Saints' O Finally Showed a Pulse — Now Dallas and L.A. Are Coming for Revenge

METAIRIE -- It took nearly three weeks of training camp, but the New Orleans Saints' offense finally looked the part. After 11 practices of up-and-down ball, the first-team unit walked into a joint practice against the Jacksonville Jaguars and held its own — no small feat against a defense that was No. 1 against the run, 21st in passing defense and 11th in total defense last season.

It was exactly the spark the unit needed after weeks of beating up on the same old faces in black and gold. And it came just in time for the starters to kick their feet up and watch the backups handle preseason duty.

On Saturday, New Orleans dropped a 24-20 decision to the Jaguars, but the scoreboard wasn't the story. Ty Chandler ripped off an 86-yard kickoff return, Audric Estime plowed in from 9 yards out on the first play, and the backup quarterback drama delivered: Spencer Rattler started but sputtered (8-of-11, 42 yards, two sacks, one fumble), while Zach Wilson showed off some chemistry with Bub Means and Barion Brown — both of whom topped 70 receiving yards — and hit Oscar Delp for a touchdown after a Means score was wiped out.

Now the real tests begin. The Saints are headed to California for joint practices against the Dallas Cowboys on Tuesday and the Los Angeles Rams on Thursday. And this is no vacation: the Rams led the league in total yards allowed last season, and the Cowboys were second. The level of difficulty just spiked considerably.

Shough: Good, but nowhere near done

"More than anything, it was good to go against a really good defense in the Jaguars," quarterback Tyler Shough said. "And continually we're going to be able to do that the next couple of games against the Rams and Cowboys. We feel really good where we're at, but we also know that we have so much more to go. We're nowhere close to where we need to be, but I also know that we're kind of light-years from where we were last year as well."

The offense didn't just wake up overnight. There were ugly days — like Aug. 11, when the defense won a red zone period by picking off Shough twice. But against Jacksonville, the good moments showed up. Shough slung a deep pass to rookie Bryce Lance, who was working against Travis Hunter. He targeted Chris Olave multiple times, including a deep ball Olave fought for but couldn't reel in, then later connected with him for a toe-tapping touchdown. Backup Rattler got on the same page with Brown and Trey Palmer, who hauled in a deep ball and slammed it into the end zone.

"I think we don't necessarily use other teams as a metric, but it's also a competition-based sport," Shough said. "So I think it was a good day to focus on us as an offense. I feel like we really improved."

Coach Kellen Moore gave the starters around 50 snaps of work against Jacksonville's first-team — far heavier than a typical preseason tune-up. The plan: let the backups get real volume in the actual game, while the big dogs get evaluated in a practice with game-day intensity.

"Sometimes the challenge for these young guys is, you come to these preseason games and you wait till the fourth quarter for your eight snaps and one snap doesn't go your way and it gets magnified," Moore said. "These guys are going to get to play a ton of snaps, which is awesome for us because inevitably there's going to be some good snaps, there's going to be a snap you want back. And it allows us to let these guys respond to those situations and just keep playing."

The cracks are still there

The Saints' offense was a mess in 2025, finishing last in red zone efficiency at 44.4%, 28th in rushing yards per game and 28th in scoring. Throwing Travis Etienne Jr. into the mix should help the ground game, and he's been leaned on heavily with the starters. But without live tackling in practice, translating that to the regular season remains a mystery.

"We've got to continue to grow and get better, and I feel like it helps us just jell and get those real live reps that some teams don't get until game time," Etienne said. "Going out there against a different defense, it was good to see what we did, get a couple of runs, a couple of things springing and see us all on one page."

There's also a kicking battle brewing. Charlie Smyth, who took over for Blake Grupe last year, is fighting off former UFL kicker Tanner Brown. Smyth missed a 52-yarder in Saturday's game, though he went 6-for-6 in practice and is 33-of-41 in camp. Brown was perfect in the game (2-of-2) but missed a 51-yard attempt in practice off the upright; he's a perfect 33-of-33 in camp. This one could go down to the wire.

With two more joint practices ahead, the Saints have a chance to build on that Jacksonville flash. The schedule is brutal. But at least now, the offense knows it can actually hang with the big dogs.