It wasn't a good week to be a bad football team. Week 7 started with a Thursday night blowout, as the Broncos took a 30-point lead on the Saints in New Orleans before allowing a garbage-time touchdown. Sunday night ended with the Jets melting down in Pittsburgh, as the Steelers scored 31 unanswered points after an Aaron Rodgers interception before halftime and eventually won 37-15.
In between, four other teams with losing records also lost by double digits. A fifth, the Browns, were only saved from that fate by a late touchdown pass by Jameis Winston, although they might have had the most painful day of all: An organization that spent the week committing to Deshaun Watson lost its quarterback to what appears to be a season-ending torn Achilles. The 2-5 Raiders fell to the Rams by five points, but they also came out of the game missing a quarterback after newly promoted Aidan O'Connell suffered a broken thumb.
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Which struggling team is in the worst shape moving forward? None are in great shape to make it to the postseason, but which of the league's worst teams are furthest away from building the sort of roster that would compete for a Super Bowl? To repurpose a famous phrase from the Harbaugh family (who won't be appearing in this piece), "Who has it worse than us?"
There are nine candidates, and I'll eliminate three as honorable mentions, all of whom are in the AFC East. The 2-5 Jets are in a tailspin and appear to have fired Robert Saleh with no meaningful or tangible positive impact, but they're closer to a potential playoff berth than most of the other teams on this list. The 1-6 Patriots haven't looked good on defense since Week 1 and have their coach calling them soft, but there's plenty to like in rookie quarterback Drake Maye's first two starts. And the 2-4 Dolphins might still be able to recover once they get Tua Tagovailoa back from his concussion, which might happen as early as next week against the Cardinals.
That leaves us with six teams as candidates for the most hopeless franchise in football. I'll start with the team we focused on seven days ago in this space, although things feel much different now:
Jump to a team:
Browns | Giants | Panthers
Raiders | Saints | Titans
Cleveland Browns (1-6)
Pros: Defensive talent, cap space
Cons: Quarterback, talent on rookie contracts
I wrote last week about how Deshaun Watson and the Browns were off to one of the worst offensive starts in recent NFL history. This week, things somehow got worse. After starting 15-of-17 for 128 yards and playing what had been his best football of the season, Watson suffered what's suspected to be a season-ending torn Achilles. He was replaced by Dorian Thompson-Robinson, who gave way to Jameis Winston after suffering an injury of his own. The Browns' chances of advancing to the postseason are now 2.5%, per ESPN's Football Power Index (FPI).
Hopes that the Browns would make an impact on the 2024 postseason have faded, but what was already a unique situation with Watson just got even more complicated. There probably wasn't going to be a path to trade him, even if they had attached significant draft capital to their embattled quarterback. Now, after a serious injury, there's no way they are getting out of the remaining $92 million due to him over the next couple of seasons. Cleveland will get some cap relief because of the injury, but it won't be enough to make a significant dent in accounting for its financial commitment to him.
For coach Kevin Stefanski & Co., this is a chance to draw a line under the Watson era. The money is a sunk cost. As I wrote last week, cutting Watson before the 2025 season wouldn't make much sense financially. Releasing him before the 2026 campaign would be more plausible. Given that his deal is fully guaranteed, that would be more about accounting than saving any sort of cash. The most logical thing for the Browns might be holding onto Watson as the most expensive backup in NFL history while pursuing a new starter, potentially with their top pick in next year's draft.
The good news for the Browns? They have the second-most cap space in all of football ($44.6 million), a product of converting virtually all of Watson's base salary into a signing bonus. They're $41 million over the projected cap in 2025, but they can create space by again converting his base salary into a bonus and moving on from veterans such as offensive tackle Jack Conklin. Extending cornerback Greg Newsome, who would be playing on a fifth-year option for 2025 at $13.4 million, would also create short-term space.
The problem, though, is the other element of the Watson deal that isn't quite as conspicuous as the money: the missing draft picks. The Browns sent three first-round picks, a third-round pick and two fourth-rounders to the Texans to acquire Watson and a sixth-round selection. That's three players they would be expecting to start for their current team, all on rookie contract deals. While the Texans made various trades with those picks, the selections themselves became Eagles defensive tackle Jordan Davis, Lions running back Jahmyr Gibbs and rookie Jaguars wide receiver Brian Thomas.
