Saints have no one else to blame but themselves for why they fell short in trading for Davante Adams
The New Orleans Saints did not land former Las Vegas Raiders wide receiver Davante Adams. Instead, Adams joins the New York Jets, alongside his old buddy Aaron Rodgers. With the news, the Saints sink back from some of the limelight that this situation has brought them. On multiple occasions, New Orleans was reported to be […]
The New Orleans Saints did not land former Las Vegas Raiders wide receiver Davante Adams. Instead, Adams joins the New York Jets, alongside his old buddy Aaron Rodgers. With the news, the Saints sink back from some of the limelight that this situation has brought them.
On multiple occasions, New Orleans was reported to be the most aggressive suitor for Adams. In the end, it simply did not work out for the Saints – due to a multitude of factors.
According to Adam Schefter, the Raiders are not paying any of Davante Adams' remaining salary. New York is taking care of all of it.
Accordingly, this proves that the Saints were always a long shot to land the former All-Pro wide receiver. They could not have done a deal like the Jets just did.
Many reports over the last couple of weeks have relayed this concept, that Las Vegas did not want to retain part of Adams' deal. They consistently were also looking for a conditional second-round pick and got that from the Jets.
Limited cap space for New Orleans
Ultimately, the Saints could not provide the package of pick and contract freedom that the Jets could in the end. The Jets will owe the wideout about $11.5 million for the rest of this season.
For the Raiders, the move was one that simply had to be made. The connection between the player and organization was not working, and they did not have to withhold money in the process of moving on from him.
They aren't paying any more of Adams' salary in the trade. That makes the dead cap hits a manageable $13.67 million this year and $15.7 million in 2025, according to Spotrac. It's a significant cap savings for a player that had a $44.1 million cap hit coming next season. — Yahoo! Sports
The Saints currently hold just over $2.5 million in salary cap space, according to OverTheCap. For New York, they have around $5.5M after completing the deal for Adams. They had plenty of cap space, with room to spare, to trade for Adams' contract.
Continued restructures and unique moves for cap space have piled up for the Saints.
They continue to navigate them, but situations like this one show that their decisions over the past handful of seasons take them out of the running for some notable talent around the league.
Saints' losing streak
Meanwhile, we have to address New Orleans on-field woes as well. They've lost four games in a row. Their offense has been inconsistent, missing some key players on the offensive line and at skill positions.
Regardless, it would have been hard to imagine that Adams wanted to latch his raft to a team that may be sinking under Dennis Allen currently.
Offensive line deficiencies
The offensive line is quite beat up for the Saints. Cesar Ruiz has missed multiple games, all of which have been losses. Erik McCoy remains on injured reserve. Lucas Patrick has been banged up for nearly a month.
As for the tackles, they are surprisingly the most consistent pieces of this evolving OL due to injuries. Its struggles are part of the reason Derek Carr is on the shelf with an oblique injury.
Carr was the major connection to New Orleans for Adams. With him sidelined for what seems like at least two more games, reuniting with Aaron Rodgers probably made more sense for Adams.
Carr may not return until after the trade deadline, and the veteran WR valued rejoining on of his former quarterbacks.
All in all, the Saints tried to make a play for Adams, but it made a lot more sense in September. As for October, New Orleans has plenty of other factors to deal with at the moment.
