A lot of eyes are on the the upcoming New Orleans Saints offseason given how poorly their 2022 campaign has gone. The Saints have clawed their way up to a 6-9 record and are facing elimination from playoff contention with a loss to the best team in the conference this week. So, yeah, a lot of attention is already going towards their fortunes next year.
And the Saints should be active again in free agency, even if they’re looking for cost-effective options amid a challenging salary cap situation. Few teams are in the red by as wide a margin as New Orleans — the rosiest salary cap projections have them starting out over the cap by more than $50 million. The Saints can whittle away at that with their usual restructures and salary cap manipulation, but they’ll probably have to part ways with some veteran players in the process, too.
Still, they’ve always been active spenders in free agency with general manager Mickey Loomis running the front office, and we shouldn’t expect that to change any time soon. Here are some areas of concern and 20 pending free agents to watch out for in the spring: