Perhaps Mike McCarthy saw the writing on the wall and tried to bow out gracefully. And maybe the New Orleans Saints are interested in McCarthy’s former offensive coordinator. But the Saints need help, and here are the two best players they must trade for in the 2025 NFL offseason.
There’s a problem with the Saints, and it’s not just the 5-12 finish in the 2024 season. The Saints won their first two games and looked like world-beaters with a 91-29 margin of victory. Seven straight losses later, their season titled the wrong and never recovered.
What will it take for the Saints to become contenders again? Well, it will take more than a couple of trades. But here is a starting point.
Saints must trade for WR Garrett Wilson
Because of the way the offense looked at the beginning of the season, dealing with an outside threat like Wilson could make this offense one of the better ones in the NFL. Yes, it would take quite a bit to pull off this kind of a trade. But at least Wilson is potentially available, according to Pro Football Focus.
“Where there’s smoke, there’s often fire, and plenty is billowing around Wilson and the Jets entering this offseason,” Bradley Locker wrote. “With only one year left on Wilson’s rookie contract and a series of sweeping changes inbound, New York could elect to trade him.”
A lot of this comes down to Aaron Rodgers. And if the Jets are wise enough to cut bait with the fading Rodgers, Wilson will likely stay put in New York.
However, there’s no doubt that pairing Wilson with Chris Olave could lift the Saints offense into a gear it hasn’t seen since the Drew Brees days. Wilson has a career grade of 84.5 from PFF. That ranks near the top 20 in the NFL.
And Wilson is hungry. Jets interim coach Jeff Ulbrich, who Aaron Glenn has since replaced, said the three-year veteran expressed his frustrations about not getting enough targets in the right way, according to yahoo.com.
“If he wasn’t frustrated, that would bother me to an extent,” Ulbrich said. “He is just one of those ultimate competitors that wants the ball. Not for selfish reasons, but from the standpoint that he can help our team win if he does have the ball in his hands.
“From that standpoint, of course, it’s going to be a little bit of frustration just when we lose because he always feels like he is the guy that can win the game for us. I think he has utilized that frustration to this point to push him to be better in every single way. As long as he continues to use that as motivation, it can be a positive.”
Saints must trade for Texans Kenyon Green
The Saints need to improve their offensive line, and give Derek Carr a fighting chance. Green is a good option because he hasn’t lived up to his first-round billing. The Texans grabbed him at No. 15 overall and he made 23 starts over the 2022 and 2024 seasons. He missed the 2023 season with a shoulder injury.
However, the production hasn’t been there, according to his grades on Pro Football Focus.
“In his two healthy years, Green has recorded PFF overall grades of 37.7 and 38.6, struggling as both a run blocker and in pass protection,” Bradley Locker wrote. “Green was the third-lowest-graded offensive lineman in the NFL this season (minimum 500 snaps). The sad truth is that Green’s inability to develop has severely hindered Houston’s interior offensive line and, thus, the team’s offensive efficacy.”
But Green is 23 years old, and another team might be willing to take a flier on him.
Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans said he expected a lot from Green when he arrived, according to Sports Illustrated..
“Right, when I first got here, Kenyon, first-round pick, you’re expecting him to be that guy,: Ryans said back in September. “Starting, playing for you the first year. It didn’t work out that way. He had some injury issues and things to clean up. He was able, this second year with them, he put the work in, in the offseason.
“In February, he was off-site training. Getting his body ready for this season. And it’s what he’s showing in our first game of the year. It goes back to the work that he put in February when nobody’s watching, nobody’s thinking about what he’s doing. He had it on his mind.
“And I could see it last year, just him being around. Although he was on IR. Just seeing how he was in our meetings and he’d come out, like, ‘Coach, man I’m ready. I want to play. I miss being out there.’ So, you saw eagerness, you saw a guy who’s passionate about the game. He put the work in and we’re seeing the benefits of the work that he’s put in.”
The rest of the season didn’t pan out that way. But the encouraging words from Ryans could lead a team like the Saints to give Green a close look in trade talks.
Salary-cap issue complicates the matter
One of the things the Saints will have to overcome is a salary-cap deficit. The Saints sit about $63 million over the estimated salary cap next year, according to overthecap.com.
Their position is $55 million worse than the next closest NFL team. They already lead the NFL in dead money with $48 million on the books following their decision to trade Marshon Lattimore, just months after they opted into a contract restructure they needed to function for 2024.
There are no savings to be found by releasing players. The only player whose release saves significant money is Ryan Ramczyk whose release saves $6 million. There are five other players who will save between $2 and 4 million if cut.
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