Beauty Babes: 2012 NFL NFC Wild Card Playoff Matchup: New Orleans Saints vs. Detroit Lions

Saturday. 8:00 p.m. ET, Mercedes-Benz Superdome

Airplanes and blimps won't be the only things flying all night in New Orleans! Drew Brees the captain of the offensive juggarnaut passed Dan Marino for the all time passing yards in a season with 5476 yards. Matthew Stafford was right on his heals connecting for 5038 yards. What do we take from this in our preview? The quarterback's are making all the noise in this preview to the match up in the NFC Wild Card game. These two quarterbacks combined for 10,514 yards of passing in 2011! Both surpassed the 5,000 mark only done 5 times in the history of the NFL. Maybe next year one of these quarterbacks may pass 6000 yards?

Advantage - Saints

Brees

Stafford

Taking a look into the running game we see the versatility of the backs for the Saints in Darren Sproles and his ability to catch out of the backfield. In the 16 regular season games Sproles rushed for 603 yards on 87 carries, 86 catches for 710 yards receiving and with return yards of kicks at 1383 yards that is 2696 yards of total offensive threat. He is not alone in the back field of the Saints Chris Ivory has stepped up and the grinder Pierre Thomas combined had 936 yards to give the offense balance in the backfield.
The Lions battled through injury all year with the running game. When healthy the running backs produced just had to baby them along all year. The first blow was the loss of Jahvid Best there future for the season. So, they reached into the past and pulled Kevin Smith off the couch and found a solid performer until he got the injury bug. He is probable in this game if able to get 20 carries he could be a factor in keeping Brees of the field and giving space to Stafford to get the ball down field.

Advantage - Saints

K. Smith

Sproles

P. Thomas

Ivory

The receiving corps on both sides of the ball are dangerous. The Saints lead out with healthy a Marques Colston, a playoff receiver looking to add to his playoff stats. Lance Moore will be out for the game so Robert Meachem may get a few catches down field. He had 9 catches over 20+ yards and 6 touchdown passes in the regular season. Devery Henderson will also burn the secondary he had 6 catches over 20+ yards.
The Lions take pride in their elite receivers and none is better than All-pro Calvin Johnson. Calvin caught 96 passes for 1,681 yards and 16 touchdowns. So, keeping the double teams on Megatron might be the Saints best defensive option. When double teaming Calvin that opens up the other side of the field and Nate Burleson and Titus Young know how to pick up the slack.

Slight Advantage - Lions

C. Johnson

Colston

Meachem

Burleson

Henderson

Young

The two offenses would not be in the elite without the play of their tight ends The play of Jimmie Graham was legendary 99 receptions for 1320 yards receiving (2nd in NFL) with 11 touchdowns. All of the rceptions were not short passes out of the back field some of them were bombs that the 6'6", 260lb TE just took from the secondary all year. In their last meeting with the Lions on 12/4 he did not catch a touchdown pass, so watch for it.

The Lions had an early injury bug but that left and Stafford found Brandon Pettigrew as ann asset to keep the safeties honest. He did end the season with 777 yards receiving but his presence was more than that for the Lions offense.

Advantage - Saints