Somewhere in between the two lists thrown by Andy Dalton Thursday night, was anyone else checking back the Saints’ Capital 2023 draft, only to remember (perhaps too loudly) that his first-round pick would go to the undefeated Eagles?
New Orleans, now 2-5 after Thursday’s 42-34 loss to the Cardinals, captivated us this off season with the idea of pretending Sean Payton’s loss wasn’t a funeral of some sort. They handed the main training gig to Dennis Allen, their qualified defensive coordinator. They traded in the first round in a draft that every other team was saving from like the auto stock market during a chip shortage. The naysayers (myself included) were charmed by the idea that James Winston’s promising start to the 2021 season could go on, that Chris Olaf could have a similar effect to Jamar Chase on attack, the defense would remain in the top five and that sooner or later Tom Brady would leave the NFC South. So, it made sense to stock up now. At that moment, everything made sense in the world, and in fact, who would have criticized a team of mostly veterans for refusing to simply walk in the water?
Problem: What will happen if the post-Payton plan doesn’t work? And after seven weeks of experimenting, it doesn’t seem to work. In fairness to Saints, one of Dalton’s false touchdowns was cross, the kind of inverted ball awarded to all teams now and then. In a global sense, their team was completely devastated by injury with inactivity on Thursday Looks a bit like a Pro Bowl roster. We didn’t even see Trevor Benning, his other first-round pick in 2022, due to injury, and when Olaf gets his hands on the ball he looks great.
If Payton escapes to a more attractive football ground, the Saints will reap some big capital from the deal, as the longtime coach is still under contract in New Orleans.
And so we’re left wondering what will happen when the 2022 movie slowly turns into a quandary. Should there have been any foresight? Can we really blame the saints for seeing what we’ve all seen, that sliver of opportunity?
From a more pessimistic view: Is there a plan to stabilize the center of the center in the near future, or even the ability to do so? What happens to key defensive players like Cam Jordan and Demario Davis, who are on the cusp of outing their 33-year seasons? Remember that team lost Marcus Williams in free agency and then replaced away CJ Gardner-Johnson with Peanuts on the eve of the season, rather than extending it after the rookie deal. And if the defense is weak—like nearly any dominant group for a while in the modern NFL—do the Saints, as an organization, have much of a foundation to stand on?
Those are big questions, maybe a little too big for Week 7. Still, it’s fair to say that this team, even with its injuries, should have been able to handle the lowly Cardinals on Thursday night, but allowed them to add more than 40 points. Alvin Kamara was largely stoned and could only run to one side of the offensive line, which only further disturbed the Saints. Predictability in a running game. The Saints only reached Kyler Murray twice, and while it didn’t make any sense, other talented defensive lines tormented this quarterback with pressure from four men.
This is a recycled, headache-inducing point for most New Orleans fans, and understandably so. No one likes to look at the center of a problem the most annoying and inciting. But at some point the rest of the components of what’s left of Payton’s good team — but not the Super Bowl winner — will be pulled out and a rebuilding phase will be needed. It is likely to be painful.
Time and time again, everyone had to keep asking themselves if it was worth keeping this team together. They had to ask if it made sense to continue layering over this core group of players and, ultimately, how much Payton accounts for in the winning column as a single entity. While there is a future on this list somewhere down the road, there is also a visible end of sorts, at least from our perspective on Thursday night. The hope is that they can effectively tackle one before the other is wasted.
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