The band-aid might finally get ripped off, folks, as the New Orleans Saints might finally enter a rebuild. The Saints have been putting off doing so for years and, by avoiding it, have made things even harder on themselves.
Well, the time has officially come to rip that bandaid off and let the rebuild begin. At 1-7, the Saints are going nowhere this year and with the trade deadline looming, plenty of their players are being looked at by contending teams.
Per Jeremy Fowler of ESPN in his weekly trade buzz update, teams have their eyes glued on the Saints ahead of next week's trade deadline.
"New Orleans has tradeable assets, from wide receivers Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed to corner Alontae Taylor and linebacker Pete Werner. The sense is the Saints will at least listen to offers on certain players. Teams I've spoken to are under the impression that guard Cesar Ruiz might be available at the right price. Change feels inevitable for the Saints this offseason regardless, with defensive staples such as Demario Davis and Cameron Jordan both turning 37 next year and Alvin Kamara turning 31."
Saints reportedly bracing for major shake-up as trade deadline nears
Fowler listed eight Saints players in his report and it makes sense why all eight of those players were included in the report. The Saints won't (and shouldn't) keep both Chris Olave and Rashid Shaheed and the team has several older players on their roster that deserve a chance to play for a contender as their careers wind down (if that's what they want to do).
This is the time for Mickey Loomis and the Saints to really shake things up and go for broke. The team is not going anywhere meaningful in 2025 so why not trade these players that they won't have the funds to keep?
If teams are interested in these players and the Saints can get a solid number of picks in return, make the trades! Of course, it won't matter if the Saints don't spend those picks on the right players but that's a problem for April. Kellen Moore has shown that he has what it takes to lead a bad roster to at least some competitive games so imagine what he can do with actual good talent that's under team control past this year.
Buckle up, Saints fans. It's going to be a bumpy ride until the trade deadline gets here.