As the New Orleans Saints navigated this year’s trade deadline, general manager Mickey Loomis said the main discussion inside team headquarters centered on the development of their young quarterbacks.
The Saints, after all, recently had turned to rookie Tyler Shough after starting second-year signal-caller Spencer Rattler the first eight games.
Although the Saints are 1-8, a record that warrants a sell-off for future assets, Loomis indicated the franchise had to be conscious of making deals that would “hinder” their quarterbacks’ growth — or the coaching staff’s chance to fully evaluate them.
“So our assessment at the end was, look, the value of what we’re doing is greater than any risk of hurting our chances to improve and develop,” Loomis told The Times-Picayune.
The Saints completed two trades Tuesday before the deadline. They sent wide receiver Rashid Shaheed to the Seattle Seahawks in exchange for fourth- and fifth-round picks in 2026. And New Orleans also received a 2027 sixth-round pick from the Los Angeles Chargers for guard Trevor Penning.
In doing so, the Saints lost two starters on the offense but gained draft capital that could help in the long term.
Loomis said the Saints still “absolutely” have enough of a supporting cast to see what they have in Shough, though he noted they’re more focused on Shough’s overall development rather than evaluation.
Notably, the Saints did not trade wide receiver Chris Olave, running back Alvin Kamara or any members of their defense.
“If you go back and look at all these quarterbacks, it just takes time,” Loomis said. “And nobody wants to hear that, right? All we have to do is look around our league and see Baker Mayfield, Daniel Jones, Sam Darnold. And there’s a bunch of examples of guys that, ‘Hey, if they would have stuck with the development plan, where would those franchises be with those players?’
“Very rarely do (quarterbacks) have instant success.”
Loomis’ answer prompted a follow-up question: How does the general manager weigh that patience with the fact the Saints are on track to have the first overall pick — a selection typically used on quarterbacks?
He said that while it was “way premature” to have that discussion, the Saints will have to evaluate the incoming quarterback class against the quarterbacks they already have.
“We’ve got two young quarterback prospects we like a lot,” Loomis said. “We haven’t really discussed the quarterbacks in this class. And look, we’ve got to build a better team around them.”
The draft picks they acquired Tuesday could help the Saints build a better team, as long as they hit on their selections — something that hasn’t always gone well for the franchise in recent years.
With Shaheed and Penning, the Saints dealt players who were on expiring contracts. Loomis indicated that status factored into the team’s decision.
Shaheed told reporters after Sunday’s loss to the Rams that he and the Saints hadn’t discussed extending his contract since the season began. And New Orleans previously had a chance to retain Penning for at least one more season, but it turned down the former first-rounder’s fifth-year option in the offseason.
“It’s always an assessment of what’s the likelihood we can get them re-signed based upon the conversations that we’ve had, information that the agent tells us and what the compensatory option might be,” Loomis said.
Loomis said Seattle had been asking about Shaheed “for a while,” adding there were several other teams that reached out about the 27-year-old. Despite reports the Saints were seeking at least a third-round pick for him, they accepted fourth- and fifth-round picks.
Asked about the compensation, Loomis pointed to the Jaguars-Raiders trade that took place just about an hour beforehand. Jacksonville sent a fourth- and a sixth-round pick to Las Vegas for wide receiver Jakobi Meyers, creating a framework for New Orleans.
“You just have to evaluate what’s the market, what’s happened in the past with receiver,” Loomis said.
In August, the Saints sent their own fourth-rounder out, along with a 2027 seventh-round pick, to the Denver Broncos for wide receiver Devaughn Vele. But Loomis said that deal did not affect what they sought for Shaheed because of the differences in their contract, with Vele under team control through 2027. He said the Saints did not make the trade for Vele or wideout Ja’Lynn Polk from the Patriots in anticipation that they would lose Shaheed by the end of the year.
Elsewhere, Loomis declined to discuss whether there were any other deals he felt the Saints were close to executing. ESPN reported that the Indianapolis Colts inquired about cornerback Alontae Taylor, though they instead traded for star Sauce Gardner in a blockbuster deal with the New York Jets.
Teams also checked in on Olave. By keeping him, was that a sign the Saints are optimistic they can reach a long-term extension with the receiver? Olave said last month that the team approached his camp about a new contract.
“He’s under contract for this year and next year already, and then we’ll have rights,” Loomis said, referring to options such as the franchise tag. “So he’s a really good player, and we want to keep our really good players.”
As for Penning, Loomis did not specify whether the trade with the Chargers came together late in the day — it was reported minutes before the deadline. Either way, it meant parting ways with the 2022 first-rounder whom the Saints invested so much in, from a pre-draft trade that gave them the No. 19 overall pick to trying him at three different positions.
Loomis was asked what lessons he took from the saga. He said he’d save those conclusions for after the season.
“Sometimes you take a player and you have a vision for them and it doesn’t work out,” Loomis said. “And you definitely have to go back and say, ‘OK, what we did miss? Why did we think one thing and it didn’t happen?’
“So we’ve done that. We’ll do that some more. When we get into the draft season and free agency, we can reflect back on that with Trevor.”