Loomis' one unforgivable decision (48 Viewers)

[No2DC]

Have to admit, that really was a head scratcher in the moment and still is. For the life of me, I still don’t understand how we got a “do over”, from the Mahones situation, and we doubled down with not taking the most electrifying QB in the draft?!?!

In his defense, no one knew Lamar was going to be Lamar. Nevertheless, the fact that he has rook now but wanted vets before is questionable.

 

[Domeination]

So the sin is giving the head coach what he wanted. Sean thought he was a good DE away from a Super Bowl and Davenport was the guy. Maybe the flaw was deferring to the head coach too often, like still trying o be in win now mode signing Derek Carr for Dennis Allen instead of taking that time to clean up the cap situation.

I agree, but the problem is it was a “flaw” nevertheless, and that same flawed guy is still making all the big decisions. He really should have been removed by Gayle before this latest HC search started, but we pretty much knew that wasn’t going to happen, so we just have to pray Loomis gets it right this time.

 

[platinumvinnyv]

This. This and only this. You can do the hindsight is 50/50 thing all day on specific draft picks or Free Agent misses but they can't all be homeruns. That's part of the job. But your main job as a GM in the NFL is the stability and health of the franchise. You have to know when to hold em and know when to fold em. SP didn't wanted no part of a rebuild so I cut Loomis some slack on SP's last year. He didn't have much of a choice but to go all in with a pair of 7s. But when Drew and SP were both gone and they were replaced with Winston and DA, Loomis moved all in on a stone cold bluff.

A lot of people around here thought it was the right move at the time. They would point to the talent on the roster and say now is not the time to blow it up. People honest to god thought we could walk the yard and win it all with DA and Winston. When you would point out that Winston isn't that great people would say that he's basically Peyton Manning and he's been attending Harvard for QBs. Remember that argument? People twisted and turned doing pretzel logic trying to justify something that was clearly a mistake.

To be fair alot of those same people also thought we should be winning games with Post Bengals Andy Dalton and Spencer Rattler so... But Seriously I think we are going down the path of when Patriots loss Brady and Colts loss Manning. We didnt do a good job replacing Brees I dont know if thats on Payton, before not wanting to be part of rebuild, or Loomis. Loomis gave Payton alot flexibility and trust when developing a roster and Winston was Payton choice. But Having a QB is such an advantage in modern NFL its insane. You cant hit him high, low, roll your body on him, during a slide even though qbs are allowed to fake slide. And this must be done whith shoulders only meanwhile WR cant be touched until they catch the ball and are "allowed to pick" corners. All this advantage I cant say a 100% clean cap, DA fired, Loomis fired we go out there with 3rd rate QB we still be mid. Feel like the Browns been doing that model of cap space and coaching GM rotation for years and still got stuck with Watson and mid team

 

[Covington Saint]

payton would have wanted to turn lamar into drew brees or a wide receiver.

 

[MikeyF]

I always get a laugh out of these kind of post...

For most of the 1st 20 years of the Saints we always traded away one of our 1st round pick for some old washed up player...
or one of our star players for a washed up player...

Today: 1967 & 1968.
The very first draft for the Saints was the 1967 draft.
The pick: Les Kelley, a linebacker, out of Alabama.
Kelley became the first-ever draft choice of the Saints, taken with the final pick of the first round.
The Saints originally had the #1 overall pick in that draft but traded it to the Baltimore Colts for quarterback Gary Cuozzo, who only played one year with the franchise.
Who did the Colts select with the top pick that the Saints originally have? Hall of Famer Bubba Smith, a defensive end from Michigan St.

How New Orleans Saints Past Drafts Turned Out: 1967 & 1968

How have the New Orleans Saints fared in the NFL Draft, in what will be their 54th year of existence in the 2020 NFL season?

1033thegoat.com

This is by far the most egregious mistake the Saints have ever made in the draft!

 

[AARPSaint]

Davenport was a reach for need in a draft class that had a dearth of quality edge rushers.

 

[fishing4food]

I would have to point to the Salary Cap management against Loomis. He's still using the same OLD model of restructuring contracts of old players and it's not effective anymore. The talent level of the Saints is just not there. Also, the organization has become one of the worst fielded teams in the weakest division in the NFL. They only managed to win 3 games in the Super Dome this year. Just disgusted with Loomis.

 

[RJ in Lafayette]

Without question, there must be consensus in the team building on how the team is built, and when and how to plan for the future. I have repeatedly described Payton during his years in New Orleans as our de facto general manager and given praise to Loomis for putting aside ego and developing an organizational process that accommodated Payton. Sean was heavily influenced by the experiences of his mentor Bill Parcells. In his first head-coaching job, Parcells battled often with Giants general manager George Young over personnel (and my memory is that more often than not Young's judgment was correct).

But at some point, the general manager, especially one like Loomis who enjoys a special relationship with the team owner, has to take a broader and longer-term prospective than a head coach like Payton who saw his Super Bowl window closing and emphasized winning now regardless of the long-term consequences.

Payton was the architect, and Loomis was the contractor who built what Payton wanted. My guess is that the Saints' personnel people graded Davenport highly, that Payton wanted Davenport almost regardless of cost, and that Loomis executed Payton's request, though he should have been more mindful of the cost. Unless Payton was willing to revamp his offense, picking Lamar Jackson in the 2018 draft made little sense. Certainly, if Payton had wanted Jackson, he would have been the pick.