To replace those missing draft picks, Cleveland has needed to spend money in free agency or give playing time to less-pedigreed players. This is a team that currently fields the league's seventh-oldest roster on a snap-weighted basis. It has had to invest money to sign players such as edge rusher Za'Darius Smith, defensive tackle Dalvin Tomlinson and safety Juan Thornhill in free agency, paying market-value prices in the process, while trading for (and extending) wideout Jerry Jeudy in another deal with the Broncos. Another deal saw the Browns swap second- and third-round picks with the Jets for receiver Elijah Moore.
While the Browns had more young talent than just about any other team after years of tanking and trading down to amass extra draft picks, the Watson deal emptied their cupboard of premium picks for a few seasons. The only starter who appears to have emerged from the 2022 and 2023 drafts, when they didn't have first- or second-round picks, is cornerback Martin Emerson. There are a couple of rotational players from that group, including running back Jerome Ford and tackle Dawand Jones, but the latter has taken a major step backward in his second season.
The Browns will need to keep accounting for those missing picks in the years to come, using future selections to fill in those absent players or continue to try and squeeze out middle-class free agent signings. They'll also need to address an offensive line that suddenly looks overmatched after the departure of star coach Bill Callahan. Jedrick Wills Jr. hasn't lived up to expectations on the left side and is a free agent after the season, while the oft-injured Conklin is likely a cap casualty.
The rest of the offense might also need an overhaul. Running back Nick Chubb returned from a multiligament knee injury and scored a touchdown Sunday, but he's a free agent in 2025 and might not want to return to a franchise that just made him take a pay cut of more than $10 million to remain there. Moore hasn't worked out, and while Jeudy signed an extension, he has been abysmal so far. This team might need a new quarterback, running back, wide receiver and two new starting tackles, all while paying its backup quarterback $46 million.
While the defense has regressed to 17th in expected points added (EPA) per play this season after leading the league in coordinator Jim Schwartz's debut season, there's still plenty of star talent on that side of the ball in pass rusher Myles Garrett, cornerback Denzel Ward and linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah. If Stefanski and general manager Andrew Berry can right the ship on offense, the defense should be able to hold up its end of the bargain. There's just a lot of work to be done. After the Watson fiasco, there's virtually no margin for error.
New York Giants (2-5)
Pros: Defensive line talent, star receiver on rookie deal, young roster
Cons: Quarterback, offensive infrastructure
Some of the most dangerous words you'll hear from a head coach are to "spark the team." When a coach benches his starting quarterback in order to "spark the team," what he's really saying is things are broken and he has run out of ways to fix them. That there's nothing the current quarterback can do and the backup might luck into some solution out of sheer physical talent and variance.
That's where Brian Daboll found himself in the fourth quarter with Daniel Jones and Drew Lock on Sunday afternoon. While the Eagles appeared to throw things back to 2022 and their Super Bowl-caliber defense by overrunning a porous Giants offensive line all afternoon, Jones and the rest of the Giants' offense generated just 94 net yards and nine first downs across nine possessions during the first three quarters. Daboll turned to Lock, who proceeded to go 3-of-8 for 6 yards. New York didn't have a single play of more than 13 yards all game, and it was lucky to avoid turning the ball over, as it recovered all three of its fumbles during the game.
While Jones has gotten to spend most of the year throwing to a No. 1 receiver in Malik Nabers, the presence of the rookie sensation has been the only thing sustaining the Giants' offense. Jones ranks 29th in yards per dropback (5.1), ahead of only Will Levis, Deshaun Watson and Jacoby Brissett. Jones has a 94.3 QBR throwing to Nabers and a 30.2 mark throwing to every other New York receiver.
The 2022 version of Jones worked despite a low-ceiling passing attack because he rarely turned the ball over and completed more than 67% of his passes. He had five interceptions on 472 attempts that season. He has already thrown four picks on 240 attempts this season. His completion percentage is down to 62.5%, with a completion percentage over expectation (CPOE) of minus-2.4%. And while he averaged 25 yards and just under two first downs per game on scrambles during that 2022 campaign, he's scrambling for just 9.5 yards per game and has two total first downs on scrambles in six weeks.
