Saints by the Numbers: Brees’ big day can’t deliver victory

NEW ORLEANS – Ten times before Sunday, Drew Brees has passed for five touchdowns in a game. Each of those times, his team won.

Brees’ NFL-record 11th game of five passing scores was not enough on Sunday as the Saints fell 48-46 to the San Francisco 49ers at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome.

Brees already had the NFL record for most games with 5+ touchdown passes. Peyton Manning is second with nine games.

Brees also became the eighth player in NFL history – and the second this year, joining the Packers’ Aaron Rodgers – to have a stat line that included at least five passing TDs and a rushing score. Prior to Sunday, no quarterback who accounted for five passing TDs and a sixth on the ground had ever lost a game.

Another Record on the Horizon: The last major career passing record still escaping Brees could fall as soon as next week. The question is, who will break it?

Manning’s record of 539 career touchdowns is in jeopardy. Brees’ five TD passes Sunday upped his career total to 537, and the Patriots’ Tom Brady had one touchdown pass Sunday to run his total to 536.

Brady and the Patriots play the 1-win Bengals on Sunday before Brees and the Saints take on the Indianapolis Colts next Monday in the Dome.

But One He Missed: Brees, a little more than a month away from his 41st birthday, became the third 40-year-old to throw five TD passes in a game. Is he the oldest quarterback to do it? Not quite.

Warren Moon had a five-TD game for Seattle against Oakland in 1997 at 40 years, 342 days old. That is 15 days older than Brees was on Sunday.

Scorigami: Thinking you hadn’t seen a game quite like Sunday? In a way, you would be right.

Perhaps you’ve never heard of the term “scorigami,” but in brief, it means a game that produces a unique final score – one that’s never before happened in the NFL.

Before Sunday, there had never been a 48-46 game in the 100-year history of the league. According to the NFL Scorigami Twiter account, it is the 1,063rd different final score in league history.

More Scoring: Sunday was the 10th regular season or postseason game since the 1970 merger where both teams scored at least 45 points.

When the 49ers led 28-27 at halftime, it was only the third game in that span where both teams scored 27 first-half points.

However, it was not the highest-scoring game of the 2019 season. That honor still goes to Tampa Bay’s 55-40 victory over the Los Angeles Rams; the 95 combined points are one more than the Saints and 49ers put on the board Sunday.

Thomas’ Big Fourth Quarter: Just when Michael Thomas was about to fall behind Marvin Harrison’s pace for the NFL single-season receiving record, the Saints star had a huge fourth quarter against the 49ers.

Thomas entered the fourth quarter with three catches, but made eight fourth-quarter grabs to finish with 11 receptions for 134 yards and a touchdown.

Thomas now has 121 catches through 13 games, three more than Harrison had in his record-breaking season of 2002. He needs 23 catches in the final three games to break Harrison’s mark of 143.

Thomas’ big final quarter allowed him to break his own single-season record for receiving yards. He has 1,424 yards, 19 more than he had a year ago.

Lost Ball: Alvin Kamara’s lost fumble in the third quarter was the first by the Saints offense this season. The only other fumble lost by New Orleans this season was on a punt return by Deonte Harris in Week 3 at Seattle.

The Saints went a team-record 9 consecutive games without losing a fumble, two games shy of the NFL record of 11 by Washington, a streak that spanned the last two seasons and ended after the first two games of 2019.

If the Saints do not lose a fumble in the final three games, they can tie the NFL record for fewest fumbles lost in a season, most recently by Minnesota in 2014.

Odds and Ends: Sunday’s game ended a streak of 18 consecutive regular-season games for the Saints when it failed to score 40 points. Ironically, it ran off three consecutive games of 45 or more points before the streak began.

*San Francisco came into Sunday’s game leading the league in total defense, with the Saints ranked eighth. Combined, they had allowed 574 yards per game. By halftime, the two offenses had combined for 581 total yards.

*Sunday’s loss was the first time since Nov. 13, 2016, the Saints lost by three points or less on a Sunday. Since that day, New Orleans has had three different three-point losses – all on Thursday night.

Research assistance by the football database website Pro Football Reference.