The official projection track and some of the models have shifted ever so slightly to the east. If I were in Vegas I'd bet that it will eventually shift a bit more east, probably hitting the mouth of the Miss. River and coming in near Gulfport, MS. That would likely be just far enough east to avoid the worst case scenario in New Orleans. Like Georges, but an even closer call this time.
But I am NOT a meteorologist.
The actual tracks for all the north GOM storms have tracked east of predictions since last year. That's a pretty good reason to expect the shift.
The worst of the weather is not in the center of the hurricane. If I remember right it's the right side of the storm in relation to the direction of the storm path. In other words, it's the east side of the storm as it's heading north. The problem caused by the eye passing over is that the winds increase gradually as the storm approaches and stop suddenly as the eye passes over. It's when the eye wall hits again that the winds go from zero to 75mph+ in seconds. If the storms sustained winds are 100 and it's forward motion is 7 mph the winds go from 0 to 107 in no time and slam into everything. That's the destructive part. Then there's the tornados... No good part of a hurricane. Missing a direct hit isn't necessarily a good thing.
Negative. If the correct quadrant of the hurricane hits the mouth of the Mississippi River at high tide, the storm surge will make it backflow and breach it's levees all the way up to Baton Rouge. East is worse.