The New Orleans Saints have made a coaching staff change coming out of their bye week.
The team has opted to move on from run game coordinator T.J. Paganetti, head coach Kellen Moore confirmed to the media Monday afternoon. The news comes after a 2-5 start to the season and on the heels of an 18-yard rushing effort during a loss to the Steelers in Paris that marked the team's worst run game showing since 1999. Head coach Kellen Moore noted the bye week as a self-scout opportunity, but didn't commit to any changes when speaking to reporters last week.
"I just felt like coming out of the bye week we needed to make a few adjustments ... and felt like this was going to beneficial to the workflow of our staff," Moore said, "and we’ll make a few adjustments as far as our weekly schedule from a staff perspective, some of those responsibilities there, we’ll keep those in house."
Moore noted multiple times that Paganetti is "a really good coach" but that the team is seeking a more streamlined approach to their gameplanning in the run game. Offensive line coach Brendan Nugent is expected to take on a bulk of that workload, though other coaches, including Moore, will also be in the mix.
“I think there’s no exact science," Moore said. "This is what I think is the best workflow for us for moving forward and these decisions are never easy. Again, we’ll shuffle some other stuff within the staff just to help our workflow and I think it’ll put us in a good position.”
Paganetti, 37, has had a long NFL career as an NFL assistant and teamed up with Moore in Philadelphia as that team won a Super Bowl on the strength of one of the most potent run games in NFL history. Current Saints OC Doug Nussmeier was also a member of that Eagles staff.
“It’s the hard part of this business," said Saints LG David Edwards, "and I wish we as players, everybody, you know, did a better job for him."
Things haven't run nearly as smoothly since that show moved to New Orleans in 2025. The Saints have been mired in the bottom five of the league in rush yards per game and have only managed 46 runs of 10-plus yards over 24 games. In 2026 the Saints rank 28th in the NFL with 86 rush yards per game. The run game issues came to a head against the Steelers with the Saints accruing their lowest rushing output since 1999. Multiple players noted that Pittsburgh's scheme attacked the Saints' tendencies.
"They definitely had us schemed up," RB Kendre Miller said. "Every run we had and had an answer for it. ... It’s just kind of one of them deals, you know, you play in the NFL, they get paid like we do so it’s kind of just tough but we’ve just got to go out and execute better if that happens again.”
The Saints have shown spurts of run game efficiency this season, most notably in a win over the Giants when they exploded for 175 yards before that trip out to Paris. The offense is also playing without left tackle Kelvin Banks (ankle) and a key free agent acquisition in RB Travis Etienne (hamstring). Etienne is eligible to return following the bye week after going on injured reserve ahead of Week 4. The Saints have relied on a committee approach with Alvin Kamara, Kendre Miller and undrafted rookie CJ Donaldson over the past four games.
The mid-season coaching move is a rare tactic for the Saints, but one they've had to employ a few times in recent years. The Saints notably fired head coach Dennis Allen nine games into the 2024 season and moved on from the vast majority of that staff the following offseason. That had come on the heels of multiple years of coaching turnover, but all of which was done during the offseason.
The decision to make a change came just a few weeks after a Gayle Benson speech that seemed to turn up the heat on the situation and declared the product, then at 1-4, as unacceptable. Edwards said that the Saints are still trying to find a consistent, winning identity in the run game and the combinations necessary for that to happen, but he did project confidence in the coaching staff in the building.
"There’s so much that goes into it that I think is unseen that, you know, makes a successful run game, so we’re still working through it," Edwards said, "we’re still trying to attack and approach this thing the right way and I know our coaches are doing the right stuff.”
The Saints have a pair of home games on deck that certainly appear winnable with the Cleveland Browns (5-3) and Carolina Panthers (3-4) visiting the Caesars Superdome in the next two weeks. The Saints will need to turn around the recent home narrative to turn their season around. They currently have a home record of 0-4 on the year (including one game in Paris) and a home record of 3-9 since Moore took over as head coach.
The Saints do remain in the thick of the NFC South race, though, despite the slow start, with no team in the division currently holding a winning record.
