{2023 Thread Bumped} Underhill Giving No Quarter to Nick Wright (2 Viewers)

[dtc]

So you say the Saints have more info on the future cap than fans, but couldn’t decipher from articles throughout the 2020 year that the cap would go down in 2021?

And if the cap had gone up, we could have really seen whether the Saints thought his price was too high. We’ll never know. That’s the point. The cap stopped us from even making an attempt.

Quit being obtuse.

By the time anyone could have predicted the covid cap changes it was too late to go back in time and change the contracts.

Your arguments have become a drag on this discussion at this point.

 

[V Chip]

I really don't think the salary cap and how it's been managed has all that much to do with it.

Yep. Anyone pointing to the last few years regression in W-L as evidence of poor salary cap maintenance issues is someone who has their conclusion already decided and is cherry-picking evidence to support it.

 

[St. Geezy]

These old Nick Wright threads from a year or two ago are funny to me in hindsight. This is another good one:

Nick Wright On The Saints Salary Cap

saintsreport.com

The overall tone of the board and attitude for how we have operated has changed so much with the losing and the benefit of 20/20 hindsight.

We almost universally loved the things we were doing at the time, but now many are acting like it was the worst decisions ever to keep trying to win now that we know it didn’t work out.

I’m sure the old Derek Carr threads would be an interesting read too.

 

[SigFreudianSlip]

These old Nick Wright threads from a year or two ago are funny to me in hindsight. This is another good one:

Nick Wright On The Saints Salary Cap

saintsreport.com

The overall tone of the board and attitude for how we have operated has changed so much with the losing and the benefit of 20/20 hindsight.

We almost universally loved the things we were doing at the time, but now many are acting like it was the worst decisions ever to keep trying to win now that we know it didn’t work out.

I’m sure the old Derek Carr threads would be an interesting read too.

I can’t speak for anyone else but for me I had zero problem kicking the can until Drew retired…

At that point and especially after Sean left it was time to reset.

 

[dtc]

These old Nick Wright threads from a year or two ago are funny to me in hindsight. This is another good one:

Nick Wright On The Saints Salary Cap

saintsreport.com

The overall tone of the board and attitude for how we have operated has changed so much with the losing and the benefit of 20/20 hindsight.

We almost universally loved the things we were doing at the time, but now many are acting like it was the worst decisions ever to keep trying to win now that we know it didn’t work out.

I’m sure the old Derek Carr threads would be an interesting read too.

It is astounding how people can flip flop based on hindsight.

 

[dtc]

I can’t speak for anyone else but for me I had zero problem kicking the can until Drew retired…

At that point and especially after Sean left it was time to reset.

It's not that simple. The can was kicked down the road. You can't reset until you catch up to the can and had we not lost half our team this year to injuries people here would likely be celebrating Loomis as a genius.

Again.

 

[zorro37]

These old Nick Wright threads from a year or two ago are funny to me in hindsight. This is another good one:

Nick Wright On The Saints Salary Cap

saintsreport.com

The overall tone of the board and attitude for how we have operated has changed so much with the losing and the benefit of 20/20 hindsight.

We almost universally loved the things we were doing at the time, but now many are acting like it was the worst decisions ever to keep trying to win now that we know it didn’t work out.

I’m sure the old Derek Carr threads would be an interesting read too.

While you are absolutely right about the general cap opinions (attitude of "make it happen Loomis" etc), I wouldn't say opinions have moved too much on Carr.

I think most people at the time accepted Carr was our best option all things considered and we were better going via the free agency route than trying to take a QB with a very late first round pick in a down year for QB talent outside the top picks (Will Levis was the only QB taken anywhere near our pick). However, I think everyone did know that signing a QB via free agency meant giving him way too much money that his resumé merited and that we were getting a guy in Carr whose level of play had been shown to be in that middle tier of QBs in the league for top 10 QB money.

The hope was that the quality in the rest of our roster was going to be good enough to win without a QB at that level for the next couple of years or Carr could make that step up. Unfortunately, wrong on both counts.

 

[El Caliente]

Blessed to see another day when my opinion didn’t come back to haunt me.

 

[rlemieux]

While you are absolutely right about the general cap opinions (attitude of "make it happen Loomis" etc), I wouldn't say opinions have moved too much on Carr.

