Well, that didn't take long.
The suspense is over. Following a strong finish to the season for the New Orleans Saints and rookie quarterback Tyler Shough, Katherine Terrell of ESPN is reporting the team is committed to Shough as the franchise quarterback. This isn't a shock, honestly, given the way the team spoke about the rookie and his play on the field, which was undeniable. Now, the Saints go into the NFL Draft looking to build around their future quarterback with offensive pieces.
Saints general manager Mickey Loomis spoke about the quarterback position following Derek Carr's surprising retirement and Spencer Rattler winning the quarterback competition over Shough in training camp.
"I would say that it just catches you a little bit off guard," Saints general manager Mickey Loomis said of that time period. "And so you got to kind of recalibrate. ... It just changes your course a little bit."
"I probably am overly patient. Sometimes your greatest strengths become a weakness, and so I'm really patient, I feel like, and whether it helps or not, hopefully it does," Loomis said. "I think it does, but I'll continue to be that way.
"Again, we're excited about Tyler ... but we have to remember that he hasn't had 17 starts yet, so we're going to go into next season with these high expectations and there's nothing wrong with that. But we also have to temper that by the fact that ... he's a second-year quarterback and he's had less than full season to start. So we've got to keep that in mind as we go forward. There are building blocks here and we cannot skip any steps."
Now, Loomis is being rewarded for his patience, and it now appears everything was supposed to work out the way it did.
Wednesday, Saints head coach Kellen Moore spoke about Shough and his excitement heading into the offseason.
"Tyler's done an awesome job through this entire process. He's gotten a ton better. He's taken advantage of a bunch of opportunities," Moore said. "We're excited to have a full offseason to build."
While some would argue that these plans could have been kept inside the building with the draft upcoming to keep other teams on their toes and maybe force some panic moves, the confidence of knowing what to expect in the offseason and strong words from leadership prove the ship is moving in one direction.
It's a very exciting time for Saints fans.