The 2024 season is the third of the Dennis Allen era, which looks to be make-or-break for the Saints’ head coach. The last two seasons have shown flashes of potential and have had some real high points, but ultimately, both have ended in disappointment without playoff football to show for it.
Most fans accepted that life after Drew Brees and Sean Payton would be difficult. However, watching the Saints squander the opportunity to win pro football’s weakest division two seasons straight has been extremely frustrating. As a result, many fans have been calling for Allen to be replaced, with this season generally looking like his final chance.
Last season was also full of missed opportunities, with seven of the team’s eight losses coming by ten points or less, with the 17-0 lead blown in Green Bay being a real tough pill to swallow. Here, we’ll look at the 2024 season and whether the Saints have made sufficient moves to improve last year’s 9-8 record.
We’ll start by looking at the offense. Unsurprisingly, the team used their first-round selection (14th overall) on the offensive line, drafting Taliese Fuaga out of Oregon State. Last season’s O-Line play was underwhelming at best, and with former three-time All-Pro Ryan Ramczyk out for the upcoming season, it was clear that the team needed to plug that hole for 2024.
Fuaga was an All-American last year and was the best offensive lineman available by the time the Saints were on the clock. Across his three seasons in college, he didn’t allow a single sack from 1,500 snaps, and the team would love that streak to continue into his pro career.
Fuaga joins a much-maligned unit, with the likes of Trevor Penning, Cesar Ruiz, and Erik McCoy all coming under criticism recently, leading to PFF ranking the Saints unit as dead last in the league going into the 2024 season.
The man behind that unit will once again be Derek Carr, who looks to improve on a 2023 season, which was solid but unconvincing at times. Carr ended the year with 25 touchdowns, eight picks, and a total of just under 3,900 yards, which are decent numbers but arguably not what the fanbase expected for $35 million a year.
Carr had a few particularly poor games in 2023, but he’s still the QB1 in New Orleans, and this year, he’s working under a new offensive coordinator. In February, Klint Kubiak joined the team, having been the San Francisco 49ers passing game coordinator during the last campaign. He is the Saints’ first new OC in 15 years, as Pete Carmichael departed at the end of the season after another disappointing offensive season, which saw the team underperform in the eyes of many Saints fans.
Kubiak was working with an All-Star cast in San Francisco made up of Christian McCaffrey, George Kittle, Brandon Aiyuk, and Deebo Samuel, but he still seemed to help Kyle Shanahan get the best out of each player.
For this Saints offense, Chris Olave, Alvin Kamara, and Rashid Shaheed will likely be the main players again. Shaheed, in particular, has been an exciting breakout star and a real deep threat, and it will be interesting to see how Kubiak can utilize his skill set in the upcoming season.
The team still looks strong on defense, having ranked in the top ten in scoring defense three seasons in a row. Once again, the team will be anchored by the ageless Demario Davis, who received All-Pro honors for a fifth straight season and was the only Saint on this year’s NFL Top 100 list, with his peers ranking him as the 44th-best player in football.
Davis and Cameron Jordan bring quality and immense experience to this defense, which can keep the Saints in any game. As we all know, the Saints’ current cap situation has limited free-agent signings in recent years, but this season did see the introduction of Chase Young, a former 2nd-overall pick released by the Niners at the end of last season.
Young is a former Defensive Rookie of the Year winner, but in recent seasons, he hasn’t been able to stay healthy, leading the Saints to only offer him a one-year $13 million contract as a ‘prove it’ deal. So far in the preseason, he’s looked excellent, and if he can stay healthy, this could look like an inspired pickup from GM Mickey Loomis.
Season Prediction
This Saints season begins with a home game against the Carolina Panthers, the worst team in football last time out. Not that any game in the NFL is easy, but if the Saints don’t get off to a winning start, this could be a long season, particularly with Dallas, Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Kansas City making up the four games after that.
If the team can get through that stretch with a 2-3 record, that wouldn’t be a disaster, with most of the rest of the schedule being easier than that.
As always, divisional games can be expected to define the season, with Atlanta and Tampa Bay likely challenging for the division title as they did last season. Atlanta benefits from a new coach in Raheem Morris and a new quarterback in Kirk Cousins and is tapped by many to do much better than they did last year with Desmond Ridder under center.
Tampa Bay is also looking to repeat at least last season’s solid 9-8 showing, which was good enough for a third-straight NFC South title. For several years, the South has been considered the league’s weakest division, but this season, it figures to have three teams battling out for the title, with the Panthers in the rear-view mirror.
Picking up divisional wins will be crucial if the Saints are to make the playoffs, but defeating the Giants, Commanders, and Broncos will be essential. Those games might look easy on paper, but you never know what might happen in the NFL. The most highly anticipated one of those fixtures is the return of Sean Payton on Thursday Night Football when he brings his Denver Broncos to the Superdome in week 7.
Some talking heads are predicting the Saints will have a disastrous season and pick up less than seven wins for the first time since 2005. But this team has enough talent and experience – particularly in the defense – to let that happen.
Going into 2024, the Saints will likely have a record similar to last campaign’s 9-8 showing. Whether that will be enough for either the NFC South title or a wildcard spot remains to be seen, as that record saw the team miss out on both spots on tiebreakers last year to the Bucs and Packers, respectively.
But once again, Dennis Allen’s team has one of the weakest schedules in football based on 2023 records, and they must capitalize. Last season was a major missed opportunity for the team, and Allen is now on his last chance with the fanbase and perhaps with the team ownership.
Allen has been given his quarterback and a new OC to get things going offensively in 2024 and bring playoff football back to the city. We expect that the Saints will be in the mix for the postseason again this time, and if they fall short, it will likely lead to more questions on whether Allen can get this team back to respectability in the NFC.
Projected Outlook and Record: 9-8 (On the Bubble Playoff Team)
