There is a movie out called, “How to Lose Friends and Alienate People.”

Photo by Brian Lawdermilk / The Associated Press

New Orleans Saints coach Sean Payton argues with official Mark Hittner during the first half of an NFL football game against the Minnesota Vikings in New Orleans, Monday, Oct. 6, 2008.

So far, if the Saints 2008 season had a title, it would be, “How to Have Excruciating Losses and Ruin a Season.”

Oh, and as always the Saints had injuries, this time to Tracy Porter and Jon Stinchcomb

First of all, never forget the team that has the fewest turnovers wins 80% of the time in the NFL.

If you had shown me the stat sheet prior to last night’s game, I would have said Minnesota would win.

Four turnovers, 11 penalties, a key dropped pass early and a blocked field goal.

None of that can be wiped out by two spectacular punt returns.
The Saints played perhaps their most physical defensive game under Sean Payton to date. The defense held Vikings running back Adrian Peterson to 32 yards on 21 carries and dominated what some people consider the best offensive line in football.

Of course the defense also negated this with key penalties on third downs.

This one’s on the players. The game plan was as good as it gets.

The offense moved up and down the field in the first half and the defense was dominant.

Blame Sean Payton all you want, but a coach can only be asked to put players in position to win. He and the rest of the staff did that.

The Saints just failed to execute.

In a game filled with huge swings, two stick out to me.

With the Saints leading 7-0 and driving Mike Karney is called for holding, and on third down Robert Meachem drops a first down catch.

Instead of first and goal, about to go up 14-0, the Saints had a field goal blocked and the game was tied.

The second was a defensive lapse.

Minnesota had a 3^rd and 16 from the Saints 33 with 7 minutes left. Gus Frerotte hits Bernard Berrian for a touchdown.

The Saints have to make that stop. Also Tracy Porter was injured on the play, meaning on the Vikings final drive Jason David would get beat on the play Kevin Kaesviharn got flagged for pass interference.

Bad news all around.

The Saints have lost games by 5, 2, and 3 points.

They are getting career years out of Reggie Bush and Drew Brees, yet are 2-3 in the loaded NFC.

They are on the verge of being irrelevant by November. In the NFL teams can win with flaws but not gapping holes. The Saints have two huge holes: No running game and no kicker.

Fatal.

To Martin Gramatica, the human bobble head, I say good day. You’ve been instrumental in two of the three defeats. While it’s not completely your fault, the life of a kicker is if you miss big kicks you go looking for another job.

Who’s available?
No idea, but is anyone else up for the Morten Andersen victory lap? Of course that 46 yarder Martin missed is probably at the edge of Morten’s range since he is about 120 years old these days.

But at least it would be cool having the Great Dane kicking again for the Saints. So where exactly do the Saints go from here?

They face Oakland and Carolina the next two weeks and quite simply both are must wins.

The Raiders are barely an NFL team at this point and their bizarre coaching change may actually hurt them.

Under Lane Kiffin they played hard but couldn’t finish games. Sound familiar?

So my guess is either the Saints come out and are mad as hell and beat them into the ground or are flat as a pancake, continue the sloppy play, and lose a close game.

Beat the Raiders and then the Saints will face the Carolina Panthers on the road and the possibility of falling three games out with just over half a season to play.

In a season where the Saints have been so close to being great, in the next two weeks if they don’t get beyond close, their season will be closed.

Ralph Malbrough is a Saints fan living in Houston. He can be reached at ralphmalbrough@hotmail.com . He also hosts an internet radio show at http://www.blogtalkradio/forecastradio.com tonight at 8pm.  You can listen live or download archived editions at iTunes.