I'd argue Jones isn't the biggest problem with this team. The offensive line was a disaster Sunday without left tackle Andrew Thomas, who is out for the season after suffering a foot injury. I thought the Giants would add 2022 seventh overall pick Evan Neal to the starting lineup, but Daboll instead used Joshua Ezeudu as the replacement for Thomas on the left side, leaving Neal active without playing a single snap on offense or special teams for the seventh consecutive game.
Ezeudu, who had played just three snaps before Sunday, allowed two early sacks. The Giants tried to give him help with tight ends, but that just opened up right tackle Jermaine Eluemunor to be beat on the other side. The interior of the line wasn't much better. Jones was sacked seven times and pressured on 43% of his dropbacks against a Philadelphia defense that was below league average in sack and pressure rate coming into the game.
On a day when Saquon Barkley lit up the Giants for 187 yards from scrimmage, the New York career of the player the organization chose over Barkley began to come to an end. Jones has a $23 million injury guarantee for 2025, and playing behind this offensive line, the chances of the oft-sidelined quarterback suffering a serious injury have to be concerning to the front office. Being forced to pay Jones $23 million if he's unable to pass a physical would set the Giants back. It would be a surprise if the team didn't bench him before the end of the season to avoid triggering his injury guarantee.
The bright spot for the Giants is on the defensive side of the ball, where the league's youngest unit held Barkley, Jalen Hurts and the Eagles to one third-down conversion all game. The defensive line has been one of the league's best at generating pressure after acquiring pass rusher Brian Burns this offseason, although edge rusher Kayvon Thibodeaux is now on injured reserve with a wrist injury. Tyler Nubin looks like a building block at safety, although the decision to move on from Xavier McKinney isn't looking great, given that the former Giants starter is having a Defensive Player of the Year-caliber campaign in Green Bay. McKinney, Barkley and Thomas were three of the more notable draftees from the Dave Gettleman era; Thomas is the only one left on the roster.
The Giants were in rough cap shape when general manager Joe Schoen took over in 2022, and after Jones' unexpected success led the organization to offer him a long-term deal, they've struggled to create much room. A sign-and-trade for Burns also added significant expenditure. New York would have about $64 million in space next year if it cut Jones after the season, a move that would free it up to go after whichever of the veteran quarterbacks it might target, with Kirk Cousins or Sam Darnold as potential examples. There's enough in the way of promising players here to imagine the Giants getting competitive relatively quickly if they can make the right decision at quarterback and solidify the offensive line.
Tennessee Titans (1-5)
Pros: Defensive line talent, young roster, cap space
Cons: Quarterback, offensive infrastructure
Titans fans must be sick of the same old story. Tennessee has held halftime leads in three of its five losses. In another, it held a lead after the third quarter. The Titans went up 10-0 on the Bills in the second quarter Sunday and appeared to be giving Josh Allen and the Buffalo offense trouble, but the Bills immediately answered back to score. While the Titans held a 10-7 lead at halftime, the Bills responded with 27 points after the break, eventually winning comfortably.
While blowing halftime leads is crushing in the moment, the ability to get leads heading into the break is usually a positive indicator of a team's future performance. Getting an early lead is generally proof that it's doing something right and not just racking up points in garbage time. Only two teams blew more halftime leads in all of 2023 than the Titans have this season. Unfortunately, one of those teams was the Titans, who blew a league-high five halftime leads that eventually became losses a year ago.
The 2024 team has generally conspired to blow leads because of ill-fated decision-making and turnovers by starting quarterback Will Levis. While he was sidelined for Sunday's game by a shoulder injury, backup Mason Rudolph came in and turned the ball over twice. The Titans have turned the ball over on just under 17% of their drives this season, the third-highest rate in football.
In addition, with Levis as the primary culprit, they have taken sacks on 9% of their dropbacks, which is the league's fifth-worst rate. Teams can't amass negative plays this often and survive without producing loads of explosive plays, and the Titans have only 16 plays of 20 yards or more, which is tied for 27th. They're 29th in third-down conversion rate and 28th in EPA per play.
Simply finding a solution in a quarterback who cuts down on turnovers would be a massive upgrade. Rudolph has been better there historically than Levis, so while he turned the ball over twice against the Bills, the former Steelers passer probably gives them a better chance to win in the big picture over the remainder of the season. Tennessee's quarterback of the future isn't on the roster and has to be the first priority for general manager Ran Carthon this offseason.
