Mickey Loomis is entering his 24th season as the New Orleans Saints’ general manager. But this coming campaign will be the first of the executive’s tenure in which the Saints are not scheduled to be in prime time.
“That’s what the league thinks of us,” Loomis said. “That’s fine.”
Speaking to reporters Monday at the Saints’ annual Hall of Fame celebrity golf tournament, Loomis said the team “can’t really complain” about the lack of prime-time games after the Saints finished 5-12 in 2024.
But the shift is an abrupt turn for a franchise that regularly played night games in the Drew Brees era. And even after the quarterback’s retirement in 2021, the Saints were still featured fairly regularly in marquee slots.
“It surprised me,” Loomis said. “Yeah, I think it surprised me a little bit.”
Loomis said he likes the Saints’ schedule otherwise. And he said that New Orleans could use the lack of prime-time games as motivation. When the Saints last failed to have a night game in 2000, New Orleans surprisingly went 10-6 in coach Jim Haslett’s first season.
“We have to go out and perform and earn those opportunities,” Loomis said.
This year, the Saints are also entering a new era. The Saints hired coach Kellen Moore in February and drafted quarterback Tyler Shough in April ahead of Derek Carr’s retirement.
Carr retired in May with a shoulder injury.
“I’ve been around a long time, so there haven’t been many things I haven’t seen,” Loomis said when asked if Carr’s retirement was one of the more “unique” situations he’s dealt with in the NFL. “You have injuries that come up and things that you might not think are that serious at one time that end up becoming serious.
“From that aspect, I would say, it’s not rare. But it doesn’t happen very often. Listen, there are curveballs in this game all the time and it’s one that we have to deal with.”