BakoSaint

The Saints draft well and have good offensive coaching and have pretty good locker room chemistry, but have not been able to get over the hump and win a championship in the last 10 years. Though the Patriots had an off year with no good QB and no receivers, they did win 5 more championships than the Saints with the same basic setup, two decades of a HOF GOAT level QB, and I think we could learn things from some of what they did, while also potentially doing better at them recently on drafting and having the edge there.

Here are some new principles I think we should consider:

1. Do not pay big and trade up in the draft unless you are acquiring a potential franchise QB. Especially do not trade high picks in future drafts to move up in a present draft unless for a QB, as the discounted value of a future pick in trade is 30-40% less than a current pick, essentially you pay 30-40% interest for one year, like the payday loan store. Do not trade next years 1st rounder to move up in the first round this year. Do not trade next years 2nd rounder to move up from the 3rd to the 2nd round this year. Yes, you may get lucky and get Alvin Kamara but often you won't, and if there is an Alvin Kamara gem in this years 3rd round, there is likely an even better gem in the next years 2nd round. Draft picks are capital. You don't win by paying high interest rates and depleting your capital. You need to amass capital by taking advantage of other teams that are desperate and will overpay by trading back. We traded two first round picks for Mark Ingram, and he was average and fumbled in key situations and we found a better option in the 3rd round and even with Murray as a cheap free agent. We traded two first round picks for Marcus Davenport and he was never quite elite, plagued by injury, and didn't make the difference for us when it counted.

2. Stop acquiring 30-something veterans at high cost, especially with injury histories, unless they are a potential franchise QB like Brees or Manning. People like to say injuries are just bad luck but the reality is that you make your own luck. If you stock your team with semi-expensive 30-something veterans, especially ones with injury histories, you are stacking the deck to have more injuries than other teams. And then when those injuries happen, they force you to shuffle players around in the starting lineup at unfamiliar positions and roles, which hurts the performance of other players and leads to more injuries of other players. Injuries have a ripple effect. You want to stack the deck to have less injuries than other teams so your lineup is more stable and players are more comfortable in roles and responsibilities and perform better and have less injuries. Picking up an injured Brees and turning him into a HOF franchise QB was very lucky, but gamblers say beginners always have the luck, and experts say thats because getting lucky in the beginning is what hooks you into becoming a gambler. Brees was our gateway drug to Anzalone, Alexander, Armstead, Meredith, Robisonson, etc. Also, in general, the core of most dynasties is not 30-something veteran free agents who come at high price with high risk. To dominate you need to draft well and get young talent cheap not settle for paying full price and crossing your fingers on aging and injuries. Bringing in a role player on the cheap with high upside who has injury risk is fine, but we need to stop being the broken bone collectors of the league if we want to be elite. Often the best values in free agency are players who are still young and come cheap because they were a backup or just learning the ropes on poor team who never got the the chance to start and shine, and we get them coming into their prime. We used to bolster our secondary with these types like Jabari Greer and Keenan Lewis and it worked great. But lately we pursue retreads in their 30's and deal with constantly injuries.

3. Likewise, stop drafting highly injury prone players. Sure Anzalone had upside but his injury history was a red flag. Like free agents, you have to consider not just the risk of constant injuries with those red flags, but the impact those injuries will have across your lineup and in preventing you from ever having a stable lineup and filling that position with someone reliable.

4. It is great that we can identify gems from small schools, but we need to not get overconfident with it. Sometimes when a player comes from a small school, they don't have the track record of being able to clash with athletes their own size and stay healthy. They may have a non-traditional frame which gives them tons of reach and speed for their size, but this frame may not hold up well. I think we see some of this with Armstead and Davenport. If we can find a small school gem in the mid rounds like Armstead that is great. But when we get too excited and trade up two first round picks or we sign one to a big extension after seeing frequent injuries, we are perhaps taking too much risk. Especially at positions prone to injury like along the line, its fine to look for small school gems, but we need to be careful not to overpay and not to accumulate more injury risk.

5. New England has been careful over the years not to commit too much cash to positions other than QB, and to trade away players for new draft capital before they pass their prime. The decline of a player like Cameron Jordan was inevitable and the only surprise is that it happened by a gradual fade not a big injury. Jordan is still a good player but will decline further as all do. We need lots of young athletic healthy players and dedicating too much of the cap to aging stars is a mistake, while cashing some in for draft picks is great. Cashing in Graham paid off. Cashing in Cooks paid off. Thats what pays and we need to get more comfortable following that mold and letting our good drafting ability be a cash cow. What we don't need to do is deplete our reserves by cashing in depth like Still and Sneed for pennies and then giving Michael Thomas $19 million a year so he can be double covered and get injured and then we have nobody.

6. Do not pay too much money to a WR. The vast majority of elite #1 best in the league WR's never win a ring since Jerry Rice. The list includes Moss, Owens, C Johnson, A Johnson, Fitzgerald, Jones, OBJ, etc. Thomas probably won't win a ring. Paying him $19 million to help us not win a ring is not smart. Trading him would be. We paid him and we saw what that got us.

