Kind of a strange and random story via The Associated Press this morning.

The New Orleans Saints, who delivered us “Bounty Gate” and complained their way to a pass interference rule change that actually didn’t really change anything, are headed to court “to keep the public from seeing hundreds of emails that allegedly show team executives doing public relations damage control for the area’s Roman Catholic archdiocese to help it contain the fallout from a burgeoning sexual abuse crisis.”

That’s a mouthful, and it’s what the AP writes in a story that continues like this:

Attorneys for about two dozen men suing the church say in court filings that the 276 documents they obtained through discovery show that the NFL team, whose owner is devoutly Catholic, aided the Archdiocese of New Orleans in its “pattern and practice of concealing its crimes.”

“Obviously, the Saints should not be in the business of assisting the Archdiocese, and the Saints’ public relations team is not in the business of managing the public relations of criminals engaged in pedophilia,” the attorneys wrote in a court filing. “The Saints realize that if the documents at issue are made public, this professional sports organization also will be smearing itself.”

Saints attorneys, in court papers, disputed any suggestion that the team helped the church cover up crimes, calling such claims “outrageous.” They further said that the emails, exchanged in 2018 and 2019, were intended to be private and should not be “fodder for the public.” The archdiocese is also fighting the release of the emails.

The rest of the story is rather dense and contains some legalese, though it mentions that Saints owner Gayle Benson is close with local Archbishop Gregory Aymond and has given millions of dollars to NOLA-area Catholic institutions.

Sounds like a big mess. My prediction is that highly-paid lawyers make this go away.