Article Best Player Available vs. Team Needs: What Will Guide the Saints in 2025? (2 Viewers)

[DerrickB]

New read from me.

Should the Saints prioritize roster holes or pure talent in the 2025 Draft? Here’s how both strategies could shape their future. Enjoy!!

How Will the Saints Attack the 2025 NFL Draft?

The New Orleans Saints enter the 2025 NFL Draft with one of the more intriguing cases in the league. On the surface, the franchise is pushing forward with a win-now mindset—retaining Derek Carr, reworking veteran contracts, and restructuring deals to create over $30 million in cap space...

sportsview360.com

 

[WhoDat?DrewDat]

New read from me.

Should the Saints prioritize roster holes or pure talent in the 2025 Draft? Here’s how both strategies could shape their future. Enjoy!!

How Will the Saints Attack the 2025 NFL Draft?

The New Orleans Saints enter the 2025 NFL Draft with one of the more intriguing cases in the league. On the surface, the franchise is pushing forward with a win-now mindset—retaining Derek Carr, reworking veteran contracts, and restructuring deals to create over $30 million in cap space...

sportsview360.com

The best answer imo is a mix of BPA with need.

You never go 100% BPA and you never go 100% need. It's a weighted scale.

The only teams that can get away with 100% BPA are ones with stacked rosters.

No team should ever draft 100% need either.

 

[Thunderchild]

New read from me.

Should the Saints prioritize roster holes or pure talent in the 2025 Draft? Here’s how both strategies could shape their future. Enjoy!!

How Will the Saints Attack the 2025 NFL Draft?

The New Orleans Saints enter the 2025 NFL Draft with one of the more intriguing cases in the league. On the surface, the franchise is pushing forward with a win-now mindset—retaining Derek Carr, reworking veteran contracts, and restructuring deals to create over $30 million in cap space...

sportsview360.com

DRAFT PHILOSOPHY
The Saints have, historically, done a mix of BPA and need. They rate their players and group them according to grade. When the time comes for the Saints pick, they look at who is in that rating "cloud" and choose a player by need from within that cloud of similarly rated players.

DRAFT DAY TRADES
When the Saints trade (always) up it is because a player has fallen that the Saints feel is rated way above that spot he is at. They will then need to feel he is worth trading up to secure his talent.

Mickey makes noises about being willing to trade down but, imo, actions speak louder than words and we all know what his actions have been.

Good topic.

 

[Winter]

Moore has hinted at BPA and the value of impact players vs specific need. I'd argue there's only a handful of players that teams would trade up to get into the top 10 of the draft for. As much as I'd love Jeanty or Warren, I see teams being more aggressive on getting them and trading up ahead of us or keeping their pick and taking them. If either of them are there at 9 or McMillan is there I think thats a BPA/impact player that would be hard to pass up. We also need depth so need picks can cover both bases later in the draft. Top of the draft I'd be in BPA mode.

 

[SigFreudianSlip]

Team has holes all over so it should all line up well no matter what. They’ll be hard pressed to disappoint me this draft lol.

 

[Hank]

Team has holes all over so it should all line up well no matter what. They’ll be hard pressed to disappoint me this draft lol.

If Saints take the best player available on their board......it fills a need

 

[TeenAgeWasteland]

To me this point is mute since we have some many needs, so many holes.

 

[TeenAgeWasteland]

Moore has hinted at BPA and the value of impact players vs specific need. I'd argue there's only a handful of players that teams would trade up to get into the top 10 of the draft for. As much as I'd love Jeanty or Warren, I see teams being more aggressive on getting them and trading up ahead of us or keeping their pick and taking them. If either of them are there at 9 or McMillan is there I think thats a BPA/impact player that would be hard to pass up. We also need depth so need picks can cover both bases later in the draft. Top of the draft I'd be in BPA mode.

Jeanty wouldn't make an impact with our offensive line. Hell, Barry Sanders or Jim Brown would not make an impact with this raggedy, mickey mouse OL of ours.

 

[livefromDC]

The philosophy the Saints have adopted as changed over time with the head coach being central to those changes. With that said, the Saints have always done better when they've went BPA. The early picks of the last several years have been a testament to why need based drafting (or the myth that is BPA at need) is a bad strategy. It only works on the rare occasion that BPA matches need. It's like the saying, "a broken clock is right twice a day". Yes, you may luck up and look at the clock at approximately one of the rare times that it's right, but most of the time, it's simply wrong. The Saints have been living that. Simply wanting a DE or OL isn't enough to make the player worth the pick.

 

[IceHot]

Jeanty wouldn't make an impact with our offensive line. Hell, Barry Sanders or Jim Brown would not make an impact with this raggedy, mickey mouse OL of ours.

Indeed, but the point would also be moot if we have same OL for the entirety of Jeantys career.

 

[RJS]

Jeanty wouldn't make an impact with our offensive line. Hell, Barry Sanders or Jim Brown would not make an impact with this raggedy, mickey mouse OL of ours.

I disagree. I think that this is a pretty decent OL when they're healthy, especially run blocking.

I also think people get in a strange spot where they think every draft pick that doesn't hit was a reach and the ones that do are BPA. Lattimore was a need who also was BPA. Ramczyk wouldn't have been a Saint if the 9ers didn't scoop Ruben Foster. There is so much luck and circumstance that goes into this every year.

 

[AARPSaint]

I would advocate for the opposite strategy: go for BPA early and needs later. There are so many needs that they might as well go for potential stars. That could elevate the whole team if opposing teams actually had to plan around their stars.

 

[RadsRock]

"And after acquiring extra picks via trades (as in their most recent projected deal with Denver),"

To what does this refer?

 

[DerrickB]

"And after acquiring extra picks via trades (as in their most recent projected deal with Denver),"

To what does this refer?

That's an error by me. It's been updated.
I referenced a mock draft story where the Saints trade spots with Denver.