7. Do not pay too much to a RB. Again paying a ton of money to a RB is not a formula to win a championship. Its a formula to sell jerseys. The running game is mostly about blocking anyway. This is not fantasy football. Kamara is amazing but again we saw the difference he made, and it didn't get us the win. Minnesota had Adrian Peterson for a decade and it got them nothing, even with Favre. Its better to spend the money on the oline, defense, and depth. If Adrian Foster and Andre Johnson had racked up 6 rings, our cap allocation strategy would make sense. They didn't. It doesn't.

8. Don't tank. New England never tanked in 20 years. The damage it does to your culture is not worth moving up in the draft. With the possible exception of benching starters or injured people in week 17, you play to win every game. The top few draft picks are often big egos anyway, and you don't need anyone but the QB to be a big ego, and you can find a good QB without one of those picks, or get a top pick from another team by acquiring future 1st rounders.

9. This is new, but I am skeptical about investing a ton in the QB position unless you are sure you have a very elite QB. Its worth paying a Brees, Brady, Rodgers, Manning, Wilson, etc in their prime. But if you have a Dalton, Palmer, Ryan, Prescott, Stafford, Cousins, Goff, etc who has one big year or racks up regular season stats, writing that check for $150 million is often a 10 year trap for your franchise. If you are not sure you have a top 5 guy for the long term not just 1 year, and if you are not sure you have a player who rises to the occasion in the playoffs, there is a lot of parity in this league at QB from 6-20 and the order shuffles every year and a lot of it is coaching and oline and weapons. A team can build more depth across the roster if the cost of QB is minimized. I think we should keep our cost at QB low if we cannot find a great one, as if we find a Prescott or Cousins or Goff type, we should be comfortable to cash them in for picks when they ask for $150 million.

10. Look for every legal advantage. Teams with white jerseys get less penalties. Wear white jerseys a lot. Yellow cloths and glove can look like a flag and be distracting, use them. Start manipulating the compensatory pick formula more like New England does, not ignoring it where the year our cap limits become insurmountable is the only time we lose enough players to get a pick.

11. Continue avoiding big egos and trouble makers. Even New England could learn something on this. New England didn't get any of their rings with Moss or Gordon or Brown and if anything those gambles correspond to the downturns in their dynasty winning rings. The Cowboys bring in every trouble maker for headlines and just lose. Its very tempting to get some potential pro bowler with a big ego and legal troubles for pennies, but its not worth it, the distraction makes your other 51 players all worse. Whats worse is if these gambles appear to 'work' which usually means fantasy league championships not real rings, you end up signing the guy to a giant contract the next year, and you lost the discount, but keep the baggage. If Von Miller robbed a liquor store, lets hope the Falcons sign him for league minimum and then extend him for a record deal the next year, not us.

Winning can be a simple formula. Good coaching. Good drafting. Acquiring more draft capital. Staying healthy. Avoiding distractions. Having solid young depth ready to step up. Getting a good value from QB spending dollars. We do some of that well. If we do all of it well, rings will come. It will just involve some tough choices. What we do well is great for getting us 12-4 type seasons but our age and injuries catch up with us in the playoffs. If we go in loaded, we can dominate in the playoffs. Thats what we need to do.

BakoSaint

Another one, and this is kind of a side note, but never draft a TE in Round 1 or sign one to a big free agent contract. The performance, durability, fit in system, etc are incredibly unpredictable. Most of the best TE in the league were chosen in late rounds. Most first round TE are busts. Most expensive free agent TE don't fit new system or get hurt. The best approach to the TE position is to throw mid-round picks at it or acquire healthy veterans cheap who didn't happen to fit another teams system well. Any team that spends a 1st round pick on a TE is passing on the chance to find an all pro at a position that can be more predictable and important. If you find a Kelce its pure luck, and Kittle 2019 one year is Kittle 2020 the next.

The Dude

We have Trautman and he will be fine.

lee909

I said most of last summer to not sign Kamara
Love the guy as a player but there is just no reason to pay a RB that sort of money, especially of they are not a 300 carry,franchise carrying RB. Even more so when you are paying a franchise QB and WR money.

gosaints1

Nah Lee, I can’t buy into that mindset. Kamara is a playmaker, he can be a difference maker each and every time he touches the ball. It’s true that every player signing is a cost benefit analysis. That being said, I don’t think his contract was egregious. The young man balls. And playmakers don’t grow on trees, quite a few of the attributes that those types of players have can’t be easily taught or learned via muscle memory. You’re either a playmaker..., or you’re not.

dizzle88

Yep, Kamara is special and didn't break the bank.

Paying guys like Peat for the level of production is where this egregious salary cap number comes from.

RefsRobbedUs

We overpaid just like we overpaid Thomas but at least Kamara is earning most of it. I’m more of a build your OL draft a Rb type of guy but it is what it is. Peats contract is still mind boggling

Rsanders24

He is most effective in space, which he had none of due to the short passing game. Screen passes didn’t work because there was not real threat to go down field.

Rsanders24

Peat is mind boggling. Great run blocker in space and on pulls but terrible at pass blocking, especially in slide protection or stunts.

dizzle88

Ryan Neilsen is about to become LSU's defensive coordinator.

Losing a few positional coaches now.