When the time came to dial up a big play for Michael Thomas Youth Mark Ingram Jersey , the Saints’ leading receiver answered the call.He even had a flip phone planted in the padding of each goal post, just in case.Thomas caught a late 72-yard touchdown reception and then celebrated with a cellphone in a throwback to another famous New Orleans play, and the streaking Saints handed the Los Angeles Rams their first loss of the season with a 45-35 victory on Sunday.”I loved the celebration myself, and I think it was the perfect time when I did it,” Thomas said. “We love our fans and we always want to bring them back great memories.”Drew Brees passed for 346 yards and four touchdowns in New Orleans’ seventh straight win, and Thomas finished with a club-record 211 yards receiving. But what happened after the last of his 12 receptions stole the show in a wild shootout between two of the NFL’s best offenses.Thomas’ long TD came on a pivotal third-down play with about four minutes left. The Rams (8-1) seemed to expect the Saints (7-1) to run a play closer to the first-down marker and double-teamed dynamic running back Alvin Kamara.Brees recalled thinking, “Kamara’s doubled, Mike’s singled, Mike’s by him, here we go.”Thomas ran free behind Marcus Peters, caught Brees’ long throw virtually in stride and ran straight to the goal post to begin his reprise of Joe Horn’s Sunday night TD celebration against the New York Giants in 2003.”I paid a tribute to him, tried to get the crowd going a little bit more, set the tone, have fun out there, giving people a show,” said Thomas, who eclipsed Wes Chandler’s club record of 205 yards receiving against Atlanta in 1979. “You got to have fun. All these guys just catching touchdowns and celebrating with each other Mark Ingram Jersey Stitched , having fun, getting the crowd involved. I felt like I had an opportunity to make it happen.”Like Horn, Thomas was penalized, but the Rams never threatened again.P.J. Williams, who forced a fumble and had an interception for a touchdown in New Orleans’ previous victory at Minnesota, broke up a fourth-down pass intended for Brandin Cooks, virtually sealing the result. The former Saints receiver, who caught six passes for 114 yards and a TD, fell to his knees in frustration.Kamara scored three times, twice on runs and once on a 16-yard catch-and-run 鈥?all in the first half.Rams defensive players lambasted themselves for poor tackling at inopportune times, particularly on Kamara, who gained 116 yards from scrimmage. But coach Sean McVay sought to put the season’s lone loss in a positive light.”We’re good. We love it. You find out about yourself when you have a little bit of adversity,” McVay said. “I know that everybody in that locker room is going to respond the right way. Sometimes setbacks can be setups for comebacks 鈥?and that’s the way we look at it.”COMEBACK BIDJared Goff, who passed for 391 yards and three TDs, nearly led the Rams to an extraordinary comeback amid the din of the Superdome.Los Angeles rallied to tie it at 35 with 21 unanswered points in less than 21 minutes, starting with Greg Zuerlein’s 56-yard field goal as time expired in the first half.The Rams opened the second half with an 11-play touchdown drive capped by Malcolm Brown’s 18-yard catch in which he hopped over safety Marcus Williams along the sideline and kept his balance long enough to reach the ball across the goal line.After another Los Angeles field goal, the Rams forced a second straight punt and tied it on Cooper Kupp’s 41-yard catch-and-run along the sideline.The Saints regained the lead on Wil Lutz’s 54-yard field goal Youth Marcus Davenport Jersey , and then forced the Rams’ first punt of the game with about five minutes left.SCORCHING STARTBoth teams scored touchdowns on each of their first two possessions, starting with Kamara’s 11-yard run and Todd Gurley’s 8-yard score.Gurley’s score have him a TD in a Rams-record 12 straight games, passing Hall of Famer Elroy Hirsch.The tenor changed when outside linebacker Samson Ebukam stripped Saints running back Mark Ingram and defensive Aaron Donald recovered on the Saints 22. But four plays later, Johnny Hekker was ruled down just short of a first down on a fake field goal.”We’re an aggressive, attacking-type team, and if we feel like some of these looks present themselves to try to do that, we have confidence in our players,” McVay said. “Unfortunately, it didn’t work out.”The Saints responded with Brees’ quick hit over the middle to rookie Tre’Quan Smith from 4 yards out for the first of three successive New Orleans touchdowns.After Zuerlein missed a 51-yard field goal attempt, the Saints scored on Brees’ 13-yard pass to Ben Watson with just more than a minute left in the half.Alex Anzelone’s