The problem is the offensive infrastructure around that potential quarterback isn't really strong. The Titans are starting veteran free agents at running back and all three wide receiver spots. The offensive line has homegrown starters in four of the five spots, but the jury is still out on their effectiveness. Rookie left tackle JC Latham generally has looked good so far, but this line needs to continue improving.
The Titans still field an excellent run defense, as Jeffery Simmons and T'Vondre Sweat anchor a unit that ranks fifth in EPA per run snap this season. Beyond that, though, this is again a unit where about half of the regulars are homegrown talents. The only player left from the 2020 and 2021 drafts is Dillon Radunz, who kicked inside to guard after failing to make an impact at tackle. It's too early to give up on the 2022 draft that eventually led to then-general manager Jon Robinson's firing, but top pick Treylon Burks went back to injured reserve this week after suffering a knee injury in practice.
The Titans are better than their record, although it might take a better quarterback for them to reveal their strengths by stopping the turnovers. Playing in a weak division will help. But this team might not have a single star currently on a rookie contract, with Latham and Sweat as the team's best hopes. Heck, their only stars on offense or defense might be Simmons and cornerback L'Jarius Sneed. They can be more of a blank slate than most, but other franchises have more upside and top talent.
Las Vegas Raiders (2-5)
Pros: Cap space, location, true superstar on defense
Cons: Quarterback, offensive infrastructure, generation of missing talent
The Raiders are a more extreme example of the Titans. Do you like turnovers? They love giving away the football. After substitute quarterback Gardner Minshew turned the ball over four times in Sunday's 20-15 loss to the Rams, the Raiders have 10 turnovers in their past three games and 16 turnovers through their first seven. That's four more than any other team and more than the Texans had across the entire 2023 season (14).
A whopping 19% of Las Vegas' drives have ended in a turnover. Now, it's not impossible to win with a wild turnover rate. The Cowboys are just ahead of them (17.2%), and the Chiefs are in 29th (16.4%). The difference is that when we remove drives ending in turnovers from the equation, the Chiefs are fourth in the league in points per possession, while the Cowboys are 16th. The Raiders are 24th. Minshew, the starter for most of the season before O'Connell briefly entered and exited the lineup with his thumb injury, ranks in the bottom quarter of the league in sack rate. Vegas is 28th in third-down conversion rate. If a team turns the ball over and takes sacks as often as the Raiders have, it needs to be wildly explosive or move the chains consistently. This team does neither.
To be fair, injuries have been a problem here. Even before O'Connell, the Raiders lost Davante Adams to a "hamstring injury" and Jakobi Meyers to an ankle issue, costing them their top two wideouts. Christian Wilkins, the team's big-money addition at defensive tackle, is on injured reserve with a broken foot. Edge rusher Malcolm Koonce suffered a season-ending knee injury in practice last month. The strengths of this team were supposed to be the receivers and the pass rush, and they've both been compromised by injuries.
The biggest problem is the same one that has faced this organization for years. I wrote about it repeatedly at the end of the Jon Gruden era in 2021, then again when it traded for Adams in 2022. After nearly a decade of poor drafts and short-sighted decision-making, the Raiders are missing virtually an entire roster's worth of homegrown players. Across an eight-year window from 2016 to 2023, they essentially would have done better drafting out of a magazine with 10 minutes of prep like your friend who forgot about his fantasy draft:
Here are the Raiders draft picks from 2016-23 - the final year of McKenzie, the Gruden/Mayock era, and the two McDaniels drafts. Guys crossed out in black aren't in the league, guys crossed out in red are in the league but no longer with the Raiders.
— Bill Barnwell (@billbarnwell) October 15, 2024
Eight drafts that appear to... pic.twitter.com/HYVNpObLVQ
Earlier versions of the Raiders tried to make up for the absences by getting very aggressive in free agency. The 2024 team is fielding the league's fifth-youngest roster, which is at least a testament to change. They're playing a young group of receivers after the injuries, paced by rookie tight end Brock Bowers, who has been fantastic. The offensive line has three starters on rookie deals, while the same is true for five of the six regulars in the secondary. Young, cheap talent doesn't necessarily equal breakout players, but the Raiders were often too confident that signing veteran free agents would solve their problems. I'm not sure they're any more likely to whiff by giving the same chances to young players.
