The Rams and Saints once had a great rivalry, playing against each other twice per season from 1970 until 2002 realignment, but still going back and forth with barn burners most of the time after that change. That includes one of the most memorable playoff games of recent NFL history, a 26-23 Rams OT win in the NFC Championship that featured two teams that won 13 games in the regular season and necessitated getting the better of Drew Brees, Sean Payton, and Michael Thomas.
But these Saints are not those Saints. New Orleans hasn’t been the same since Brees retired, a cautionary tale for any franchise that assumes they can withstand the aging/retirement of a great quarterback.
As long as we’re comparing Brees with Matthew Stafford, it is worth noting that L.A.‘s 37-year-old quarterback would play four more seasons if he was on the same timeline as the Saints’ destined Hall of Famer.
In fact, Brees led the NFL in completion percentage at ages 38, 39, and 40, and those seasons rank fifth, first (74.4%), and second as the all-time best completion percentage seasons in NFL history!
Completion percentage has become kind of a ridiculous joke stat in modern football, but not in Brees’ case as he also led the NFL in success rate those years, had a passer rating of 110.3 in the last four seasons of his career, and the Saints went 41-13 in his final 54 starts from age 38-41.
Brees knew his strengths and weaknesses, but so did head coach Sean Payton, and the duo remained successful right until the bitter end of their partnership, making the playoffs in all four of his last seasons and winning a playoff game in three of those campaigns. Even as Michael Thomas faded into obscurity, Brees and Payton found a way.
Until Payton no longer had Brees.
Despite getting a year to groom Jameis Winston as the heir apparent to Brees when he retired, Payton soon had to find out how monumentally different the quarterbacks were under center. Winston “won” a QB competition against Taysom Hill, a career gadget player, and they added backup journeyman Trevor Siemian just before Week 1 of the 2021 season.
How much different is this plan than holding onto Jimmy Garoppolo and Stetson Bennett? Not much. I mean, the details are a lot different, but at the end of the day L.A.’s two backup quarterbacks are backups for a reason and nobody else in the league has shown any urgency to add them to their rosters to compete to start. Even as the Minnesota Vikings search for answers at the position, there are no rumors of Kevin O’Connell pushing for Garoppolo or Bennett.
And there are even rumors that the Vikings want Winston.
Winston’s stats were actually not bad in 2021 and the Saints went 5-2 in his seven starts, but completion rate plummeted (58% as a team) and the offensive lacked any consistency, reliability, or explosiveness. New Orleans also went 4-1 in Hill’s five starts, but 0-4 with Siemian and 0-1 with rookie fourth round pick Ian Book.
Just in one year without Brees, the Saints started FOUR different quarterbacks. In the first year.
After going 9-8 in 2021, Payton immediately bailed from the Saints and “retired”, only to pop up with the Broncos in 2023, a deal that required Denver to send a first round pick to New Orleans.
As much as any fanbase thinks they couldn’t lose their coach — and few people were as closely tied to an organization’s city as Payton to the Saints and New Orleans — maybe it always comes down to how optimistic that coach is at any given time. And without Brees or much talent and a mess of salary cap issues, Payton bailed almost immediately.
With Dennis Allen taking over head coach duties in 2022, the Saints started Andy Dalton for 14 games (6-8) and Winston for three (1-2), ending in a 7-10 record.
In 2023, the Saints went a “safer” route by signing Derek Carr to a four-year, $150 million contract after he was let go by the Raiders. After all, Carr had started 142 games and was at least a predictable option. What could go wrong? The Saints went 9-8 in Carr’s first season, then hired Klint Kubiak to be the new offensive coordinator in 2024. After scoring over 40 points in each of their first two games of 2024, injuries mounted and the Saints lost their next seven games in a row, the last of which got Allen fired.
Carr ended the season on IR, then abruptly retired during the 2025 offseason, citing a shoulder injury. However, Carr may just be copying Payton’s retirement plan as he has made it clear that he’s open to a return with the right team and right situation.
Just not with the Saints.
Having already hired Kellen Moore to be the head coach before Carr retired, but also being too late to make a move on the veteran market by the time Carr retired, the Saints were left scrambling for options at quarterback headed into the draft without a great pick for one.
The Saints had selected Spencer Rattler in the fifth round of the 2024 draft and saw him go 0-6 as a rookie in place of Carr. (New Orleans also went 0-1 with Jake Haener.)
Deciding that Jaxon Dart was not worthy of a top-10 pick, the Saints chose offensive lineman Kelvin Banks at 9th overall and then waited until the second round. After the Giants traded up for Dart in the first, New Orleans finally turned in the card, picking 26-year-old Tyler Shough with the 40th overall selection.
Yes, 26.
A five-star recruit in the 2018 high school class (a year before Rattler graduated), Shough spent three years at Oregon, three years at Texas Tech, and one year at Louisville until he had a healthy and productive college season. Said to have all the tools you’d look for in a quarterback, it still took Shough seven years to become a worthy NFL draft prospect.
And the Saints were desperate.
Shough may prove to be a great NFL quarterback, we don’t know yet. But here’s what we know: From the year he signed in 2006 to his age-39 season in 2018, Drew Brees started 205 of a possible 208 games with the Saints. He missed three games in 13 years and most of those were just because the Saints locked up a playoff spot.
When he turned 40, Brees missed 5 games and then 4 games the next year. But New Orleans was used to consistency at the position with one quarterback.
Shough will be the Saints ninth different starting quarterback since 2021, the first year with Brees since 2005.
That’s like changing starting quarterbacks twice every year.
And given how things are going — the Saints are 1-7 and currently hold the top pick in 2026 — they are likely to pick Shough’s replacement in about six months.
Stafford is on track to have one of the best seasons of his career, maybe the first time he will ever get real MVP consideration. Just like Brees, there’s a chance that Stafford plays until he’s 41 and does so at a high level, which means that L.A. doesn’t have to make a plan for his retirement any time soon.
If Stafford plays four more seasons, a plan to replace him would be a total waste of time, cap space, and draft picks. It really would. The Patriots got almost nothing out of their decision to draft Garoppolo in 2014. It was too soon and he will barely be remembered in New England.
However, there’s also the timeline where Stafford decides he has had enough and retires abruptly.
The only perennial starting quarterback older than Stafford right now is Aaron Rodgers, who is 42. Joe Flacco is 40 and Andy Dalton is 38, but they’re only journeyman starters, bouncing from desperate team to desperate team.
The only quarterbacks the same age as Stafford are Russell Wilson and Kirk Cousins, both backups now considered untouchable as starters.
The next-youngest starting quarterback of note in the league is Dak Prescott, who is only 32.
Stafford could play 5 more years, or he could play 10 more games and playoffs.
The Rams can only hope that whenever that happens that they’ve either been extremely lucky or exceptionally prepared. Because it doesn’t matter how many first round picks you have, how much you’re willing to spend in free agency, or what trades you’re open to making for a veteran: It took the Saints 30 years to find Drew Brees. It might take them 30 more to find the next Drew Brees.
Stafford’s been a revelation for a Rams team that’s been through the wringer for multiple eras at the quarterback position. Will they withstand the storm when it comes? On Sunday, they’ll get a glimpse at what happens to a franchise when a breeze becomes an ice age.
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