There were a lot of people who drank the New Orleans Saints Kool-Aid coming into this season. They fielded a really tough defense in 2022 and won seven games with Andy Dalton at the helm for the majority of the season. One would make the assumption that adding a more viable quarterback would push them to more wins in the sickly NFC South.
The Saints thought the same thing, which is why they went out and signed Derek Carr. who had four consecutive seasons of 4,000 yards passing from 2018-21 with the Las Vegas Raiders before becoming the scapegoat in Josh McDaniels’ House of Pain.
By all accounts, it made sense for the Saints to bring in Carr, but for several reasons, it has yet to pay off. He is currently 23rd in EPA/play, which is behind the likes of Ryan Tannehill and Sam Howell. He’s also 24th in success rate, which puts him behind Mac Jones and Jordan Love. Carr has also only thrown six touchdown passes to four interceptions and has a passer rating of 82.8, which would be the lowest passer rating he’s put up since his rookie year in 2014.
A big reason for this is the lack of juice the Saints have offensively. Chris Olave looked good as a rookie, but has yet to put together any sustainable chemistry with Carr. Alvin Kamara is great, we know that, but he was gone for the first three weeks and the offense was noticeably worse without him. Outside of those two, what else does New Orleans have? The ghost of Michael Thomas? Rashid Shaheed? Taysom Hill? No offense to any of those guys, but no defensive coordinator is getting gray hair trying to figure out how to cover Rashid Shaheed, and Taysom Hill is only relevant when he’s poaching one-yard touchdowns, or when your uncle talks about how gritty he is at Thanksgiving dinner. So while Carr has been less than optimal, he can’t throw the ball to himself.
Now, there are two silver linings for the Saints. For starters, their defense is capital G good. They are sixth in the NFL in EPA/play and third in success rate, trailing only Cleveland and Baltimore in the latter category. They don’t have any glaring holes on that side of the ball. Cameron Jordan is a future Hall of Famer that is still playing near the top of his game. Carl Granderson recently got a well-earned extension, and Demario Davis and Peter Werner are both very good in the middle of the defense. Plus, Marshon Lattimore and Tyrann Mathieu on the back end, and the likes of Alontae Taylor and Paulson Adebo have both proven to be good role players, as well. They are getting major production from their stars and the remainder of their starters, which is keeping them in games.
Additionally, the rest of their schedule is as easy as it comes in the league. Here are their remaining games:
- at Colts
- vs. Bears
- at Vikings
- at Falcons
- vs. Lions
- vs. Panthers
- vs. Giants
- at Rams
- at Buccaneers
- vs. Falcons
The only game where they seem completely outmatched is against the Lions. The remaining nine games are all very winnable. While the Saints are far from a great team, they benefit from playing a cupcake schedule in a cupcake division while fielding a great defense. Even at 3-4, that is the silver lining, and their season is far from over.