METAIRIE, La. — On Tuesday, the Saints let go of offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael and two other offensive assistants. The team finished 9-8 for the second time in three years, but failed to clinch a third-straight playoff berth – the second under head coach Dennis Allen.
Loomis, serving as both Saints EVP and GM since 2013, addressed the media from the team's training facility along Airline Drive in Metairie on Wednesday after uncharacteristic freezing temperatures moving across southeast Louisiana forced him to postpone the press conference a day earlier.
“Our expectations were higher – collectively," said Mickey Loomis, Saints executive vice president and general manager. "We had some games that slipped away from us and a couple we didn’t perform in well. It’s a variety of reasons. When you look at a season, when you look at how you perform, there’s so many variables... it just wasn’t good enough, ultimately."
Loomis also addressed his thoughts on Allen, who despite not leading the Saints to the playoffs in his first two seasons, recorded his first winning regular season in five seasons as a head coach, including his first two and a half for the Oakland Raiders (2012-2014).
"The easy thing to do – the lazy thing to do – is look at the results of the season and say 'Aw, it's the coach's fault or it's the quarterback's fault,'" Loomis explained. "I think oftentimes you need to look beyond that."
Loomis pulled out a piece of paper from his back pocket and proceeded to read off a list of losing records at the start of eventual hall-of-fame coaches, such as Chuck Knoll, Tom Landry, Bill Walsh and Bill Belichick, who just parted ways with the New England Patriots, a team he led to six Super Bowl titles with quarterback Tom Brady.
Dennis Allen, Oakland Raiders & New Orleans Saints
- 2012 – 4-12 (Oak)
- 2013 – 4-12 (Oak)
- 2014 – 0-4* (Oak)
- 2022 – 7-10 (NO)
- 2023 – 9-8 (NO)
*fired after four games
Chuck Noll, Pittsburg Steelers
- 1969 – 1-13
- 1970 – 5-9
- 1971 – 6-8
Tom Landry, Dallas Cowboys
- 1960 – 0-11
- 1961 – 4-9
- 1962 – 5-8
- 1963 – 4-10
- 1964 – 5-8
- 1965 – 7-7
Bill Walsh, San Francisco 49ers
- 1979 – 2-14
- 1980 – 6-10
Bill Belichick, Cleveland Browns & New England Patriots
- 1991 – 6-10 (CLE)
- 1992 – 7-9 (CLE)
- 1993 – 7-9 (CLE)
- 2000 – 5-11 (NE)
"What are the reasons we were 9-8 instead of 13-4," he questioned. "It's collective. It's the players. It's the coaches. It's me. It's our personnel staff. It's our roster. It's variables that sometimes we don't have any control of.
"So, my assessment is Dennis Allen is a good coach," Loomis added. "Again, with Sean Payton we went 10-6 the first year, but then we were 7-9 and 8-8 and I heard some of the same noise, but at the time I knew we had a good football coach. So, sometimes the hard thing to do is to be patient and recognize your other shortcomings and get those fixed and that's what we are doing."
Following 15 years in the Seattle Seahawks organization, Loomis joined the Saints as director of football administration in 2000 before being promoted to general manager in 2002. He also held the position of executive vice president of basketball operations for the New Orleans Pelicans, Saints owner Gayle Benson's NBA team.
During his tenure with the team bolstered by head coach Sean Payton (2006-11, 2013-2021) and quarterback Drew Brees (2006-20), Loomis helped oversee the Saints' Super Bowl XLIV-winning run in 2009-10, and was one of the officials penalized in 2012 for the team's "Bountygate" scandal.
Also on Tuesday, longtime Saints running backs coach Joel Thomas took the same role with the New York Giants.
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