The following is an excerpt from Warren Sharp's 2026 Football Preview. In addition to Warren's deep, detailed write-up on all 32 NFL teams, each chapter features page after page of full-color charts, stats, and heatmaps, as well as penalty analysis from Joe Gibbs. Click here for a full FREE chapter from the 2026 Football Preview.
Penalties are an under-discussed aspect of NFL success and failure. Average teams can become playoff contenders with good discipline, and good teams can become great simply by winning the penalty battle.
Let's look at how the New Orleans Saints performed from a penalty perspective in 2025 and where they can improve in 2026.
New Orleans Saints 2026 Penalty Outlook: Discipline, Flags & Hidden Edges
The Good
- The New Orleans defense (and home crowd) was a top-10 unit at generating offensive holding and false start penalties when playing at home, ranking third and ninth in those categories.
- The Saints were a mid-level team at surrendering automatic first downs via penalty in 2025. However, 76% of these infractions occurred in the first half of games, with a dramatic improvement in the second half.
The Bad
- The Saints ranked sixth in penalties per game and were a top-five penalized home team.
- The Saints recorded the NFL’s second-highest penalty average in the first quarter of games in 2025.
- The Saints ranked third in pre-snap penalty average, with false starts accounting for an overwhelming 61.5% of those infractions. The Saints ranked second in false start penalties per game in the 2025 season.
- Furthermore, the offensive holding and false start combination accounted for 46% of the team’s overall penalties. In raw numbers, no team averaged more penalties per game via that combination than New Orleans.
- The Saints struggled with penalties in the first half, getting penalized at a high percentage versus opponents through the first two quarters. However, they flipped the script in the second half of the game, with a more acceptable 47% of overall infractions being assessed on them after halftime.
- On third-down plays, the defense was a top-five-ranked unit for surrendering automatic first downs via penalty.
Grade: B-
The Saints overachieved versus preseason expectations in 2025, with Kellen Moore quietly establishing himself as a quality head coach in his rookie season.
The result of that is New Orleans entering the 2026 season with renewed optimism.
The NFL scheduled the Saints in one prime-time contest, an improvement versus zero appearances under the prime-time lights in 2025, and a show of faith in the team's trajectory.
While there will continue to be bumps in the road, expect a more dynamic Saints offense, with ownership adding potentially game-changing talent in the offseason.
The silver lining is that a nine-win campaign may be sufficient to secure the NFC South, and serve as a building block for a Saints team looking to return to relevance after some lean years in the NFL wilderness.
This analysis continues in the 2026 Football Preview
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Warren Sharp’s 600+ page full-color PDF, the 2026 Football Preview, is unlike anything you have read. Stunning visualizations, including new heat maps and stat pages, are built with the reader in mind. Innovative, next-level thought processes abound in every team chapter and article.
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- Team Chapters previews are in-depth, data-driven & full of actionable info
- Fantasy Football player profiles, predictions, and ranks
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- Rookie draft class deep dive into impact for every team
- Rankings for every positional unit on every team with analysis
- Penalty analysis for all 32 NFL teams
