Drew Brees discusses his return to New Orleans, the Saints’ future, and insights on NFL quarterbacks (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)
The New Orleans Saints have not seen nearly the heights of success that they reached in the Drew Brees era since the legendary quarterback announced his retirement from the league.
And the lack of success was strongly felt during the 2024 season in which New Orleans fired head coach Dennis Allen and finished out with an abysmal overall record of 5-12 that put them at dead last in the NFC South division.
Brees will soon be headed back to New Orleans, though it is not in an on-the-field capacity. He’ll be reuniting with the Big Easy and the Caesars Superdome just in time for Super Bowl LIX between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles.
We recently caught up with Brees on what his plans are for the big event, in addition to a multitude of topics regarding the Saints, the modern era of the NFL and much more.
Drew Brees Headed to the Super Bowl with Rob Gronkowski
Brees will be coming back to New Orleans in February for Super Bowl LIX alongside former Patriots standout Rob Gronkowski as his “wingman” in quite literally every sense of the word.
“I’ll be out with Gronk as his wingman, a part of his wingman campaign that he partners with Bounty on,” Brees said in an exclusive interview with RG. “He asked me to be his wingman this year in New Orleans, and he said he has never been to New Orleans.”
And there is hardly any better person than Brees to show Gronkowski the way around town than Brees, who spent so much time there and has also been involved in restaurants located in Louisiana, including the sports bar “Walk-Ons.”
“This was his opportunity and he wanted me to show him around, and I know we are going to have a great time,” Brees said. “At the end of the day, you can’t have football without wings, and you can’t have wings without Bounty.”
Saints Coaching Search Marches On
Brees said earlier this offseason that if he could have any person as the next head coach of the Saints, that it would be former New Orleans defensive backs coach Aaron Glenn.
Unfortunately for Brees, he won’t be getting his wish as Glenn recently accepted the head coaching position with the New York Jets. While that means Brees’ former team will be forced to go with another candidate, Brees says he wishes Glenn the best and gave plenty of insight on what Glenn brings to the table for his new team.
“I’m excited for Aaron Glenn. Obviously, we would have loved to have had him,” Brees said.
“He’s an incredible coach. Great teacher, great communicator, great leader. He’s going to do a great job.”
Brees believes the pool is still rich with head coaching candidates for the Saints, though, and says he has a ton of trust in who is making the decisions. And, right now, it is looking like Philadelphia Eagles offensive coordinator Kellen Moore is the frontrunner for the job.
“I think there are a lot of great candidates out there,” Brees said. “Whether we go in-house, whether we go outside to the rest of the NFL to find our next head coach, I know that there is a process in place with our GM, Mickey Loomis and the organization to find that best candidate.”
While the Saints are entering something of a rebuild moving forward as far as the coaching staff and the front office goes, Brees does not exactly feel like there are super strong winds of change blowing overall.
He says the Saints are not “starting over.”
“[They are] not rebuilding or anything. I think we have good pieces in place on both sides of the ball to take the next step and really be a contender,” Brees said. “I think we showed what we could be like last year, especially those first few games where we were totally healthy. Unfortunately, after that, we were decimated due to injury and were not a healthy team. It was just hard to recover. Once you’ve lost all of your playmakers on offense.”
It will be interesting to see how things change with the introduction of Moore or another candidate, but it is clear that Brees feels the Saints have a better foundation to build upon than a lot of people have given them credit for.
Whether or not that statement holds true will be something to keep an eye on.
Coaching Opportunities in the Future?
Drew Brees drew some intrigue in regard to him possibly becoming a football coach when he very briefly joined the Purdue coaching staff as an interim assistant coach in 2022 while the program was undergoing some changes.
It’s a fond memory for him to reflect on, as short-lived as it was.
“I helped Purdue for three weeks once, back when they were in a transitional period,” Brees said. “So I said to them, ‘While you’re going through this transition, if you need help for the bowl game, I am happy to do that. I felt like it would be fun to be with the team during the bowl season and kind of solidify confidence in that program at that time.”
As far as heading into coaching formally in a more permanent role, Brees says that is nothing anyone should be expecting him to do in the immediate future. He did not, however, fully rule out the possibility.
He says that, in a sense, he feels that he’s already a coach of sorts in his everyday life.
“I love coaching. I love coaching my kids,” Brees said.
“I feel like indirectly, I am always coaching. Whether it be with young players who are coming up and asking for advice, or an NFL guy calling, I have those conversations all throughout the year.”
