An encouraging 2-0 start has turned into a frustrating stumble to 3-4, but that hasn't dented the optimism inside the Saints' facility heading into Week 8.
Saints GM Mickey Loomis explained as much on WWL Radio this week.
Listen to the full, exclusive interview with Mickey Loomis in the player above. Can't see the embed? Click here.
“I think we’ve had high expectations around here for a long time and we continue to have high expectations," Loomis told WWL's Mike Hoss. "I still have, and we still have high expectations. We know inside the building, we know that we have a quality team."
The frustration has seeped in the past two weeks, with a pair of winnable games slipping away against the Texans and Jaguars due in large part to red zone woes. Each of the past two weeks the Saints accrued more than 400 yards of offense, but failed repeated deep in opposing territory. Both games ended in 7-point losses with the Saints driving for potential tying scores but falling short in the final minute with eight failed heaves to the end zone.
In Week 7, that result from the 6-yard line marred a game that included a 15-point 4th quarter comeback to tie the game at 24-24, only to lose 31-24. The crowd at the Caesars Superdome was clearly frustrated, with a large number of boos to be heard throughout the game, particularly directed at the Saints' scuffling offense, which only managed a pair of field goals and trailed 17-6 at the break.
"I want everyone in here to have high expectations, including our fans," Loomis said. "And we should be disappointed and frustrated or angry, however you want to describe it when we don’t meet our expectations.”
The Saints' next chance to live up to those expectations will come on the road and the Colts (3-4), led by backup Gardner Minshew after season-ending shoulder surgery to rookie Anthony Richardson. The Colts are the only team in the NFL to score more than 20 points in every game this season.
MORE FROM MICKEY LOOMIS
On Chris Olave speeding incident in Kenner
“Yea, I don’t have a lot of comment on that. I think he was going too fast in his car and he’ll have to face those consequences. But we’ll let that play out.”
Any trade deadline buzz yet?
“There hasn’t been much of that yet. There’s been a little bit. I think that heats up pretty significantly later this week, but … there hasn’t been a lot of it so far.”
Are deadline deals driven more by buyers or sellers?
“I think that varies from year to year. I really do. Oftentimes it’s driven by an injury that happens around this time of the year, or it happens when a team views themselves as being out of the mix, which not very many teams can view themselves that way because we’ve added playoff teams, we have a 17-game schedule, but occasionally somebody will view themselves as being out of it and then want to move and start accumulating assets for the following year. But there hasn’t been a lot of that conversation to date.”
Are the Saints' issues fixable?
"I know we believe that [they are]. Putting more points on the board I think is the No. 1 paramount thing that we need to achieve, and, OK, we think that scoring in general feels like it’s down at this time of the year. Look, this last weekend there was only 13 teams that scored 20 points or more and so that feels like that’s less than in the past, and I don’t know what the answer for that is. But we haven’t been one of those teams that’s struggled to score, historically. So we’ve got to get that fixed.”