Tom Telesco appears to have done well in his first draft as general manager, with Bowers as the clear hit. The Raiders don't have any meaningful commitments at quarterback and project to enjoy nearly $108 million in cap space, the fourth-highest total for any franchise. But there's a lot of work to be done to get them to the point where they could be a seriously competitive playoff team, mostly because of those subpar drafts and the impact they had on the organization. And by the time those coffers could be replenished, Maxx Crosby, the team's one true star, will be out of his prime seasons as a pass rusher. This is mostly a blank slate, but there's a lot of work still to be done from a franchise that has routinely attempted to take shortcuts along the way.
Carolina Panthers (1-6)
Pros: Running game
Cons: Quarterback, defense, missing recent draft capital
Hope you enjoyed Week 3! Andy Dalton's first start after the benching of Bryce Young was a success, as the veteran quarterback threw for 319 yards and three touchdowns in a win over the Raiders. Since then? The Panthers rank 26th in points per drive and 27th in EPA per play. Dalton has averaged 5.5 yards per pass attempt and thrown more interceptions (six) than touchdown passes (four). The Panthers have lost four straight by an average of nearly 22 points.
We know Dalton isn't the future in Carolina, but as the team gave up on Young, the hope was Dalton would right the ship and restore some level of competency to the offense. He has been better than the 2023 No. 1 pick, but Sunday was about as ugly as the worst moments of the Young era. Dalton ended the first drive by throwing an interception on a screen pass directly to Commanders edge rusher Dante Fowler, who returned it for a pick-six. On a fourth-and-1 in the following quarter, Fowler burst through the Carolina line so easily he nearly managed to take the handoff from Dalton before dumping Chuba Hubbard for a loss of 2 yards. It's one thing to get blown out by T.J. Watt. It's another to face one of the league's worst defenses and turn Fowler into an honorary Watt brother.
Hubbard and the running game have been the biggest positive this season. The organization invested heavily at guard over the offseason to bring in Damien Lewis and Robert Hunt, and while they didn't save Young's job, they've considerably improved the run blocking. The line was looking like a plus before holdovers Austin Corbett and Taylor Moton went down with injuries. Left tackle Ikem Ekwonu has taken strides forward in his third season, although it's still unclear if the Panthers will pick up the 2022 first-round pick's fifth-year option next spring. If Jonathon Brooks steps in and forms a one-two punch with Hubbard, the running game will be an obvious strength for coach Dave Canales and the offense.
Everything else doesn't feel great. The Panthers revamped the defense this offseason, letting pass rusher Brian Burns and linebacker Frankie Luvu walk out the door. The additions made in their place were mostly minor, with Jadeveon Clowney as the most prominent defender to join the team. The hope was likely that the unit would come together around a pair of young standouts in defensive tackle Derrick Brown and cornerback Jaycee Horn, but Brown was lost for the season after tearing his meniscus in the Week 1 loss to the Saints.
The results have been brutal. The Panthers are allowing a league-high 3.1 points per possession, tying them with the 2007 Dolphins for the third-worst performance for any team through seven weeks since that 2007 season. Only the 2019 Falcons and 2020 Raiders were worse on the defensive side of the ball through seven games. The same offenses that have averaged 33.7 points per game against Carolina have generated a weighted average of just 20.8 points per contest against the rest of their opposition.
Even that undersells just how bad the Panthers have been. Facing a dominant Commanders offense Sunday, they immediately allowed quarterback Jayden Daniels to stretch his legs on a 46-yard run. Shortly afterward, Daniels suffered a rib injury that forced him from the game, leaving Washington to rely on Marcus Mariota for the remainder of the contest. Mariota came off the bench and went 18-of-23 for 205 yards with two touchdowns. A passer who has perennially ranked among the league's most sackable quarterbacks was taken down just once on 24 dropbacks by a feeble Carolina pass rush.
