The New Orleans Saints are probably shaking their heads right now, following some recent extension news from the NFL. An NFC foe just made a big deal with a former Saints draft pick.
Zack Baun’s massive extension
The former defender for the Saints has blossomed once he left New Orleans. With the Philadelphia Eagles, he turned into an All-Pro performer this past season.
Accordingly, Philly is rewarding the emerging defender who no one expected to have that sort of season in 2024. The Eagles are re-signing Baun to a three-year, $51M contract. That’s a $17M AAV for Baun, who absolutely deserves the long-term commitment.
The Saints’ salary cap is to blame for letting some of their notable talent walk in recent years. Baun was not an example of that. He signed a cheap, one-year deal with Philly last offseason, one that New Orleans could have made.
They did not want to because they did not see Baun’s value for their defense. The two sides never meshed, for really no fault of the player’s.
Dennis Allen’s blame
Baun was a game wrecker at the linebacker position for the Eagles this past campaign, a spot that New Orleans never really gave him an opportunity to play under Dennis Allen’s leadership and defensive decision-making.
Instead, Allen and his staff tried to morph Baun’s game to be mostly just a pass rusher off the edge. When he wasn’t in the game in that role, he was only playing special teams. His defensive snaps were limited.
You can argue that the Saints had other impressive talent at the LB position ahead of him. That’s certainly part of it.
That being said, the issue for Allen and New Orleans when they had Baun was not ever even seeing the sort of impact he could have from a different role on defense. It was never even on the table.
His upside and potential was capped with the Saints, so it is great to see him flourish elsewhere when given the correct opportunity. We will see if he can build on it going forward in Philly.
Meanwhile for the Saints, they need to avoid these sort of missed chances with young players in the future. That was a major miss by the former Saints’ head coach and his assistants.
