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Well that’s worrying. Veteran options at quarterback are thinning out for the New Orleans Saints, and their safest bet may be another year with Jameis Winston starting under center. But they may go in another direction instead — San Francisco 49ers passer Jimmy Garoppolo is expected to be traded this offseason, and New Orleans could be considering him instead of Winston. This comes from ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler, who wrote in his post-NFL scouting combine notebook:
“The wildest rumor I heard this week? Quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo potentially pairing with New Orleans. This would be a surprise since many around the league expect Jameis Winston to return to the Saints. But if Rodgers and Wilson aren’t moved, Garoppolo becomes one of the top options available. Maybe New Orleans at least kicks this idea around.”
Garoppolo is a competent quarterback, sure, but he’s the textbook definition of a passer teams win with, not because of. He’s racked up 33 wins in 47 regular season starts, and that matters to Saints head coach Dennis Allen, whose first words about what he values in a quarterback were that he wants a winner. Garoppolo is that with a career winning percentage of .702 and a 4-2 record in the playoffs.
But you’ll see the flaws in that metric if you take even a moment to glance over his resume. Garoppolo runs an efficient offense, completing 67.7% of his passes, by refusing to take risks and avoiding dangerous throws to a fault. It says a lot that he’s averaged just 188 passing yards per game in his career, and that his per-game average with the 49ers has hovered around 242. They know he can’t handle the heavy lifting.
And when the chips were down just a few years ago in Super Bowl LIV, he airmailed the game-winning touchdown pass over Emmanuel Sanders’ head to cost his team a title. He might get the Saints back to the postseason by staying out of the way, but there are going to be times when he has to make a play, and he hasn’t been able to do that with any consistency.
Then you’ve got to consider his injury history. Garoppolo has missed a ton of time with a torn ACL, two high-ankle sprains, and a sprained shoulder, and he’s currently recovering from shoulder surgery that won’t allow him to start throwing until training camp. If the Saints brought him in as their starter, he wouldn’t get a single snap with the starting until from organized team activities in May to summer workouts in June and July.
It just feels like a bad move, but it’s one Allen and the Saints may talk themselves into. They could see Garoppolo as a one-year band-aid to keep the offense afloat while a quarterback for the future, maybe Ian Book or a rookie draft pick, gets prepared to replace him. Ironically that’s exactly what Garoppolo has been doing in San Francisco with Trey Lance waiting to replace him. If the Saints are comparing Garoppolo and Winston head-to-head, his higher career winning percentage (.702 against Winston’s .428) and lower interceptions numbers (a rate of 2.7% against Winston’s 3.3%) are going to look better.
Maybe Garoppolo could be acquired for a fourth or fifth round pick in this year’s draft, given his low level of play and lengthy injury history. He’s under contract for just one more year so the Saints could walk away from the deal in 2023 to go in another direction. But if that’s the case, wouldn’t you rather sign someone like Teddy Bridgewater who plays a similar error-free, low-ceiling style of football but who won’t cost you a draft pick and may come at on a more affordable contract?
It would hurt to see Winston’s time with the Saints end like this, given the strides he made to clean up mistakes in his game and the disappointing injury that cut his season short last year. He’s worked hard to get back from knee surgery and deserves the opportunity to start again in this league. But it’s possible the Saints end up pivoting to Garoppolo should Winston go somewhere else — general manager Mickey Loomis said recently that the team views Winston as one of their options, but he wasn’t so sure a reunion with New Orleans was on Winston’s mind.
The only certainty is that there’s a lot of intrigue surrounding the Saints’ quarterback situation. We’ll see how it all develops in the weeks ahead, with teams cleared to contact free agents on March 14.
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