Highlights from Mickey Loomis’ pre-draft press conference

Saints’ GM previews the upcoming NFL Draft.

The 2024 NFL Draft is about to get underway in a few days and the New Orleans Saints hold the 14th overall pick in the first round.

As he does every year, Saints GM Mickey Loomis held a pre-draft press conference to discuss all things draft related with the media. Here were some of the highlights from Loomis’ Tuesday presser:

On how they look at draft day trades…

“For us, we will look at, since we’re at 14, what it takes to get to 13? What’s it take to get to 12, 11, 10, nine, eight. That’s probably about where I’ll cut it off. Then I’ll go back, how far back are we willing to go? Generally, I’ll go ten spots in front and ten spots behind and I’ll spend a lot of time in the next couple of days looking at the value of that and what’s the history in our league when somebodies traded from 14 to 10 or 14 to nine and what’s the history of going back from 14 to 20… There will be a lot of calls over the next few days to those GM’s in front of us and those GM’s behind us saying ‘hey, what are you thinking? Do you have an inclination to go forward or an inclination to go back?’ Look, every GM is different with this, but we’ll have an idea of what might be available.”

On why the Saints don’t often trade back…

“I think there are cases where dropping back makes some sense to get more picks. I just think, in our case, most of the time it’s been a move too far back. If you move back two, three or four spots, the level of player is similar. If you’re moving back eight to 10, you’re often time dropping down a class…It’s hard for me to grasp getting a lesser player talent wise.”

On if he likes their potential choices at 14…

“I do. I think we’re going to get a very good player, yes.”

On if they’re looking to move into the third round…

“It’s a big gap [between picks 45 and 150]. I wouldn’t say we’re spending a lot of time thinking about that right now. The way the draft is structured currently, we do the first round on Thursday and then the second and third on Friday, so then we have a whole evening to strategize about moving into the third and fourth round. Part of what goes into it is what players are available and do we really want to move up? When you have four fifths’, it gives us the opportunity to take a couple of those and bump it up, but we won’t be thinking about that until we know who the players are that are going to be available.”

On the OT class this year…

“I think it’s a good year for offensive players, that’s probably the way I’d put it…I think everyone would say the offensive line is a position of strength in these draft, and wide receivers, but there’s players at every position, it’s just a matter of how we look at them compared to other clubs.”

On weighing what the team needs now and in the future…

“I don’t know that I can answer that right now. We think about it. Generally speaking, coaches are thinking about right now and at the personnel end of it, we’re thinking about this year and the year after as much as we’re thinking about right now. It all comes into play, it just does, it’s the nature of our sport. You have to be focused on right now with an eye towards the future… You have to consider if you’re picking for right now or for the future, and that’s a big function of my job, to make sure that we’re doing what’s right for the franchise, not just right now, but moving forward.”

On if they plan to be active in free agency after the draft…

“We’re going to keep looking. There’s still good players out there that haven’t found a home yet, so I think we’re going to be in that mix… You go into the draft thinking you’re going to get certain positions and even with UDFA’s, but afterwards you find you have a gap here, so you look at who’s available.”

On if he can tell if there will be a lot of trades on draft night…

“I don’t have a sense for that and maybe I’m not smart enough. I feel like the amount of conversations and the things that happen before the draft weren’t any different the last three or four years [when there were a lot of trades] than they were any other year. I don’t feel like this year’s any different, so I don’t anticipate more or less in terms of that kind of movement.”

On how far down their board they’ll go to fill a need…

“We’re not going to vary too far. It might be two [spots], but we haven’t picked anybody where there was a big gap just to fill a need…Need is a variable, but it’s not the variable.”

On a potential Marshon Lattimore trade…

“Listen, everybody’s tradable, it just depends on the offer that you get. It’s not very common. I’m not one who likes to do a lot of trades, I don’t like trading players who have been contributors for us. I like maximizing our roster with the guys we got, but we’ve made trades before. There’s too many what if’s here. If there was something imminent, well, I probably still wouldn’t tell you guys.”