Yikes. The New Orleans Saints sure don’t look like a playoff team after losing 7 of their first 10 games to start the season, and the numbers back that up. The latest season forecast at FiveThirtyEight gives the Saints a 6% chance of reaching the postseason, which is second-worst in the NFC South. Only the Carolina Panthers (5%) face longer odds.
That’s quite a fall from grace for a team that touted itself as a Super Bowl contender throughout the offseason, having trusted Dennis Allen to maintain continuity with Sean Payton’s tenure without, well, Sean Payton. Instead Allen’s Saints team has played just as poorly as his Raiders teams from a decade ago, tying for the third-most penalties (72) across the league with a poorly-disciplined defense and inconsistent-at-best offense.
But they aren’t out of the race yet. The NFC South is still wide-open, with the Atlanta Falcons (14%) barely hanging on while the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (83%) sit on top at 5-5 on the year so far. A late-season playoff push out of New Orleans isn’t an easy sell, but stranger things have happened.
We’ll see if Allen can rally his squad and make some noise down the stretch. The Saints host the reeling Los Angeles Rams this week before flying out to face the red-hot San Francisco 49ers on the road next week, followed by another cross-country flight to see the Buccaneers in Tampa Bay. They’ll have a chance to breathe and regroup during the bye week, but it might be too little, too late to bring much relief.