HE’S NOT COMING BACK

The saints have to remain in conversation for Paytons next pay check. If he says, “Look, I am done with New Orleans. I will not return. No chance.” He loses the leverage. There will always be the team he wants to go to and a team that does not stand a chance.
There is no leverage here - aside from the fact that zero people outside of this fanbase thinks he would come back to a team worse off than when he left it, any other gm/owner knows there isn’t a bidding war against a side that won’t give up assets to retain SP

But more importantly we should be embracing SP going somewhere else so we can load up as much draft capital as we can squeeze