After finding a way through the 2020 season, it was fair to assume 2021 would offer some kind of return to normalcy.
Instead, it was what Trevor Siemian summed up with one perfectly fitting word: "Chaos."
The Saints' veteran backup came on in relief to guide the Saints to a 30-20 win over the Falcons, the second such time he's won a game following a starting QB injury. He also started four games this season, all four losses.
And when he was asked if he could recall a season with anywhere near the difficulties, hazards or hurdles as the one that just ended, Siemian quickly said "no." Then he said it again.
"I thought last year was pretty weird with all the COVID things going on. But this is, it's been chaos, to put it in one word," Siemian said. "It's been chaos for us and I think it's hard to process that now and internalize that, but I think that's something we can hang our hat on is the leadership, the captains, everybody kind of righting the ship when it was chaos at times.”
Even the end of the Saints' sure win didn't go smoothly. A long review of a late Falcons touchdown, then a 2-point conversion attempt called back for a penalty extended the final minutes of the Saints' victory. By the time the Saints got back into the locker room, the Rams-49ers game was in overtime. The Saints began watching not long before San Francisco kicked a go-ahead field goal. The result was sealed when Matt Stafford threw an interception while driving for what the Saints needed to be a winning touchdown.
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It was a new situation for many Saints players on the current roster. Between the vaunted 2017 draft class of Marshon Lattimore, Ryan Ramczyk, Alvin Kamara and Marcus Williams, none had missed the playoffs in their four NFL seasons. The same would be true of the 2018, 2019 and 2020 draft classes. Those teams have waited on results in the final week of the season, but only in regard to seeding.
Siemian has been a part of teams that missed the playoffs, but never one that was watching its fate play out on a television screen and thousands of miles away on the opposite coast. When Stafford's pass was intercepted, there was no reaction, the QB said. The room just went quiet. The team knew, definitively, that after months of work, practice, games, obstacles, whatever, the brakes had been slammed. The season was done.
"We were all locked in," he said, "and that just kind of takes the air out of the room.”
It's a result that he characterized as "hollow," a disappointment following the exhilaration of coming off the bench to lead his team to a pivotal win. It's unclear whether Taysom Hill's Lisfranc injury would've kept the starting QB out for the remainder of the season, but it's likely. It's a typically painful injury, and one that Hill lost a season to back in college. Marcus Davenport's 2019 season ended with a Lisfranc injury that required surgery.
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With Jameis Winston done for the season, it's possible Siemian would've been in line for his first career postseason start if the team had gotten there. But the Saints are left with nothing but disappointment, questions and an offseason to find the answers. Chief among those questions will be the one at Siemian's own position. Winston won the starting QB job in the offseason, but he's now rehabbing from the significant knee injury suffered in Week 8. The 28-year-old has been documenting his rehab through social media videos, not unlike Kwon Alexander last year, and was in attendance in Week 18, the first time since his injury.
He hasn't been absent, though. Winston has been "Zooming" in for QB meetings and been in regular contact with the QB room. Still, he entered the 2021 season on a 1-year deal and there's been no extension yet. If the Saints want to bring him back for another go, there'll need to be a new contract in place first. But his presence is a good indicator that he and the team are still pointed in the same direction.
“To see him in person," Siemian said, "see him walking around, shoot the breeze with him a little bit pregame was great. So great to see him.”
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But one way or another, the Saints' 2021 season ends at 9-8, a record that felt unlikely after a 5-game losing streak that plunged the Saints from 5-2 to 5-7. There will be plenty of games to look back at and wonder "what-if." That includes a Week 4 loss to the Giants in which the Saints led by 11 in the 4th quarter, and a Week 9 loss to the Falcons -- the first of Siemian's starts -- in which a furious rally to take a 25-24 lead in the final moments was undone by a 64-yard pass to Cordarrelle Patterson and turned into an ugly 27-25 loss. If either of those games went the Saints' way, they'd have at least one more game to play.
It might take time, Siemian said, but he expects there will be a point this team looks back proudly on how this season finished. But that won't be right now.
"The season is never straightforward any year, and as bad as things were at times or as weird as they felt, like I said the leadership in the locker room and the coaching staff kept us on the straight and narrow when it could’ve got real ugly. ... it stinks right now to miss out and just miss the way we did," he said. "But to get to nine wins, all things considered, is something we’re going to look back on in a few months or however long and be pretty proud of.”
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