The Saints suffered their first loss of 2009 before the season even started.

A U.S. District Court judge upheld the suspensions of Saints DEs Charles Grant and Will Smith last month, as the players appeared to have exhausted all their methods of avoiding a suspension after nearly six months of haggling. Grant and Smith tested positive for the banned substance bumetanide last year, which was in a diuretic they took called StarCaps.

With those two sidelined, backup DE Bobby McCray will be thrust into the starting lineup. However, he told PFW he hopes the suspensions are somehow overturned — he wants to beat out Grant or Smith for a starting spot in training camp without any help.

“I will be starting this season no matter what, because I’m going out in training camp and I’m taking something,” McCray said in a recent interview with PFW. “I don’t care who’s there. I came here for that (situational) role last year, but the tables have turned.

“I don’t hope any suspensions on anybody because they’re great players and I need them around to help me get better.”

It’s not hard to figure out how to get under McCray’s skin — just ask him about the spot-duty role he signed up to play for New Orleans last offseason after weighing his options as an unrestricted free agent. McCray doesn’t like the label of “situational” pass rusher that’s attached to him, and he’s determined to shed it this season, he said.

“I am not a situational guy,” McCray said. “That’s just a little topic that has stuck with me. People like to write stories about that. That’s never been me.”

The truth is the 27-year-old has played the situational role for a large portion of his career, including the first half of last season. At 260 pounds, he’s not considered big enough to hold his ground against 300- to 320-pound offensive linemen on running downs.

He was signed to play behind the highly paid starting tandem of Grant and Smith, each of whom weighs more than 280 pounds, and there has yet to be any serious debate about him replacing either one of them for the long term. McCray was brought in to help “in the defensive line rotation,” Saints GM Mickey Loomis announced after inking him to five-year, $20 million deal in March ’08.

However, McCray, who spent his first four seasons with the Jaguars after leaving the University of Florida, has made at least seven starts in four of his five NFL campaigns and has proved to be a capable every-down player. A season-ending injury to Grant bumped McCray into the starting lineup for the final eight games of the Saints’ disappointing ’08 campaign, and the “D” didn’t collapse, although it continued to struggle. In fact, McCray led the team in sacks with six.

Although he’ll open the season at the top of the depth chart again, barring injury, McCray said the team has yet to tell him he’ll be starting when the ’09 campaign kicks off. He doesn’t seem too concerned about what the team has to say. McCray’s doing the talking for now.

“I don’t even want them talking to me about it as far as the first four games. The media has been trying to get me to talk about that. I don’t even listen to anything they say about it. I don’t do any research. I don’t Google anything. I don’t ask Will or Charles. None of that.

“My mindset is I’m going into training camp and I’m taking somebody’s position. It’s going to happen.”

He doesn’t lack for confidence, and it’s been partly inspired by the addition of new defensive coordinator Gregg Williams, who has a track record of leading aggressive, swarming and ultimately successful units. Williams helped another pass rusher from Florida improve his game when he worked with Jevon Kearse while serving as D-coordinator for the Titans from 1999-2000.

“I personally think (Williams) is the shit,” said McCray. “Knowing his background and his swagger that he provides, it’s just … you can’t even question it. So far this whole offseason with him has just been phenomenal. The plays he has. … He has me doing a lot of different things — moving around, which I can’t even talk about right now.”

Perhaps in McCray, Williams saw someone with enough swagger to match his own and found a kindred spirit. Regardless, the Saints have to hope the new coordinator can get the most from McCray. Since Smith joined forces with Grant before the ’04 season, the two have combined for 61 of the team’s 160 sacks in the regular season, which is nearly 40 percent of the team’s sacks.

McCray will be charged with filling the void and keeping the Saints’ season from derailing in a hurry while Grant and Smith sit out. While he doesn’t subscribe to the theory that he could only be keeping a seat warm, he at least acknowledges that the theory exists.

“If what people are talking about happens, and if it looks like a (starter-by-) default type of process, I mean I’m used to it,” he said. “It’s no problem to me.

“I’m just going to work hard.”

Kickoff is coming! Be sure to buy your copy of the Pro Football Weekly/Yahoo! Sports 2009 NFL preview magazine, now available at bookstores, newsstands and retail outlets where magazines are sold. Or order your copy online at PFWStore.com .