My criticism of Loomis is that at times he surrendered too much power to Payton; that at some point he should have been assertive about building for the post-Brees era and finding our quarterback of the future; and that with Payton's departure, he should have moved in a very different direction, favoring a rebuild on some level, rather than the continuity approach that was chosen. Given how close Payton and Loomis supposedly were, Loomis must have known for some time that Payton wanted to leave.

 

[OzzieSaint]

He had pancakes for desert

"Pancake eating mothertrucker"
-Sonny Weaver Jnr.

 

[seguinfan]

I know there are many threads on decisions under Mickey Loomis that have set our team back. But one BY FAR is the worst and most unforgivable.

When we traded 2 first round picks to move up in the first round to pick Marcus Davenport over Lamar Jackson.

Everyone on the TV was shocked. They all thought we made that bold trade move for one reason only, for a successor to Drew Brees.

Instead we wound up with a DE with low ambition that could not stay healthy and eventually not resigned.

Jackson has been a multiple NFL MVP candidate.

It's very hard for me to get over that move.

Loomis was a basketball point guard for a small college. Why in the world does he have the right to determine what a FOOTBALL team needs for success. Sean Payton propped him up big time. I would not be surprised if Loomis was part of why Sean eventually wanted out.

If he had good judgement, he would realize that a basketball player is not a good decision maker for an NFL team.

HIRE A FOOTBALL GM LOOMIS, WE DESERVE BETTER!

Drafting Johnathan Sullivan in 03 was far worse, we traded 2 1st round picks and were precicted to draft Troy Palamalu with one of them, that bum never played a down for us and was traded to the patriots for a no name WR. That set us back so much, in hindsight we probably would have used Palamalu wrong and he would have been a bust.

 

[RJ in Lafayette]

And I remember well the commentary on television when we made the trade up to 14. The talk was that we had moved up to take Jackson. It was a surprise when the Davenport selection was announced. Jackson was the first of the true running quarterbacks who showed that his legs could be a weapon. There was concern about his accuracy--Bill Polian, whom I respect greatly, suggested he should play wide receiver. Baltimore's front office has been playing chess rather than checkers for many years. Teams failed to understand that Jackson could play the position differently and his athleticism easily outweighed the accuracy concerns. (Also, I want to say that Jackson refused to run the 40, which hurt his draft status.)

And sometimes God watches over drunks and NFL general managers. In 2008, we made a huge trade offer to move up to pick defensive tackle Glenn Dorsey, which fortunately was not accepted--over the years, our desperation to acquire defensive linemen has far exceeded our ability to evaluate them. And of course, we were incredibly close to signing Deshaun Watson.

 

[2009ring]

No the unforgivable sin is letting Andy Reid trade in front of him to get Patrick Mahomes when we clearly needed a succession plan for Drew. Likely SP stays here with Mahomes and we're playing this weekend.

 

[Jd101]

I know there are many threads on decisions under Mickey Loomis that have set our team back. But one BY FAR is the worst and most unforgivable.

When we traded 2 first round picks to move up in the first round to pick Marcus Davenport over Lamar Jackson.

Everyone on the TV was shocked. They all thought we made that bold trade move for one reason only, for a successor to Drew Brees.

Instead we wound up with a DE with low ambition that could not stay healthy and eventually not resigned.

Jackson has been a multiple NFL MVP candidate.

It's very hard for me to get over that move.

Loomis was a basketball point guard for a small college. Why in the world does he have the right to determine what a FOOTBALL team needs for success. Sean Payton propped him up big time. I would not be surprised if Loomis was part of why Sean eventually wanted out.

If he had good judgement, he would realize that a basketball player is not a good decision maker for an NFL team.

HIRE A FOOTBALL GM LOOMIS, WE DESERVE BETTER!

Stop with the lamar jackson stuff. Baltimore took a tight end at 25 before trading back into the first round to pick jackson. So every other GM in the league passed on him as well.

 

[MJ in Calif]

I know there are many threads on decisions under Mickey Loomis that have set our team back. But one BY FAR is the worst and most unforgivable.

When we traded 2 first round picks to move up in the first round to pick Marcus Davenport over Lamar Jackson.

Everyone on the TV was shocked. They all thought we made that bold trade move for one reason only, for a successor to Drew Brees.

Instead we wound up with a DE with low ambition that could not stay healthy and eventually not resigned.

Jackson has been a multiple NFL MVP candidate.

It's very hard for me to get over that move.

Loomis was a basketball point guard for a small college. Why in the world does he have the right to determine what a FOOTBALL team needs for success. Sean Payton propped him up big time. I would not be surprised if Loomis was part of why Sean eventually wanted out.

If he had good judgement, he would realize that a basketball player is not a good decision maker for an NFL team.

HIRE A FOOTBALL GM LOOMIS, WE DESERVE BETTER!

Im not here to defend ML but I think the problem with your post is that Loomis did not and still does not make personnel decisions. The Saints are not structured that way. Loomis gets them under contract and negotiates with agents. That was Payton and then Allen who made the personnel decisions. I agree though with the premise on how bad a decision that was back in 2018.

The next horrible decision was the 2022 draft and what they did there as well.

 

[No2DC]

Im not here to defend ML but I think the problem with your post is that Loomis did not and still does not make personnel decisions. The Saints are not structured that way. Loomis gets them under contract and negotiates with agents. That was Payton and then Allen who made the personnel decisions. I agree though with the premise on how bad a decision that was back in 2018.

The next horrible decision was the 2022 draft and what they did there as well.

This is the root of the problem: we have a football account masquerading as a football GM.