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It’s not quite a full-blown makeover in New Orleans, but look around the Saints’ locker room and the future has clearly arrived. The baby faces behind the helmets might still get carded at dinner, but they’re already shaping what’s next for this franchise. In a 2-8 season that blends hard lessons with hope, New Orleans’ tomorrow is taking shape in real time.<\/p>\n
The Saints’ two-deep rotation includes six rookies or second-year players who are either starting or have started at some point this season: offensive tackles\u00a0Taliese Fuaga\u00a0(first-round pick, 2024) and\u00a0Kelvin Banks Jr.\u00a0(first-round pick, 2025); quarterback\u00a0Tyler Shough\u00a0(second round pick, 2025); safety\u00a0Jonas Sanker\u00a0(third round pick, 2025); and cornerbacks\u00a0Kool-Aid McKinstry\u00a0(second round pick, 2024) and\u00a0Quincy Riley\u00a0(fourth round pick, 2025).<\/p>\n
Two other rookies, running back\u00a0Devin Neal\u00a0(sixth round) and linebacker\u00a0Danny Stutsman\u00a0(fourth round), have seen their game reps increase in recent games.<\/p>\n
Shough, Sanker and Riley weren’t opening-game starters, and Neal and Stutsman weren’t forecast to be heavy contributors, but performance and injuries guided each from the sideline to the huddle.<\/p>\n
“There’s a lot of guys that we’re focused on developing here, and that’s certainly my goal and aspiration, is to help these guys become the best players they can be,” Saints coach Kellen Moore said. “As we go we’re going to keep developing, keep growing.<\/p>\n
“We understand that there’s some challenges that we’ve navigated… (but) we can come out of it a really, really good team with a lot of potential moving forward. You see a lot of these younger guys, they take steps each week, they keep growing, they don’t make the same mistake twice. We’ve got to keep growing.”<\/p>\n
That begins with Shough, who shone against Carolina in his second NFL start, when he completed 19 of 27 passes for 282 yards and two touchdowns, with no interceptions, in a 17-7 road victory.<\/p>\n
After\u00a0Spencer Rattler\u00a0won the offseason quarterback competition and started the first eight games, Shough replaced him in the third quarter against Tampa Bay and started the next two games. Overall, Shough has completed 51 of 83 passes for 586 yards and three touchdowns, with two interceptions.<\/p>\n
“It’s just continual reps, continual progression, getting better every single day,” Shough said after the win against Carolina. “I think I can continue to get better and be better… Continual progression. That’s my job. I’ve got to continue to do that.”<\/p>\n
The traits Shough possessed that enticed the Saints to draft him were on display\u00a0even before he made his first start. “Tyler has a great feel for the game. I think he can handle a lot,” Moore said after Shough’s debut, a 34-10 loss to the Rams. “We’ll build that as we go. There’s times when he’ll have some different tools as far as protection adjustments, and then we’ll try to utilize the headset as much as we can just to get into a few plays in the tempo offense and some of those different situations.”<\/p>\n
Ultimately, Moore is encouraged by how Shough handles pressure, particularly for a rookie quarterback still learning NFL speed. “You want to see where his eyes go, and ultimately where his body goes (under duress). I thought there was some good stuff. He kept his eyes downfield, and I thought there were some really good examples of him stepping up in the pocket.”<\/p>\n
“That’s always the biggest challenge for young quarterbacks coming up in the NFL. If you try to go backward and out \u2014 some guys can get away with it in college \u2014 but with the sheer talent of these edge rushers, that’s where the big sacks come and the fumbles.”<\/p>\n
Perhaps the clearest example came just before halftime against the Rams. Shough read the rush, stepped up through pressure, and hit\u00a0Chris Olavefor a 27-yard gain on third down. The kind of pocket management expected from a veteran. “That’s a snapshot of everything we want out of Tyler. That was awesome,” Moore said.<\/p>\n
That adjective also frequently has been used to\u00a0describe Banks, who became a starter when his name was called on draft night. His addition allowed Fuaga to flip from left to right tackle.<\/p>\n
The brigade of young Saints talent is no surprise to Banks.<\/p>\n
“They didn’t draft you for no reason,” he said. “They drafted you because they see the potential you’ve got, and you’re going to get every opportunity you can to go out there and compete. When their opportunity or my opportunity is called, we just go out there and try to do the best we can.”<\/p>\n
He noted that the defensive players did exactly that.<\/p>\n
“It’s just that thing of them being able to have the opportunity to step up and play that specific role, and earning the trust from the coaches as well,” Banks said. “Those guys have been doing great on their side of the ball and hopefully they can keep doing good.”<\/p>\n
McKinstry (two), Sanker and Riley (one each) have combined for four of New Orleans’ five interceptions this season. The secondary has taken some lumps, but count it as growing pains.<\/p>\n
“For me, it’s really just me being a sponge, soaking up all the game I can from my vets and sitting back and learning each day,” Riley said. “No matter if I’m doing good or bad, just always learning something new each day. That’s been my learning experience so far.”<\/p>\n
