MILEBIL, Alabama. – General manager Mickey Loomis acknowledged that this will be a “discouraging” season for the New Orleans Saints, who will likely have to replace Drew Brees as quarterback and could exceed $ 100 million above the salary cap.
But Loomis made it clear that the Saints will not go into rebuild mode after winning the last four NFC South titles.
“Listen, we have a fantastic list. And I can’t foresee a circumstance in which we don’t say, ‘Man, we’ll do our best to win: win now and compete for a championship,'” Loomis said during a video conference with the media while attending the Senior Bowl.
He did not go into much detail, saying that there are still “more unknowns than are known” at this time in the calendar, including:
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There is still no official word on whether Brees will retire, as it takes time to decompress with his family after his twentieth season.
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There is no official word on how much the salary cap will go down after losing revenue from the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. The cap could drop to $ 175 million per team after being $ 198.2 million in 2020 , although it could be superior.
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The Saints have not yet finished their internal ratings of the players.
So it’s too early to tell if the Saints will try to re-sign outstanding free agents like quarterback Jameis Winston, safety Marcus Williams, defensive end Trey Hendrickson, defensive end Sheldon Rankins and winger Jared Cook, or if they could enter the market for a high priced QB like Matthew Stafford or any other that is commercially available.
“All this assessment and what’s going on with that remains to be seen,” Loomis said. “We like [quarterback Taysom Hill]. We like Jameis. We liked what they did for us. But, like any position, we will have a lot of discussion over the next week or two. “
The Saints are currently projected to have $ 277.8 million in salary caps for 2021 with only 43 salaries on the list, according to ESPN’s List Management System. However, they could save at least $ 13.5 million in maximum space (and possibly more) if Brees retires. And they’ve been one of the most aggressive teams in the NFL for years when it comes to facing cap costs in future seasons. So they could go on and on if they want to keep most of the current list intact.
For years, it seemed that the Saints would “update” the salary cap and perhaps switch to reconstruction mode every time Brees retired. But then they reloaded a championship roster around them with fantastic draft classes in 2016 and 2017 that included stars like receiver Michael Thomas, runner Alvin Kamara, corner Marshon Lattimore, offensive lineman Ryan Ramczyk, Williams , Hendrickson and Rankins.
An important decision the Saints face is whether they want to expand 2022’s pending free agents like Lattimore, Hill, and the Ramczyk and Terron Armstead offensive attacks. Another would be whether they would consider whether there would be box office operations to free up cork space and add draft selections, as they did with stars Jimmy Graham and Brandin Cooks in the past.
“Look, it’s sure to be a challenge,” Loomis said of the salary cap. “And yet I don’t want to speculate on the challenge it will have until we have a better understanding of what will be available, not just for this year, but even for next year. So I can’t really respond to that question other than saying, yes, it will be discouraging. I think it will be discouraging for most teams in our league. “