Key Acquisitions: Max Unger (C), Brandon Browner (CB), Dannell Ellerbe (LB), CJ Spiller (RB)
Key Losses: Jimmy Graham (TE), Kenny Stills (WR), Ben Grubbs (G), Curtis Lofton (LB), Pierre Thomas (RB), and Junior Galette (Jerk)
2014 Record: 7-9, second in the NFC South
The Saints blew it all up. Those maniacs, they blew it up. Damn them. Damn them all to hell!
Really, the Saints were in position to cruise into the playoffs last year in an extremely weak division and yet when they lost back-to-back games to the Falcons and Browns something seemed to be wrong. Eventually we figured out it was all wrong, and the Saints were terrible. The excellent defense from the previous year had fallen apart, and Rob Ryan was getting the blame (rightfully so).
So what do the Saints do? They jettison Jimmy the Dunker to Seattle for a center, removing Brees’ best weapon. Then they jettisoned Kenny Stills, another effective Brees weapon. Now, all Brees has left is Brandon Cooks and the aging corpse of Marques Colston. But wait, they have Ben Watson at right end! Why are you laughing? Oh right, because it’s Ben Watson.
This is a big retooling year for the Saints. Brees is another year older, now 36, and while he still performed last season, some cracks in the drywall showed up. Soon a gentle Brees will knock him over. It’s going to be interesting to see how he performs missing his most trusty weapon.
The defense was the true weak spot last season, and somehow Rob (the wolfman) Ryan kept his job. Ryan’s defenses have a strange tendency to play very well his first year with the team, and then fall apart in subsequent years. If that holds true then he’s toast. But don’t take my word for it, take a true Saints fan’s word for it.
Saints Fan “Silly Burrito” Fan Perspective:
Last year, the Saints were the trendy pick to win the Super Bowl. Everyone believed that this was the year. The offense would shine, and the defense, man that defense would be killer. Everyone drank the grape Kool-Aid, from the Saints players, to the coaches, to the staff. We just knew that we were marching in to another Super Bowl. We were handed a beautiful Christmas gift, and we couldn’t wait to open it. Then the season started, and Saints fans were in for a nasty shock. Much like the kid in this video, we were about to be sorely disappointed. If you had told a Saints fan that all they had to do was beat a 7-8-1 record to win the NFC South, they would’ve laughed their butts off.
No one is laughing now. After a 7-9 season where nothing went right defensively, and the offense seemed to take a step back (even if the actual numbers don’t look that bad), the Saints are determined to bring it back to the 2006 roots of the Payton/Brees era, minus the devastating hurricane. They’re blowing up the team, and caused minor non-poboy related heart attacks in New Orleans by shipping off the very popular Jimmy Graham to the NFC champion Seahawks for a center and a first-round draft pick. Even though they just gave Junior Galette a huge contract last year, after his behavior and the beach video came out, they cut him after desperately trying to find anyone who would take him off their hands. The Saints have approximately tree fitty in cap space left, so there’s not much that can be done.
The lone bright spots of the previous year: seeing Mark Ingram look like an actual NFL running back, and the potential that Brandin Cooks showed before his injury. This year, the hope is that Ingram and newly signed C.J. Spiller will start an effective Saints rushing attack that will be the focus of BWAHAHAHAHAAHA YOU KNOW BREES IS THROWING FOR 6000 YARDS THIS YEAR “RUSHING ATTACK LOL” SEAN PAYTON.
Rob Ryan is generally seen as having one more year left to turn around the Saints defense, or the recently fired/hired Dennis Allen will be taking over soon. In the same vein of thinking that any improvement from 31st place out of 32 would be better, the Saints D should improve from last year, but every Saints fan is crossing their fingers. The optimistic side of me is hoping for a 10-6 NFC South championship knowing that with Brees all things are possible. The pessimistic side of me is seeing a defense that recently couldn’t figure out how many men should be on the field, leading to a 6-10 record and that oh so familiar pre-2006 sinking feeling in the pit of our stomachs. Let’s split the difference.
8-8, sixth seed in the NFC.
Anyway if Rob Ryan gets fired he will at least have time to finish his series of romance novels