While acknowledging the offense hasn't helped matters by handing coordinator Ejiro Evero's unit the second-worst average starting field position in football, the defense simply isn't close to being competent. It ranks last in pressure rate and 31st in sack rate. We've already seen Carolina look toward younger players by cutting veteran Troy Hill and replacing him with rookie fifth-rounder Chau Smith-Wade, but this has been the league's fourth-oldest defense on a snap-weighted basis this season. It's unfathomable to be both this bad and this experienced on that side of the ball.
Assuming the Panthers are done with Young as their quarterback of the future, the coast is clear for them to acquire their next solution under center during the 2025 offseason. The problem is they can't even credibly claim to be one quarterback away. The defense needs to be overhauled with young talent. The offense still doesn't have a No. 1 wide receiver and might not have a very good left tackle. They're also missing the players and picks they sent to the Bears for the Young pick, having basically nothing to show for trading away their top wide receiver along with two first-round picks and two second-rounders.
New Orleans Saints (2-5)
Pros: Offensive infrastructure
Cons: Cap disaster, veteran roster
Injuries, injuries, injuries. The Saints looked like a pleasant surprise when they began the season 2-0 and dropped a combined 91 points on the Panthers and Cowboys. A week later, they lost star center Erik McCoy in the first quarter of what would be a loss to the Eagles, and the injuries haven't stopped since. By Thursday night, they were down their starting quarterback, top two wide receivers, all three starting interior linemen and whatever position you want to say Taysom Hill plays. They went down to their third-string left guard during the game. And with the defense already down starting safety Will Harris, cornerback Paulson Adebo fractured his fibula and will miss the rest of the season.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Saints have fallen apart. They've lost five straight games, and while the first two were by a combined five points, the ensuing three have been by an average of 20 points. Their playoff chances have fallen from 80.8% after Week 2 to 7.3% on Monday. With a road game against the Chargers on the way, another loss would require coach Dennis Allen's team to defy most of league history. Just three teams since the AFL-NFL merger in 1970 have endured a six-game losing streak and still managed to advance to the postseason.
To be fair, the Saints might feel like things could have broken slightly differently. Facing the Eagles in Week 3, Allen's defense had Philadelphia backed up for a third-and-16 with a five-point lead and 1:16 to go, only for Philly to run Dallas Goedert on a mesh concept across the field and pick up a 61-yard gain. Saquon Barkley scored the winning touchdown on the next play. The following week, New Orleans handed the rival Falcons two scores with a muffed punt and a pick-six, only for the Saints to battle back and take a 24-23 lead with 1:04 to go. With the Falcons out of timeouts, a 30-yard pass interference penalty on Adebo set up a 58-yard Younghoe Koo field goal, giving Atlanta the victory. The Saints are responsible for those mistakes, but the line between winning and losing in those games was thin.
I can't say the same about the three most recent contests. And while the offense has understandably slowed down because of injuries, what has really been concerning to watch is the decay of the defense. Even as recently as last season, while New Orleans had to endure roster turnover and some inconsistent moments, Allen was still fielding one of the league's best defenses. Safety Tyrann Mathieu & Co. ranked seventh in EPA per play.
The Saints rank 17th this season and 26th from Week 4 onward, when they've simply cratered. Adebo and others were already struggling with sloppy play in coverage and a steady stream of penalties, but this defense looks shockingly undisciplined. They put one of the worst displays of tackling you'll ever see from an NFL team in the loss to the Buccaneers, with a long Chris Godwin catch-and-run as the most prominent example:
ay caramba pic.twitter.com/nsUVr6Dvov
— Mina Kimes (@minakimes) October 14, 2024
The Bucs had no trouble running past the Saints, in part because New Orleans wasn't reliably containing runs and didn't have consistent gap discipline. The Broncos then gashed them for 225 rushing yards and two touchdowns across 35 carries Thursday night. That's two of the league's worst running teams since the start of 2023, utterly overwhelming what was supposed to be a solid run defense.
The pass defense has been better, but it hasn't exactly been great. The Saints have just four sacks over their past four games. Cameron Jordan, the team's legendary edge rusher, has no sacks after being moved into a situational role. Mathieu dropped what should have been the easiest interception of his career. They have had problems blowing coverages; Bo Nix had two receivers running so wide open on a first-quarter play that he seemed to get confused and threw incomplete between them.
