The Saints’ 45-24 loss to the Falcons on Monday night didn’t land like a normal defeat. It was ugly from the start, ugly throughout, and ugly in a way that left New Orleans looking flat on a night that was supposed to matter to the city and the fanbase.
For Kellen Moore, that kind of showing naturally raises the question: how hot is his seat after a 1-3 start?
Moore didn’t dodge it after the game. He admitted several times that the Saints were not ready for Monday night, which only sharpened the frustration around a performance that felt especially hard to stomach given the stage and the opponent.
This wasn’t a one-off stumble, either.
Since the start of the 2025 season, the Saints have trailed by double digits 16 times under Moore, the most in the NFL over that stretch. Atlanta wasted no time adding to that number, racing to a 14-0 lead in the first quarter before pushing the margin to 24-7 by halftime.
That’s been the pattern that keeps following New Orleans around. It’s not just that the Saints keep falling behind early. It’s that Moore keeps getting the same questions about slow starts, and his answers keep circling back to needing to review the film, make corrections and sort out what went wrong.
At some point, that has to turn into something more tangible.
The first quarter has been a real issue. Through their first four games, the Saints scored only six total points in the opening period and have spent every game this season chasing the scoreboard. Under Moore, New Orleans has now failed to score in the first quarter 14 times, a number that puts even more pressure on the coach to clean up the preparation and execution that have trailed the team into another year.
There’s still a long way to go, and moving on from a head coach after four games would be drastic. But this is Year 2 for Moore, not Year 1. The Saints were expecting growth after a six-win season, and instead they’re sitting at 1-3 after getting embarrassed by their biggest rival on Monday night.
Moore has kept saying the Saints need to look at themselves.
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