Brees on target to smash Marino's passing record as New Orleans surges in NFL

The only thing that did not work for Saints quarterback Drew Brees this past Monday night was celebrating. "I was a little more tired than I thought I would be," said Brees.

Not that Saints fans would complain about the quarterback's lack of effusive outbursts after he led his team to a historic win over the New York Giants.

Brees passed for 363 yards and four touchdowns to go with a rushing score in the Saints' 49-24 victory. The offense piled up 577 yards, second most in franchise history, and second-most allowed by the Giants in their staggering history.

A happy day for the team and its fans, to be certain. But Brees has his eyes set on a much bigger prize one that has been elusive to all signal-callers for 27 years.

In 1984, legendary Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino set the single season passing record at 5,084 yards. That record stood unthreatened until 2008, when Brees came within 15 yards of snatching it.

This season, Brees leads NFL quarterbacks with 3,689 yards passing (with New England's Tom Brady second and Green Bay's Aaron Rodgers third) and is on pace to finish with a blistering 5,366, which would obliterate Marino's record.

Brees, Brady and Rodgers could all top 5,000 yards. Brees also has passed for at least one touchdown in 38 straight games, the second-longest streak in NFL history.

Most of the hard work in the march toward history is already done. Over 10 games this season, Brees is averaging an astounding 335.4 yards a game. He needs to average 279.2 yards the rest of the way to surpass Marino's mark. Should the Saints' receiving corps and offensive line stay healthy, the magic number is well within reach.

Brees claims that it really isn't on his mind.

"I try not to give it much thought," he said. "We would love to have that record, but within the framework of winning games. I certainly try not to think about it. You just try to do whatever it takes to win and if that means we have to throw it 300-plus yards a game or run it 200-plus yards a game, we'll do whatever it takes and we'll see where the chips fall at the end of the season."

The Saints are 8-3, with a three-game winning streak that culminated in a dominant win over the Giants. At this point, they would seem to be the most likely NFC team to challenge the undefeated Green Bay Packers. The two teams met in the season opener, in which the Packers stopped the Saints with a goal-line stand on the final play of the game and won 42-34.

But that was then. With the four-time Pro Bowl quarterback firing on all cylinders, the Saints remain firmly entrenched as the likeliest candidate to get between the Packers and a second Super Bowl. In fact, Brees envisions this year's squad to be even better than one he led past the Indianapolis Colts 31-17 as MVP of Super Bowl XLIV to close the 2009-2010 season.

"I feel like we have the opportunity to be better," he said. "We're not there yet. As I look at our guys, we have a lot of guys from that '09 team. The guys we've added - Jimmy Graham, Darren Sproles, Mark Ingram - not too shabby."

China Daily

(China Daily 12/03/2011 page15)