The successful coach is gone, the quarterback situation is unclear and the salary cap is once again becoming a problem. A busy offseason awaits the New Orleans Saints.

Munich – The worst cap situation in the league and question marks at the quarterback position. The New Orleans Saints are kind of where they were a year ago, too.

Except now their winning coach is gone, too.

The Saints are now the ninth team in the NFL to search for a head coach. Sean Payton is leaving the franchise after 16 successful years, only Bill Belichick has been under contract with a team longer among current NFL head coaches.

In the franchise’s history, no coach has won more games, with a 152-89 record and four seasons of 11 or more wins, Payton, along with ex-franchise quarterback Drew Brees, has made the team a consistent challenger for the Super Bowl title. In 2009/2010, it was even enough for the only championship in Saints history.

New Orleans Saints: Payton retirement at ideal time?

“On behalf of our entire organisation, I extend the utmost appreciation to Sean Payton for what he has meant to the city of New Orleans from 2006 onwards,” owner Gayle Benson said in thanking the 58-year-old for his contributions.

It is not yet clear what will happen next for Payton. He himself does not know yet. The only thing that is clear is that he does not want to coach in 2022. “I don’t like the word ‘end of career’, it’s overrated. I still have my eye on continuing to do things in football and, quite honestly, I might coach again at some point,” he announced at the press conference.

He chose the timing of his retirement well. With a record of 9-8 in the first season after superstar Drew Brees, the Saints fought for the playoffs for a long time, although that was certainly not a given with the squad and some injuries.

For the California native, the timing may have been a grateful opportunity to leave the franchise with a positive season result. Indeed, it is doubtful that the Saints will be more competitive next season than they have been this year.

New Orleans Saints: Questions at the quarterback position

Not a step forward at the quarterback position from last year.

Jameis Winston tore his ACL on game eight after a good start to the season and had to sit out the rest of the season. Backup Taysom Hill managed to play to his strengths in the run game but left questions about his passing ability, and Trevor Siemian and Ian Book didn’t show enough to warrant long-term consideration for the starter’s job.

So general manager Mickey Loomis will have to think carefully about which way to go now.

New Orleans Saints: Free agent, draft or bridge solution?

Is he keeping an eye on the quarterback market in the league and hoping to get a shot at possible top quarterbacks like Aaron Rodgers, Russell Wilson and Deshaun Watson? That would probably spare the Saints the immediate upheaval, they would automatically be in all-in mode and would have to go for the quickest possible title win.

Or is he banking on the draft and going for a rookie quarterback from the thin 2022 class? There would be the problem of the Saints only holding the 18th pick, some other quarterback-needy teams would have the advantage and could take presumptive top picks Malik Willis and Kenny Pickett off the board.

The bridge solution would be Jameis Winston. The free agent was already on a low salary last year and could try to build on the strong first few weeks of the current season in a second season. That way, the Saints would save themselves time, not expose themselves to the risk of a rookie quarterback, and save cap space at the same time.

New Orleans Saints: salary cap causes concern again

That would be the next construction site. Currently, New Orleans is an estimated $70 million over the cap. That’s a full $34 million more than the Green Bay Packers, who are in second place.

Loomis already showed that he can handle the calculator last season. There the franchise was even in the red with 111 million dollars and managed to be under the cap just in time for the new season.

To do so, however, a lot of contracts had to be restructured. Turning some players’ base salaries into signing bonuses and spreading them evenly over outstanding contract years is a clever interim solution, but it’s also exactly the mechanism that puts the Saints in the same situation year after year – despite the salary cap rising every year.

“It will certainly be a challenge, but I don’t want to speculate yet on how challenging it will be until we know exactly how much money we will have in the coming years,” Loomis said. The salary cap has been steadily increased in recent years, apart from the Corona year. The Saints will have to build on that in the coming years.

The question is whether to shovel some salaries on again for the next few years, or make room by terminating or trading away expensive contracts.

New Orleans Saints: More restructuring or shakeup?

Michael Thomas would be a candidate for that. The actual top receiver is expected to be on the books at $24 million in 2022, according to “Spotrac”. Way too much money for a player who could only start seven games in the last two seasons.

Adding to that are pros like Cameron Jordan (soon to be 33), Malcolm Jenkins (34), Taysom Hill (31), Terron Armstead (30) and Demario Davis (33), all of whom are expected to earn well over ten million dollars next year. Partly extremely important players, but certainly not building blocks of the future.

In New Orleans, at any rate, the squad is considered good and fit enough to postpone a shake-up. “We have a great squad and I can’t see any circumstance that would dissuade us from saying we’re going to do everything we can to win now and play for the title,” the general manager said.

Loomis will have to decide with the new head coach whether it makes sense to restructure all those contracts again and postpone the shake-up because of the slim hope of a championship.

Sean Payton, at least, doesn’t have to deal with that. Maybe because he knew what kind of situation awaits him. After all, he already knows this from last year.