Saints GM Mickey Loomis Was “Not Really In Favor” Of Firing Former HC Dennis Allen

New Orleans fired former HC Dennis Allen following a 2-7 start to the 2024 season in his third year as the team’s head coach.  

On Jay Glazer’s Ubreakable podcast, Allen said Saints GM Mickey Loomis admitted he wasn’t in favor of the decision to part ways.  

“Mickey came into my office, closed the door, said, let’s talk,” Allen said. “And Mickey was not really in favor of this move. And we talked, and we had a really good conversation.”

Allen pivoted to his assistant coaches, as he prioritized speaking with them because of how much these moves affect them. 

“And I said, look, I just, you know, I want to be able to address the staff. I want to be able to talk to the staff… It affects all these assistant coaches. It affects their families. It affects the people and personnel and their families because, you know, like I was the one that brought a lot of these people here into this organization, and there’s going to be a lot of change.”

Allen, 52, began his coaching career at Texas A&M as a graduate assistant back in 1996. He took his first NFL coaching position with the Falcons as their defensive quality control coordinator in 2002 before working for the Saints and Broncos.

The Raiders hired Allen as their head coach in 2012 and he was going into his third year in the position before he was fired in Week 4. Allen returned to the Saints in 2015 and was promoted to defensive coordinator later that season.

The Saints opted to name Allen head coach following Sean Payton‘s decision to retire. 

As the Raiders’ head coach, Allen posted a record of 8-28 (22.2 percent) over the course of three seasons.

As the Saints’ head coach, Allen notched a record of 18-25 with no playoff appearances.