the season for two #1 draft choices
• Kilmer started 11 games in NO's second season. He passed for 2,060 yd as the Saints amass a 7-20-1 record over two seasons, the best ever for an expansion team.
• The highlight of 1969 occurred on November 2 in St. Louis. Kilmer engaged in a duel with his Cardinal counterpart, Charlie Johnson. Billy tossed six TD passes in the 51-42 victory while Johnson matched him with six of his own. The aerial circus set a record for most TD passes in an NFL game as Kilmer won the NFL Player of the Week award.
• Three weeks later in Tulane Stadium, the saga of Billy Kilmer featured another memorable chapter. The Saints trailed the 49ers 21-0 when Kilmer suffered a separated shoulder. Saints assistant Ed Khayat: "We all figured he was done, but he said, 'Hell no! Pop it back into place and get me back out there!" He led the NO comeback, passing for 235 yd and two TDs as the Saints won another shootout, 43-38, on their way to a 5-9 record.
• The Saints retrogressed in 1970 to 2-11-1 as Billy started only 10 games. After the season, he was traded to Washington, where he led George Allen's "Over the Hill Gang" to the 1972 Super Bowl.
• He retired in 1978 after a 17-year career.

Kilmer has always had a warm spot in his heart for New Orleans and its fans.

I always loved New Orleans, and I always will. I love the fans and the way they supported the team even when we lost. I used to tell the players, "You don't realize how good you have it here. Put out, work a little harder, win a few games and you'll be kings of Louisiana." I would have loved to have finished the job here and brought a winner here. It would have been Mardi Gras for years.

Doug Atkins came to the Saints in the original expansion draft from the Chicago Bears. A mountain of a man from the Tennessee mountains, the 6'8" 270 pounder had incredible strength, as illustrated by this story.

G Ray Rissmiller, later Adkins' teammate with the Saints, faced him with the Philadelphia Eagles in 1966. Veteran C Jim Ringo cautioned his young teammate.

When you go against Adkins, whatever you do, don't hold him. Because if you do, he's going to hurt me.

Puzzled, Rissmiller asked why Atkins would hurt Ringo for something Rissmiller did.

Because he's going to pick you up and throw you on me.

The fear and awe that Atkins engendered in his teammates is exemplified in this story that Billy Kilmer tells from the Saints' initial training camp at California Western University.

After bed check, the rookies on the upper floor of the two-story dormitory blast their stereo, keeping Kilmer and everyone else awake.

Suddenly, a voice booms from one of the first floor windows: "Shut that music off!" It's Atkins. But the music continues. Soon Doug yells again to no avail. Finally, Kilmer hears "Pow! Pow! Pow!" He jumps out of bed and races into the room next door to find Doug aiming a shotgun upward out of the window. "I decided it was too late for all that noise," Atkins explained. "I hollered up there and didn't get a response. I had a screen on the window and couldn't get it off, so I just angled an old .38 out there."

The music stopped, and everyone soon fell asleep. The next day, the rookies moved down the hall, and no one roomed with Atkins the rest of training camp.

Reference: Tales from the Saints Sideline, Jeff Duncan

Doug Atkins

Jim Ringo

Eric Martin

Dave Waymer

The Saints lost Jim Mora's debut as head coach in the first game of the 1986 season. Atlanta thumped the Saints in the Superdome 31-10. The next week brought a different outcome.

• The Green Bay Packers provided the opposition in the Superdome.
• The Saints not only won, 24-10, but set a franchise record with 7 INTs.
• The "Bayou Bomber," Bobby Hebert, connected with WR Eric Martin on a 72-yd TD only 1:32 into the game. Shortly afterwards, the two hooked up on an 84-yd pass play from the Saints 9 that led to a Morten Andersen FG and a 10-0 lead.
• NO moved out 17-0 later in Q1 on a 3-yd run by rookie Dalton Hilliard.
• The Saints led 24-3 at the half.

Two of the seven picks were by Dave Waymer. He had lost his six-year starting job to Willie Tullis at the opening of the season. However, Tullis missed practice Friday and Saturday, claiming he was sick. Since he hadn't checked with the team medical staff, he was replaced by Waymer.

Packer QB Randy Wright threw five of the INTs while Vince Ferragamo accounted for the other two. S Russell Gary said:

We were hiding a lot of things, disguising the defenses well. A lot of times, it looked like we were in one thing and we were in something else.

The Saints finished Mora's maiden season 7-9, thanks in part to Hebert missing six weeks with a broken bone in his foot.

Reference: Tales from the Saints Sideline, Jeff Duncan