The New Orleans Saints got some help from an unlikely source when retired quarterback Brett Favre suggested the team get fitted for custom-made earplugs to help deaden the noise during Monday night's game at Seattle’s notoriously loud stadium.
Monday Night Football sideline reporter Lisa Salters said that Saints head coach Sean Payton had texted Favre last week for suggestions on handling Seattle’s crowd noise.
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“Favre shared with Payton that the Vikings had designer noise reduction ear plugs custom made for that game and Favre said it really helped. ... So,
Payton ordered up 20 of those ear plugs,” Salters said, wrote Business Insider.
“That game” Salters referred to was the 2009 NFC Championship Game at the New Orleans Superdome. Favre, then a Minnesota Viking, was targeted by the Saints in a bounty scandal, in which Payton and several players were suspended for payments made for hits that led to opposing players being led off the field. Favre had an alleged prize of $35,000. The Saints didn’t knock him out of the game, but they did get in some big hits on Favre.
Payton figured Favre had to deal with a lot of noise during that meeting.
Salters told the MNF television audience that the Saints were fitted for the earplugs last Tuesday, and the pieces arrived on Friday. The team wore the earplugs during practices over the weekend.
USA Today noted that Payton told Salters the Saints loved the earplugs because the players could still hear the calls at the line of scrimmage.
But did they really work? The noise was bad, and the Saints were worse. The Seahawks trounced New Orleans 34-7 as noise from the Seattle crowd reached a record-breaking 137.6 decibels.
Monday night’s win gave the Seahawks an 11-1 record and helped solidify their chances of taking the NFC’s Western Division title. New Orleans is now tied with Carolina atop the NFC South with a 9-3 record. Carolina has won eight games in a row.
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