In the 2017 offseason, the Saints also signed ex-Lions guard Larry Warford, ex-Panthers linebacker A.J. Klein, and ex-Cardinals pass rusher Alex Okafor. Those three players were all regular starters on the 2018 Saints.  In fact, 7 of the 16 Saints players with 6+ points of AV this year were added in 2017.   The Saints, in some ways like the Patriots, are here because of their famous quarterback/head coach combo.  Sean Payton and Drew Brees both came to New Orleans in 2006, but the Saints had just completed back-to-back-to-back 7-9 seasons at the end of the 2016 season.  From 2014 to 2016, New Orleans had been outscored by 76 points.  As good as Brees and Payton are, they wouldn’t be here today without what happened in the spring of 2017.

The graph below shows the AV on the 2018 Saints from players drafted by New Orleans (in gold) and drafted or otherwise acquired by New Orleans (in black) from each year since 2006.

Last year, New Orleans nearly made it this far on the backs of those seven players, Brees and Payton, too. It’s been a remarkable two-year run for the Saints, and a reminder that in one offseason, any team can turn it around (and that goes double if you have a Hall of Fame quarterback).

Brees threw a lot in garbage time

I tried to align this with a very conservative definition of “garbage time” … all data are from 2004-17 — 2004 was Brees’ first good season — and none of the game/score situations below produced any wins by any team during those years. “P/B/R” indicates the combined total of Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, and Aaron Rodgers.

Please pardon the informal prose and formatting; this was originally composed as a comment, not an article.

Any time in the fourth quarter, down 25+

Yardage Leader: Eli Manning — 83/122, 934 yds, 10 TD, 2 INT, 111.2 rating, 10 sacks/-66, 6.58 NY/A

Runners-up: Matt Cassel, Matt Hasselbeck, Drew Brees, Jay Cutler

Rating Leader*: Blake Bortles (122.0), runners-up Brees and Eli
* top 20 in yardage to qualify

Brees: 63/93, 733 yds, 7 TD, 1 INT, 112.0 rating, 2 sacks/-26, 7.44 NY/A
P/B/R: 26/48, 264 yds, 0 TD, 2 INT, 52.8 rating, 5 sacks/-37, 4.28 NY/A

Last 4 minutes, down 17+

Yardage Leader: Drew Brees — 78/106, 789 yds, 9 TD, 3 INT, 110.9 rating, 5 sacks/-27, 6.86 NY/A

Runners-up: Eli Manning, Blake Bortles, Matt Cassel, Matt Hasselbeck

Rating Leader*: Blake Bortles (116.5), runners-up Brees and Blaine Gabbert
* top 20 in yardage to qualify

Brees: 78/106, 789 yds, 9 TD, 3 INT, 110.9 rating, 5 sacks/-27, 6.86 NY/A
P/B/R: 30/52, 347 yds, 1 TD, 1 INT, 76.4 rating, 3 sacks/-23, 5.89 NY/A

Final minute, down 12+

Yardage Leader: Drew Brees — 32/50, 397 yds, 8 TD, 1 INT, 119.8 rating, 1 sack/-0, 7.78 NY/A

Runners-up: Eli Manning, Jay Cutler, Marc Bulger, Matthew Stafford

Brees has 70% more yardage than second place.

Rating Leader*: Kyle Orton (127.3), runners-up Cutler and Brees
* top 20 in yardage to qualify

Brees: 32/50, 397 yds, 8 TD, 1 INT, 119.8 rating, 1 sack/-0, 7.78 NY/A
P/B/R: 3/11, 30 yds, 0 TD, 1 INT, 1.7 rating, 1 sack/-9, 1.75 NY/A

Brees has far more volume in these situations than any other player, and his advantage can not be explained exclusively by playing time in blowout-loss situations. The Saints rank 25th, 18th, and 12th in total offensive plays in the game/score categories above — fewer such opportunities than an average team. While Brees has played throughout that time frame, he has far more garbage time production, and better garbage time efficiency, than peers such as Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, Carson Palmer, Philip Rivers, Ben Roethlisberger, and Tony Romo, whose playing time was similar. Only Eli Manning is even remotely close to Brees in garbage time production.

Based on these data, I would suggest that in situations when most teams are running out the clock, Brees was still throwing. If true, this would artificially inflate his counting stats, since other players were not afforded the same opportunity. Since all credible systems of statistical analysis account for volume at some point, Brees’ production should be evaluated with this consideration in mind. His advantages compared to Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, and Aaron Rodgers — the peers to whom he is most often compared — are particularly pronounced, and significant in analyzing their respective careers.

Furthermore, Brees’ passer rating and NY/A were noticeably higher in these zero-leverage situations than his overall stats during the same time period. While the effect on his overall stats is minor, this suggests that Brees did pad his statistics by passing — far more frequently than anyone else in the league — in situations when the outcome was no longer in question, and against defenses that were playing less aggressively because of the lopsided score and the minimal time remaining.

So what does this all mean? In short, it means that yes, Drew Brees padded his stats in garbage time. He threw often and efficiently in situations when doing so did not materially help his team, and when other elite QBs were handing off, kneeling out the clock, or sitting on the bench. The difference between Brees and his HOF contemporaries is striking and significant. This does not taint the career of an all-time great QB, but when we put his stats in context, especially relative to his most accomplished contemporaries, it bears consideration that Brees took advantage of zero-leverage situations and his peers did not.

I checked the reverse, as well: zero-leverage passing by winning teams. There’s nothing significant at the 1-minute and 4-minute levels, and only one player is significant at the 15-minute level: Tom Brady, who passed for 539 yards and a 132.0 rating with 25+ point leads in the fourth quarter. Second place is Packers backup Matt Flynn, with 214 yards and a 35.7 rating.

The QB series continues with Part Six next Wednesday, July 11.