For the elite, best of the best, lofty goals beget lofty goals.
For New Orleans Saints receiver Michael Thomas, it's not enough to have broken the single-season receptions record. He wants to blast past his own mark.
"Yeah, I think I can break it again," Thomas said Sunday, via John DeShazier of the team's official website.
Thomas didn't just squeak past Marvin Harrison's all-time receptions mark of 143 -- a mark some thought untouchable. He soared by, snagging 149 passes. He smashed the record with a game to spare.
"It's just what I do. At my position I set real high goals and try to accomplish them along with winning football games and helping out the people around me," Thomas said. "It is kind of just like something that keeps you (motivated), you know, we have goals at the beginning of the season and you kind of just chase them all year and just kind of, I do not know. I feel like in my head I was going to get it eventually because I don't really drop too many passes. When it comes to that I just had to just stay consistent and be more consistent and take advantage of my opportunities and it just added up faster."
The dynamite Ohio State product with vise-grip hands and elite route-running acumen has improved each season in the NFL. He soared onto the scene with 92 receptions for 1,137 yards as a rookie. The 27-year-old has improved each year since, netting 104 receptions for 1,245 yards, 125 catches for 1,405 yards the following two campaigns before last season's record-setting 149-catch, 1,725-yard year.
In the Saints' prolific offense, Thomas benefited from being the go-to target whenever Drew Brees -- or Teddy Bridgewater last season -- needed to make a play. Being the Alpha wideout on a squad with a bunch of Epsilons provides more opportunities.
This offseason, the Saints added veteran receiver Emmanuel Sanders in hopes of providing Thomas a legit sidekick. While logic might suggest that adding a player of Sanders' caliber could take targets away from Thomas, the All-Pro receiver sees it differently.
"Any time you get a chance to play with another veteran guy that's played a lot of football and has played in championship games and has won a lot of games that plays the same position, you always get excited," Thomas said.
"Being a receiver, you want to free up the coverage. You always want to get the defense to have to go 'man' or something. You have to just figure it out, what they're going to do. So any time you can add another weapon to the other side, it just makes you more excited for the things that the offense can accomplish as a whole. We have a lot of weapons and the more weapons we have, the more exciting it's going to get. It's just simple math."
Thomas hopes that math adds up to him breaching the 150-catch plateau, a place no NFL player has ever been.
