It's a simple question, but the answer will inevitably be complicated: Will the Saints be "buyers" or "sellers" at the NFL trade deadline.
In most years there'd be no question heading up to the Nov. 1 deadline, but in 2022 the Saints enter Week 8 at 2-5 and with a long road ahead to even fight back to .500. That's not exactly a ringing endorsement for a team that should go all-in this season.
It's the same record the Carolina Panthers have currently, a team that just sent Christian McCaffrey cross-country to the San Francisco 49ers, Robby Anderson to the Arizona Cardinals and fired head coach Matt Rhule. A compelling argument could be made for the Saints to do the same.
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But there is one very clear reason the Saints likely won't enter the weekend entertaining notions of selling off star players like Alvin Kamara, Cam Jordan, David Onyemata, Marcus Davenport and others: They might still be the favorites in the NFC South.
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The Falcons currently lead the division at 3-4, and face the Panthers this week. Should the Saints win, they'll be at worst in a tie with the Bucs at 3-5, who have now lost back-to-back games and have looked bad doing it. If the Saints have a chance to sniff the playoffs in Dennis Allen's maiden voyage, they have an obligation to see that through.
"I wouldn't say that there's anything ... imminent or anything like that," Allen said on WWL this week, "but we're going to explore all avenues."
That's the most common and reasonable approach, so long as those avenues aren't expensive. Because in no way should they qualify as "buyers." In order to justify leveraging future assets for the now, it'd better be because you see yourself as a legitimate title contender. Good teams go all-in to be a great team and shoot for a Super Bowl, bad teams go all-in to be a good team and shoot for the playoffs. The Saints would be the latter if they shipped out even more assets (remember, the Eagles currently own their 2023 1st and 2024 2nd). Adding more future assets to that list would be a mistake.
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What's not a mistake is splitting the difference. There could be some waiver wire shenanigans (think Janoris Jenkins in 2019) or maybe a player who is being given away for peanuts (think Eli Apple in 2018), but I don't see more than that. The Saints should be in "let's see what happens" mode. That's the signal you get from the decision to start Andy Dalton at quarterback. It's also a signal that you believe once key players like Michael Thomas, Jarvis Landry and Marshon Lattimore get back from injury, this will return to being the team that felt like a fair bet to win the NFC South in the first place.
It just might not be with the double-digit wins target that was out there to start the season. At this point it's not unrealistic to see a 7-10 team waltz into the playoffs.
There's not much runway left after Week 8. The Saints need to see what happens against the Raiders. If the turnaround begins there, the people in the room right now will be the ones expected to keep it going.
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