METAIRIE, La. — Saints coach Sean Payton said Wednesday that it remains unclear whether quarterback Drew Brees will play in Sunday’s home finale against the Jacksonville Jaguars.
Brees injured his right foot in Monday night’s loss to Detroit, but never missed a snap.
Payton said Brees has had an MRI and was awaiting a second opinion from another doctor before deciding how to move forward.
“We’re kind of taking it day by day,” Payton said. “Each day we’ll gather more information and have a better idea of where he will be as it pertains to playing.”
The Saints, who’ve been eliminated from playoff contention, did not practice on Tuesday and did not have a practice scheduled Wednesday, either.
Brees is scheduled to meet with reporters after practice this afternoon.
Payton said Brees, who has one more season left on his current contract, would be held out if Saints trainers were concerned about the risk of worsening the injury or exposing Brees to undue contact from pass rushers because of a lack of mobility.
“Typically, if a player is playing, we have cleared him medically and he is not risking further injury,” Payton said. “If a player has a risk to further injure himself, we don’t play him. That would be in the regular season. That would be in the postseason. That would be with two weeks left to go in the season where we are at now.”
Brees passed for 341 yards and three touchdowns Monday night, eclipsing 4,000 yards for a 10th straight season.
If Brees does not play, the Saints’ backups are veteran former LSU star Matt Flynn and rookie Garrett Grayson, who was the first of New Orleans’ two third-round draft choices last spring out of Colorado State. Grayson was the third QB drafted last spring behind Tampa Bay’s Jameis Winston and Tennessee’s Marcus Mariota, who were taken first and second overall.
Tight end Ben Watson said he suspects Flynn would be first in line to step in.
“That would be my assumption. As far as I know, he is the backup quarterback, correct?” Watson said. “The only reason I say that is because during the game (Monday night) I know that Matt was warming up. I know he was up. That would be my assumption, but obviously that would be a coach’s decision once we got to the actual game.”
Grayson has not taken a snap in a regular season game and usually is inactive on game days.
Flynn is in his eighth NFL season. He has been a backup throughout his career and last started in 2013, when he received five starts for Green Bay in place of injured starter Aaron Rodgers. Flynn finished that season 1,146 yards and seven TDs passing.
For his career, he has completed 61.3 percent of his passes for 2,541 yards and 17 touchdowns.
“He has been around a lot of football. Obviously, the coaches brought him in understanding that he could learn some of the things that he needed to do if he were to have to perform,” Watson said of Flynn. “Garrett has been here as well for the whole year. I don’t know who it would be if Drew wasn’t there. But again, I’ll reiterate the fact that since I’ve been here, Drew hadn’t missed a game except for the Carolina game this year. He is usually pretty reliable, so the idea is that we’ll just go through the week and see if he is going to be up or not.”
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