I think most people at the time accepted Carr was our best option all things considered and we were better going via the free agency route than trying to take a QB with a very late first round pick in a down year for QB talent outside the top picks (Will Levis was the only QB taken anywhere near our pick). However, I think everyone did know that signing a QB via free agency meant giving him way too much money that his resumé merited and that we were getting a guy in Carr whose level of play had been shown to be in that middle tier of QBs in the league for top 10 QB money.

The hope was that the quality in the rest of our roster was going to be good enough to win without a QB at that level for the next couple of years or Carr could make that step up. Unfortunately, wrong on both counts.

Best option, I wouldn't say that. Best available QB, maybe. To me there was a lot of sign Baker, re-sign Andy Dalton, take a mid to late round flyer. I think a good portion realized that signing Derek Carr put you exactly where you are now. Best case scenario with Carr was a fringe playoff team that might get lucky in a wild card round. A good portion of fans, myself included, knew that signing Carr meant at best a mediocre team and we didn't want that. Three years ago, Mickey could have avoided a lot and been ahead of the cap had they just done what everyone, minus the front office, knew was for the betterment of the team. Suck for a year or two (we're on year 3 of suck now) and stop putting bad contract after bad extension out there to ruin next years cap. So many but Mickey saw this coming and it amazes me for all he thinks of himself he didn't, it actually concerns me. We hire a bad coach with mediocre as his ceiling, we hire an offensive coordinator in Pete that for a nice of a guy as he is can't speak publicly without sounding like a 10 year old boy at a spelling bee, sign and extend aging vet after aging vet, and trade away draft asset after draft asset because Mickey thinks he's Nostradamus or Mrs. Cleo out there. Local media and fans tend to get pulled into the bs of the front office. While Sean was here, even after Drew, we had a chance to make something out of nothing. Now with what we have leading this team it's going to take a whole lot of something to get something back out of it.

 

[greatshow25]

Best option, I wouldn't say that. Best available QB, maybe. To me there was a lot of sign Baker, re-sign Andy Dalton, take a mid to late round flyer. I think a good portion realized that signing Derek Carr put you exactly where you are now. Best case scenario with Carr was a fringe playoff team that might get lucky in a wild card round. A good portion of fans, myself included, knew that signing Carr meant at best a mediocre team and we didn't want that. Three years ago, Mickey could have avoided a lot and been ahead of the cap had they just done what everyone, minus the front office, knew was for the betterment of the team. Suck for a year or two (we're on year 3 of suck now) and stop putting bad contract after bad extension out there to ruin next years cap. So many but Mickey saw this coming and it amazes me for all he thinks of himself he didn't, it actually concerns me. We hire a bad coach with mediocre as his ceiling, we hire an offensive coordinator in Pete that for a nice of a guy as he is can't speak publicly without sounding like a 10 year old boy at a spelling bee, sign and extend aging vet after aging vet, and trade away draft asset after draft asset because Mickey thinks he's Nostradamus or Mrs. Cleo out there. Local media and fans tend to get pulled into the bs of the front office. While Sean was here, even after Drew, we had a chance to make something out of nothing. Now with what we have leading this team it's going to take a whole lot of something to get something back out of it.

I said the same as you then. Why pay Carr all that money? You could of kept what you had or signed a Baker Mayfield, Sam Darnold, Mariota, Brisset, Minshew, or Lock. My top 2 were Mayfield and Darnold followed my Mariota. They could all signed 1 year prove it deals. All of them signed for about 3-5 million for one year. I wanted one of them draft a QB and if the vet looks good you sign them to a long term deal as Baker did with the Bucs. This would of help start fixing the cap earlier than having to move money to sign Carr and now stuck with his salary. The Carr signing had much to due with DA as it did with Loomis.

 

[SigFreudianSlip]

It's not that simple. The can was kicked down the road. You can't reset until you catch up to the can and had we not lost half our team this year to injuries people here would likely be celebrating Loomis as a genius.

Again.

I know it isn’t easy. I’m just saying to me we should have started that reset as soon as Drew retired. That’s all.

 

[No2DC]

I know it isn’t easy. I’m just saying to me we should have started that reset as soon as Drew retired. That’s all.

The reset should have begun before he retired, but we get a little sentimental about our aging starters. Although I blame Mick for hiring Allen, I primarily blame him for his lack of foresight regarding the possibility of life after Drew and Sean.