For the Saints’ youngest players, the lessons often come quietly \u2014 not just in team meetings or pep talks, but in the way\u00a0veterans play\u00a0or carry themselves. “Sometimes, if you just listen to (the veterans), without them telling you personally, you’re going to learn a lot,” Riley said. “Just watching how different vets move \u2014 you’re going to learn who you need to lean on more. They send a message without even telling you a message. Just pay attention closely.”<\/p>\n
And time on the field allows for chemistry building that will be critical later, Riley said.<\/p>\n
“Sanker is a starting safety, so we always have communication like, ‘Man, we’re going to be here for a minute, we’ve got to bond a little more, just know each other a little more and have fun,'” Riley said.<\/p>\n
For all the growing pains that come with a youth movement, there’s also an undeniable energy building inside the Saints’ locker room. The losses sting, but the lessons feel valuable \u2014 shared experiences that could shape the team’s future. “We’re young guys on the field but we expect to be good,” Riley said.<\/p>\n
“Sometimes things are going to go bad. That’s just the nature of life. But we’ve got to lean on each other and pick each other up. It’s fun because I know we’re going to have learning experiences together and then when it’s time to break out, we’re going to break out together.”<\/p>\n
The Pittsburgh Penguins have had many a pleasant surprise over their first 17 games. They\u2019ve gotten a lot of life out of mid-level free agent signings like Justin Brazeau, Anthony Mantha and Parker Wotherspoon. Arturs Silovs has looked the part of an NHL goalie. Tristan Jarry and even Ryan Graves have started upon redemption journeys, no matter how modest or long-lasting they might be. Evgeni Malkin has seemingly turned back the hands of time. Erik Karlsson is playing like he has something to prove. Sidney Crosby is, well, you can\u2019t be too surprised that he\u2019s still the best player on the ice most nights but at 38 it\u2019s still something to see.<\/p>\n
The progression of Ben Kindel, however, is arguably their finest and most pleasant surprise of all so far. No one had him even close to the NHL radar in 2025-26 (though, hey, at least we were able to\u00a0raise the possibility of the unexpected)<\/p>\n
Those seven other forwards who fit in the category are Zach Benson, Cole Sillinger, Ryan O\u2019Reilly, Patrice Bergeron, Dustin Brown, Justin Williams and Sykora. Of those, only the first two have had their rookie seasons in the last 15 years.<\/p>\n
Not only is Kindel making it, he\u2019s excelling. It\u2019s early, small sample, blah blah but Kindel has stepped right in and looked the part of a player who can drive his own line and now has stepped up to the first line to play on the wing. Kindel\u2019s two-way play was touted coming out of the WHL just as much as his ability to produce points and that has been the case thus far in his first 15 NHL games.<\/p>\n
Of the others, here are some stat lines for their rookie years:<\/p>\n
These players, of course, were far from finished products even though it is rare to even show enough to stick in the NHL from this age without being a top-10 draft pick. One commonality amongst these players seems to be a defensive conscious, Beregron won six Selke trophies in his career, O\u2019Reilly has won the award once. Brown and Sykora picked up Selke votes in their careers and were known as reliable players off the puck, as was Williams. It wouldn\u2019t be a surprise if Kindel joins them to at least find his name on Selke ballots in the future if he eventually grows into a penalty killing center as his career blossoms. That makes sense on the surface level, if a young player is going to make it right off the bat they have to instantly create some trust away from the puck and demonstrate a good compete and detail level to their game beyond their young age.<\/p>\n
As the stats above show, there\u2019s a lot more offensive upside for the players to find. Most of the rookies ended up in the 25-30ish point range as draft+1 NHLers and almost all of them eventually found their game grow into being 60+ players (including Benson, who got to 60 in his second season). That hasn\u2019t always been the case \u2014 Sillinger has no more than 33 points over his four NHL seasons and may never reach the levels that just about everyone else did but the track record there is fairly strong and shows a clear path about a promising future is ahead for young Kindel.<\/p>\n
Of course, one doesn\u2019t need this article to realize all of that, the eye test is showing in spades the impressiveness in Kindel\u2019s game. It was only a month ago when the Pens\u2019 coaches\u00a0had a plan\u00a0to cycle Kindel out as a healthy scratch at times to keep him from getting overloaded. Plans can change, Kindel has played the last eight games in a row and more all the time (scoring five points and averaging 16:30 per game while playing more minutes each game in the last four games than he played in all of his first 11). The scratches have gone away because there hasn\u2019t been a need lately to give him time off.<\/p>\n
Kindel has been able to handle what the Pens have asked, whether that\u2019s been centering his own line or now moving up to play wing with Crosby. For someone drafted outside of the top-10 and won\u2019t turn 19 until after the regular season ends that could be the biggest and best surprise of them all this season in Pittsburgh.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It’s not quite a full-blown makeover in New Orleans, but look around the Saints’ locker room and the future has clearly arrived. The baby faces behind the helmets might still get carded…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8762,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8763","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hot-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t