Bo Nix had two wide-open receivers on that first down and split the difference pic.twitter.com/rVEWhK16jQ
— Bill Barnwell (@billbarnwell) October 18, 2024
While the Saints will get Derek Carr back from his oblique injury, this team has no hope of competing without a very good defense. Any defense can have a bad game, but the Saints looked awful against the Buccaneers and didn't play much better the following week. This is the league's fifth-oldest defense, and it returns the vast majority of the players it had over the past two seasons, so there shouldn't be many teething issues here.
And, of course, here's where the other shoe drops. The Saints are, as usual, in dire cap straits. They project to be $81.4 million over the 2025 cap. In the past, general manager Mickey Loomis and the front office have gotten out of their cap woes by restructuring as many contracts as possible, allowing the team to retain their core players while scattering the money from their deals over future caps to come.
That's great if players continue to stay healthy and play well. Once they get injured or the team wants to move on, though, it has to account for all of that dead money. The Saints have endured that with Michael Thomas and Drew Brees, but they've continued to push as much money as possible into the future to try and stay competitive. That has felt like a flimsier proposition with each passing year, with New Orleans going from being all-in for a Super Bowl during the final days of the Brees era to all-in for a 10-win division title and home playoff game with Carr.
Even that feels out of reach now. Because the Saints have stretched that restructure rubber band so thin over the past eight years, even if they did face reality and decide to start rebuilding, they can't even have a clear-the-books season and fix things in one fell swoop. Here's a table of every significant New Orleans veteran and how much money the team would save by trading them or cutting them next offseason, either as a standard release or as a post-June 1 move:
It's tough to squeeze $82 million out of that mix when teams are allowed to designate only two players as post-June 1 releases. (The Saints can make additional moves once the calendar actually passes that date, but they need to be cap compliant for the new league year in March.) To take a page out of colleague Katherine Terrell's book, here's the easiest way for them to get cap compliant if they want to start over:
Trade Derek Carr. Even if it just means landing a seventh-round pick in return, trading Carr would allow New Orleans to avoid paying his $10 million bonus and free up $11.3 million in space. While he has a no-trade clause, it's tough to imagine him sticking around for what would be a lame-duck season.
Designate Hill and Marshon Lattimore as post-June 1 releases. While the Saints can make more money by designating other players as post-June 1 departures, the only real way to make cap space in moving on from either of these players is to use the June 1 distinction. Of course, while this frees up an extra $30 million in 2025, it also pushes nearly $28 million in dead money for Hill and Lattimore into the 2026 cap.
Release Ryan Ramczyk and Alvin Kamara. Ramczyk (knee) could retire this offseason, and the Saints might rework his deal to create more short-term cap room, as they did with Brees and Malcolm Jenkins before their retirements. Kamara is entering the final year of his deal, and while he has been productive this season, they can't justify a $22.4 million base salary for their star back in the final year of his deal. This is another $25 million off the books.
Restructure Jordan's deal. His two-year, $28 million extension that created cap space a year ago might turn out to be the worst deal in football, given that he has barely been productive and was taken out of the starting lineup in Year 1. Only $1.5 million of his $12.5 million base salary in 2025 is guaranteed, but the structure of his deal and the various restructures the Saints have made put them in an accounting bind. They could designate Jordan as a post-June 1 release, but giving the veteran one more year frees up $10 million, which will eventually make it onto the 2026 cap.
That's $82.3 million in new cap space, but it involved the Saints moving on from their starting quarterback, running back, multiposition playmaker and lead cornerback. In this scenario, they also wouldn't re-sign pass rusher Chase Young or tight end Juwan Johnson, whose contracts void after 2024. They'll need to clear out more space to fill out their roster. And they're still left with nearly $38 million in new dead money on their 2026 cap, when they'll deal with several of the other veterans remaining on this list.
Which team has it worst?
I have to go with the Saints. While they could have competed for a playoff berth before the injuries, the defensive collapse I've witnessed over the past few weeks and the sheer amount of time it will take to return to being a cap-compliant team on a growth track is staggering. They are a couple of years away from even being in position to start a multiyear rebuilding process.
While the Browns are stuck with the worst contract in the league as part of the Watson fiasco, they have more young and prime-aged talent on their roster than the Saints. And while the Panthers are a mess, they at least have some flexibility and can clear out room without many major commitments. The Panthers probably have hit bottom. The Saints still have a long way to go.