diving interception of Goff’s pass over the middle set up Kamara’s short TD run with 26 seconds left in the half.”We as a defense didn’t play well enough,” Rams defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh said. “The first half, we gave up way too many points and put ourselves in a bad position.”INJURIESRams edge pass rusher Matt Longacre was being evaluated for a concussion during the second quarter.UP NEXTRams: Host Seattle on Sunday.Saints: Visit Cincinnati on Sunday. It’s never been easier to score in the NFL.At the midpoint of the season, the league is on pace to set records for most points, touchdowns and touchdown passes in a single season. Teams have scored 6,440 points, 736 touchdowns and 473 TDs in the air through Week 9.The increase in offensive production follows the lowest-scoring season this decade. Teams averaged 21.7 points per game in 2017. That’s up to 24 points this season. A total of 12 teams are averaging at least 27.5 points per game led by the Chiefs (36.3), Saints (34.9) and Rams (33.2).There are several reasons scoring has soared. A combination of new rules and rule adjustments over the past few years favor offenses. The league has banned helmet-to-helmet contact Marcus Davenport Jersey Stitched , implemented a defenseless receiver rule and a body-weight rule against players making sacks, outlawed low hits on quarterbacks and emphasized illegal contact penalties.There’s also been an influx of innovative, offensive-minded coaches — Sean McVay, Doug Pederson, Kyle Shanahan — and talented young quarterbacks — Patrick Mahomes, Carson Wentz, Jared Goff, among others.Five quarterbacks — Mahomes, Goff, Matt Ryan, Ben Roethlisberger and Aaron Rodgers — are on pace to throw for 5,000 yards. That only happened nine times previously in league history. Ten QBs have a passer rating over 100, double the total last season.Games are not only featuring more scoring but there’s been plenty of close, down-to-the-wire action. Seventy-one games were decided by one score, eight points or less. That’s the fifth-most through nine weeks. Thirty-seven games have been decided by a field goal, which was fourth-most at this point. Ten games have reached overtime and 36 teams have rallied to win or tie after trailing in the fourth quarter or overtime.Close, high-scoring games are exciting for fans Youth Tre’Quan Smith Jersey , especially the millions who spend billions of dollars to play fantasy football. All of it is good for the league’s television ratings, which are up after declining in 2016 and 2017.More folks are also watching by live streaming. According to a recent study from Conviva, a real-time measurement platform, NFL live viewing was up 72 percent in plays and 83 percent in viewing hours over the same time frame last year.Conviva’s data shows mobile NFL plays were up 95 percent and prime-time NFL saw 109 percent growth in plays and 97 percent growth in viewing hours.Here’s a look inside the numbers from the first half:PASSING KING: Drew Brees broke Peyton Manning’s record for career passing yards last month. Brees has 72,781 yards passing and counting. Manning had 71,940.KICKING KING: Adam Vinatieri broke Morten Anderson’s record for most points and most field goals. Vinatieri has 2,550 points and 573 field goals. Anderson had 2,544 points and 565 field goals.THE 500 CLUB: Brees and Tom Brady joined Manning and Brett Favre as the only players to throw 500 TD passes. Brees has 506, one more than Brady. Manning had 539 and Favre had 508.PATRICK THE GREAT: Mahomes has 29 TD passes and 3,185 yards passing yards, the most in both categories through the first 10 games of a player’s career. He also has thrown for at least 300 yards in eight straight games, one away from setting the record he currently shares with Andrew Luck.THIELEN’S CHASE: Adam Thielen became the first player to have eight 100-yard receiving games to start a season, tying Calvin Johnson for the longest streak of such games. The former undrafted wide receiver has 78 catches for the Vikings. He’s on pace to challenge Marvin Harrison’s single-season record of 143.GURLEY GETS IN: Todd Gurley has 16 touchdowns — 12 rushing and four receiving — for the Rams. He’s on pace for 28. The record is 31 by Hall of Famer LaDainian Tomlinson.KIRK COMPLETIONS: Kirk Cousins became the first player to complete at least 30 passes in four consecutive games. Before the season, Cousins became the first player to sign a fully guaranteed contract when the Vikings gave him $84 million for three seasons.FIRST MISS: Justin Tucker had made all 222 extra points in his career before he missed one at the end of Baltimore’s 24-23 loss to New Orleans in Week 7. He hadn’t missed any kick 33 yards or shorter in 300 tries his career.