Saints are rolling instead of marching into San Francisco

There is no truth to the rumor that the 49ers are bringing in the Alabama defense and six tanks from Camp Pendleton to try to stop Drew Brees and the New Orleans Saints on Saturday.

But there is also no denying that San Francisco’s defense will have its hands full.

We are down to the final eight in the NFL playoffs, and projections have a Green Bay Packers-New England Patriots Super Bowl. That is the oddsmakers’ pick.

But next in line on the betting sheets are the Saints. And if you have been watching closely, it would not be a shock to see those Saints go marching right in to Indianapolis for Super Bowl XLVI on Feb. 5.

The 49ers are solid and well-coached in all regards under Jim Harbaugh but especially on defense, where they rank fourth in the NFL. But the manner in which Brees and the boys finished the regular season and carried on with a 45-28 trampling of the Detroit Lions in a playoff opener last weekend makes it conceivable that San Francisco fans could be borrowing a chant from Saints fans when it is all over.

As in, “Who Dat? Who Dat? Who Dat just beat us?”

New Orleans is not only positioned nicely just below the pressure cooker of favorite, but also had a run of eight consecutive victories to close the regular season, followed by an impressive win against a decent Lions team to open the playoffs.

Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford — who passed for 5,038 yards this season and had his team behind only 24-21 early in the final period in the Superdome — saw how quickly and effectively Brees and the Saints can open things up.

“Watching Drew Brees and that offense is really impressive,” Stafford said. “We just couldn’t stop them.”

Nor could others. The Saints’ losses in their 13-3 regular season came in the opener at the defending Super Bowl champion Packers, 42-34, and two other road losses to non-playoff teams that seemed to feature a lack of motivation. Those were Oct. 16 at Tampa Bay, 26-20, and Oct. 30 at St. Louis, 31-21. Since their 26-23 overtime victory at Atlanta on Nov. 13, the Saints’ average margin of victory has been 20 points.

That sort of dominance seldom happens in the competitive NFL.

Statistics are usually boring. The Saints’ are eye-opening.

Not only was Brees’ 5,476 yards passing an NFL record, but so was his team’s 7,474 yards for the season. Brees passed for 49 touchdowns and three of his receivers were statistical marvels.

Tight end Jimmy Graham, a second-year player out of Miami, caught 99 passes and averaged 13.2 yards per catch. Darren Sproles, the 5-foot-6 fireplug running back — who should be impossible to find in the middle of all those other huge men, much less pass to — caught 86 for 710 yards and set a league record for all-purpose yards with 2,696. Receiver Marques Colston caught 80 for 1,143 yards in the regular season and seven for 120 yards against the Lions.

Also against the Lions, the Saints got rushing games of 66 yards from Pierre Thomas, 51 from Sproles and 47 from Chris Ivory, prompting Coach Sean Payton to state the obvious.

“I’m pleased with our balance,” he said.

Clearly, stopping these guys is like halting an avalanche with a snow fence.

“San Francisco’s been playing well all year,” Colston said, “but we’re hitting our stride.”

You think?

Brees, who bounces around the pocket with jaunty confidence before unloading, hasn’t failed to throw a touchdown pass since Oct. 4, 2009, against the New York Jets. That’s 48 games ago. Including Saturday against the Lions, he has a streak of 215 postseason pass attempts without an interception, including 102 in the Super Bowl run two years ago.

Colston said of his quarterback, “He’s playing at an extremely high level for us.”

Indeed.

This weekend will mark the first time in NFL history that the divisional round will include four former Super Bowl most valuable players — Aaron Rodgers, Eli Manning, Tom Brady and Brees.

The fans’ dream matchup for the NFC title game has Brees facing Rodgers and the Packers. The odds point that way, although playing the 49ers at home is certainly no sure thing for New Orleans. But were the upset to happen at Green Bay and the Saints meet the New York Giants, the Superdome would be rocking again, 73,000-plus, as it was for the Lions on Saturday and the Bowl Championship Series title game two days later.

That would keep New Orleans in a pre-Mardi Gras frenzy that already has been estimated by the frequently optimistic chamber of commerce arithmetic to bring in $500 million in benefit to the city. The Lions’ playoff game was a bonus, as would be an NFL conference title game.

The city that was devastated by Hurricane Katrina, and its beloved pro football team, are on a roll.

Beware, 49ers. Two more tanks might be a good idea.

bill.dwyre@latimes.com