Demario Davis named Saints’ best free agent signing of the last 5 years
NFL free agency is right around the corner, so it’s a good time to take a look back at some of the New Orleans Saints’ biggest hits on the open market. The easy pick for the team’s best free agent signing was quarterback Drew Brees, who came to New Orleans and accomplished a career worthy of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. They also found key players like Darren Sproles and Jabari Greer in free agency, and more recently landed Pro Bowlers like Larry Warford, Jared Cook, and Tyrann Mathieu.
But there’s one Saints free agent pickup who stands above the rest (behind Brees, anyway). ESPN’s NFL Nation panelists listed every team’s best free agent pickup since 2018, with Saints beat reporter Katherine Terrell making the obvious choice for New Orleans: linebacker Demario Davis. Here’s what she wrote of the 2022 Pro Bowler:
This was true several years ago and still holds true today. The Saints got a steal when they signed Davis to a three-year, $24 million deal. He has started 81 games in New Orleans, earning one first-team All-Pro nod, three second-team All-Pro honors and his first selection to Pro Bowl this season. Davis helped turn a struggling defense into one of the top units.
Davis outplayed his contract and then some, regularly ranking among league leaders in tackles each week and captaining a Saints defense that’s placed inside the top-10 every year he’s been in town. It’s a crime that Davis didn’t get more recognition from the annual all-star game earlier in his career, but fans know just how important he’s been to the team’s success since his arrival.
So how many more years will Davis be leading the team on and off the field? He celebrated his 34th birthday in January and has two more years left on his contract after a recent restructure, with his deal set to void in 2025 and leave behind a modest $6.8 million in dead money. But Davis carries a whopping $18.1 million salary cap hit in 2024, so he’ll likely restructure it again to kick that can further down the road (where the always-rising salary cap diminishes its cost). Unless he’s ready to step away from the game and retire, anyway. But that’s a conversation for another day.