He’s not looking to take it up a notch above that at this exact moment, though. If he ever does, it is easy to get the sense that move is quite far off from right now.
“But as far as specifically going into coaching, I probably wouldn’t be a college coach or an NFL coach, at this stage,” Brees said. “But I would say that there is always some level of coaching or mentorship that is taking place.”
Quarterbacks in the Modern Era and Joe Burrow’s MVP Case
One of the hottest topics in sports as the NFL season enters its final stages is who will win league MVP. With his postseason performance, it seems like Saquon Barkley has run away with the award.
It was not always that way, though, and there have been a multitude of strong candidates.
“I don’t think we could have asked for a better finish to the season in terms of guys who have played at such a high level who you could make arguments for to be the MVP,” Brees said.
Naturally, as a former quarterback himself, Brees is partial to the offensive players. That much is understandable.
“The year [Eagles running back] Saquon Barkley has had, the year Ja’Marr Chase had, just phenomenal. Of course, Josh Allen as well,” Brees said. “Lamar Jackson. Joe Burrow.”
Brees hinted at the notion that Burrow was kind of behind the 8-ball considering that his team did not make the postseason. Due to the Bengals’ lack of overall, success that unfairly, perhaps, placed him at a disadvantage in the race.
“So, you’ve got all these guys who just had phenomenal individual seasons, and now, I guess it’s just the way MVP voters look at it,” Brees said. “Especially as a quarterback, there’s a combination of how your team performed. Did the wins add up with the personal statistics?”
And, speaking of Burrow, one of the things that has helped him is just how well he truly aligns with what a quarterback is supposed to be in the modern era of NFL football. That’s a player who is first and foremost solid from the pocket, but who also has the ability to move.
That’s some Brees, and plenty of others, see as borderline non-negotiable.
Of the quarterbacks in the modern era, you’ll find a unicorn in Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson. Many have tried to replicate what the team has done with Jackson, but there truly is not another dual-threat quarterback out there like him.
“Lamar Jackson is a guy who has such a unique skill set,” Brees said. “Because there is no other quarterback that can run like him. You could truly design an offense and a game plan behind his ability to run or his ability to affect how the defense plays the run, just because of the threat that he poses.”
While Burrow does not hold a candle to Jackson from the mobility perspective, he is what he has self-proclaimed himself as, which is “sneaky fast.” But, the key is, Burrow is deadly accurate from the pocket and is first and foremost a dropback quarterback.
“A guy like Joe Burrow, you say, is technically a pocket passer,” Brees said. “But countless times during the 2024 season, I think his offensive line struggled. He was forced to move, buy time, step up, escape pressure.”
The Bengals have consistently had one of the worst offensive lines in the league, and even with that, Burrow has still made himself into one of the best quarterbacks in the NFL. That has a lot to do with what he can do on the ground.
“He is so fundamentally sound, and he would extend plays and make plays all over the place. At some point, though, you have to be able to drop back and stay in the pocket and deliver the ball downfield to go win a game,” Brees said.
But without at least a little bit of improvisation ability, Burrow and other quarterbacks who primarily work from the pocket, likely would not achieve the same level of success.
“You also have to have the ability to escape or extend plays,” Brees said. “If you don’t, you better be so darn efficient with when that ball is coming out of your hands, and be so accurate.”
New Orleans Saints at the 2025 NFL Draft
Every draft is important, but the Saints need to hit it right in multiple spots during the 2025 NFL Draft to make a leap in the upcoming season.
Some may argue the team needs help just about everywhere, but Brees believes they and all NFL teams should look toward the trenches first.
“Every team is also looking at line. O-line, D-line, it comes down to the trenches,” Brees said.
Defensively, having a good pass rusher is essential.
“No team can have enough pass rushers. That is the great equalizer in the league, especially when it comes to being effective on defense,” Brees said.
Versatility within pass rushers, and really all defensive players, is essential.
“Can you rush the passer with four?,” Brees said. “And, so, you are always looking for pass rushers, always looking for depth, always looking for guys that can play multiple positions, because guys get injured, and you have to flip-flop guys around.”
Looking at the offense, Brees seems to believe the Saints are already in a pretty good place when it comes to guys who can make plays. Despite some of the blunders the team has had, there is no denying some of the special talent the team has had that the rest of the NFL has tried to mimic.
Most of those efforts have been unsuccessful.
The Saints have certainly got their work cut out for them moving forward, but as Brees has made clear, there is still a silver lining and plenty of reasons for optimism in the dawn of a new era in New Orleans.
Crissy Froyd
