Take a look at the Saints’ defensive rankings this season

Sunday’s 27-19 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers left the team New Orleans Saints with a 5-12 record at the conclusion of the 2024-25 season. The Saints will have the ninth overall selection in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft.

New Orleans performed poorly in almost every aspect of the game for most of the season. Offensive performances were tainted due to an incredible number of injuries that crippled the unit.

Defensively, the situation was completely different. This unit remained relatively healthy compared to the attack and was intended to be the strength of the team. Instead, New Orleans’ defense fell to the bottom of the league and was the worst product the Saints had put on the field in years.

Here are the Saints’ end-of-season defensive rankings.

Points allowed = 19th place

• 398 points
• 23.4 per game

New Orleans did well enough defensively to start the year, especially in the red zone. They held their first three opponents to under 20 points and gave up 21 or fewer points eight times during the season.

Still, the Saints’ 398 points were their highest since 454 in 2016. Oddly enough, it was a fairly consistent base of mid-to-high 20 points that their limited offense simply couldn’t match.

The low points, in terms of scoring, saw them give up an astounding 51 points to Tampa Bay and 33 to Denver’s mediocre offense the following week. Green Bay, which scored an easy 34 points in Week 16, was the only team to score 30 or more points against the Saints.

Total yards = 30

• 379.9 per game

The Saints had games where they limited their opponent’s scoring. They were never able to stop the opponent from moving and possessing the ball at will. It was a terrible performance that ultimately was the main reason defensive head coach Dennis Allen was fired after Week 9.

New Orleans has gained at least 375 total yards 10 times this season. Six of those games were over 400 yards. The low point came in Week 6, when the Buccaneers tore through the hapless Saints for an incredible 594 yards.

Teams like the Raiders, Browns, Broncos and Chargers have all had mediocre or worse offenses this season. Against the Saints, these teams averaged 400 total yards rushing.

What was once the reason New Orleans at least stayed in the games was the main reason for its 12 losses in 2024.

Passing yards = 27th

• 238.5 per game
• 19 touchdowns
• 14 steals
• 39 bags

New Orleans enters 2024 with the best cornerback team in the league. That was changed by Paulson Adebo’s season-ending injury in Week 7, as well as the injury and subsequent trade of Marshon Lattimore.

Rookie second-round pick Kool-Aid McKinstry had a successful year and Alontae Taylor is a good player, but the secondary as a whole underperformed. Lack of coverage, particularly at key moments, plagued the defense throughout the season and directly led to three defeats.

The team was at least among the league’s top picks in interceptions through the first half of the year, led by veteran safety Tyrann Mathieu with three picks. However, the team did not even provide this throughout the match, and the defenders made several plays in attack range.

An equally big problem for the Saints was the lack of pass rush. Second-year DT Bryan Bresee led the Saints with 7.5 sacks and was one of the bright spots. Despite good pressure from Carl Granderson, Chase Young and Cam Jordan, the Saints often failed to finish plays and were helpless against quarterbacks with any mobility.

Rushing yards = 31st

• 141.4 per game
• 4.9 for haste (31st)
• 20 touchdowns

While New Orleans’ pass defense was poor, their run defense was downright terrible. It wasn’t that long ago that one of the league’s most consistent opponents tore through Saints this season with shocking ease.

At the beginning of the year, the Saints won by two runs, which caused their opponents to essentially abandon the winning streak at halftime. New Orleans then allowed an average of 152 rushing yards per game and 5.1 yards per carry. Eight opponents had more than 150 yards rushing on the ground, and an embarrassing six had more than 170 yards rushing.

Average or worse ground attacks like the Chiefs, Broncos, Rams and Raiders averaged 169 rushing yards against the Saints. Raiders RB Ameer Abdullah had the fourth-most rushing yards of his 10-year career at halftime against New Orleans. Before the last shot, he completed the first 100-yard dash in his 143-game career.

The Saints’ most embarrassing performance was against Tampa Bay. The Buccaneers racked up a franchise-record 277 rushing yards while posting an impressive 7.9 yards per carry. Tampa Bay RB Sean Tucker had 136 yards on the ground and 192 yards in the all-purpose game. In Tucker’s remaining 27 games, he totaled 195 rushing yards and 257 all-purpose yards.

This is just the most egregious example of how poorly the Saints played. The team was pushed around by almost all opponents and played undisciplined football. Perhaps worst of all is the fact that New Orleans was arguably the worst offensive team in the NFL, both in terms of fundamentals and effort.

There are several reasons why the Saints had their worst season since 2005. A relatively healthy defense was as much to blame for New Orleans’ slide down the rankings as a spate of offensive injuries and poor coaching.