The New Orleans Saints didn't have the season they hoped to have in 2024, but that doesn't mean that they didn't make any good moves ahead of the campaign.
New Orleans clearly wanted to bolster the defense ahead of the campaign and one move that they made was bringing 2020 No. 2 overall pick Chase Young to town. He signed a one-year, $13 million deal with the Saints and shined.
The 25-year-old has struggled with his health throughout his young career but played in all 17 games in the season for the Saints. He logged 5.5 sacks throughout the campaign to go along with 31 total tackles, a career-high 21 quarterback hits, three passes defended, and one forced fumble. Young looked closer to the player he was in 2020 when he took home the NFL's Defensive Rookie of the Year Award.
Now, he's heading back to free agency and should have a much better time this year as opposed to last year. It's unknown if he will be back, but Spotrac currently is projecting his market value to be just over $70 million across four years.
That seems to be perfectly reasonable for a player of his caliber. With Young, a team is going to get a 25-year-old with Pro Bowl-upside coming off two straight seasons of good health. The Saints have a lot of cap issues at this point so it doesn't seem likely that they will be able to hand out a deal of that caliber, but hopefully he shines wherever he plays in 2025.