 

[3ParStillDriver]

It's not so much the problem being kicking the can down the road, its kicking the can down the road for the wrong people. Onyemata is one we should have kicked the can down the road for, and not Cam. A few bad draft deals (like Davenport) and bad picks, and a few wrong decisions like letting Onyemata walk and signing Cam to a big deal as he was declining, is what our biggest issue. Dennis Allen was another big issue, but even if we have maneuvered correctly, his departure was inevitable. Now we're stuck with an awful cap problem, limited young talent, aging talent that has become a liability and no coach to coach up what young talent we have, nor the young talent we acquire.

And despite what many think, it's really hard for me to imagine a hot candidate looking for his first head coaching job, wanting to risk his chance for a sinking ship that will continue to sink for at least a couple of years. Even Vrabel seems like he would pass on us. We're worse off then the Browns and arguably the Panthers.

 

[Alan12]

Didn't read the whole thread but read this tweet on the first page and it made me think not only about the production we lost by those departing defenders and the production we had by their replacements vs. the guaranteed money us, the Falcons, Panthers, Vikings, and Lions had to pay for them.



Since 2023...

Onyemata (30 games, 1128 snaps): 7.0 sacks, 93 tackles (47 solo, 46 assisted), 14 TFL, 21 QB hits, 32 pressures, 4 passes defended, 2 FF

Tuttle** (31 games, 1113 snaps): 0.5 sacks, 85 tackles (40 solo, 45 assisted), 1 TFL, 2 QB hits, 1 pressure, 8 passes defended, 1 FF, 2 FR

Davenport (6 games, 207 snaps): 2.5 sacks, 9 tackles (4 solo, 5 assisted), 2 TFL, 8 QB hits, 12 pressures

Shepherd (32 games, 1133 snaps): 5.0 sacks, 86 tackles (42 solo, 44 assisted), 7 TFL, 14 QB hits, 20 pressures

Saunders** (29 games, 949 snaps): 2.0 sacks, 100 tackles (42 solo, 58 assisted), 4 TFL, 7 QB hits, 7 pressures, 4 passes defended, 1 INT

Young (16 games, 701 snaps): 5.5 sacks, 30 tackles (20 solo, 10 assisted), 8 TFL, 21 QB hits, 32 pressures, 2 passes defended, 1 FF

** Also not sure why, but the advanced stats for Tuttle's 2024 season and Saunders' 2023 season isn't showing on PFR's site so the pressure #'s might not be entirely accurate.

----------

Combined totals:

Onyemata/Tuttle/Davenport combined: 10.0 sacks, 187 tackles (91 solo, 96 assisted), 17 TFL, 31 QB hits, 45 pressures, 12 passes defended, 3 FF, 2 FR

Shepherd/Saunders/Young combined: 12.5 sacks, 216 tackles (104 solo, 112 assisted), 19 TFL, 42 QB hits, 59 pressures, 6 passes defended, 1 FF, 1 INT

So relatively even production from the two groups with a slight edge to our new acquisitions, especially in the "sexy" pass rushing categories of sacks, pressures, and QB hits.

Now here comes the really interesting part in this whole equation...

2023 Departing defenders:

• Onyemata: $24.5M guaranteed by Falcons
• Tuttle: $13M guaranteed by Panthers
• Davenport: $10M guaranteed by Vikings, $3M guaranteed by Lions

Total: $50.5M guaranteed

2023 Incoming defenders:

• Shepherd: $10.18M guaranteed)
• Saunders ($4.6M guaranteed)
• Young ($13M guaranteed)

Total: $27.78M guaranteed

Essentially better production from the new guys vs. what we had for nearly half the price (55%) it would've taken to keep Onyemata, Tuttle, and Davenport. That is a significant factor that is continuously overlooked.

Better production and that's considering Young's stats are only from the 2024 season. If including Granderson's stats considering he was the DE that replaced Davenport just in the 2023 season alone he had 8.5 sacks, 78 tackles, 34 solo, 44 assisted, 14 TFL, 20 QB hits, 28 pressures, 1 pass defended, 1 FF, and 1 FR.

But I wanted to try and keep it fair, Young's stats are for one year since Davenport can't play half a season.

----------

Honestly of those 3, Onyemata is the only one that has any amount of sustained success however I really can't fault the front office for not wanting to shell out $24M+ to keep a player that is on the wrong side of 30 and had declined the previous seasons.

 

[Doug B]

After reading Alan12's post about the D-line ... it's hard not to think the Saints would have been OK right now if two broad things had been different in recent years:

1) The Saints hit on an average of around 2.5 more players per draft since 2017. Way too many draft misses.

2) Sean Payton stepped down at the same time Drew Brees retired, and the team then turned around and promoted Dan Campbell to HC.