What a Week 5 Bye Week Means for the Saints

The Saints are currently sitting at .500 with two wins and two losses heading into Week 6. They have three more games before their next divisional matchup (vs the Tampa Bay Buccaneers), so these next three games could be critical. On paper, you have to like the Saints’ chances in Week 8 against the Bears, and have to feel nervous about their Week 7 contest at Lambeau against the Green Bay Packers. This week’s game at home against the Detroit Lions looks to be all the more important as a potential “swing” game for the next three weeks.

The Saints have had an extra week to prepare for Matthew Stafford and the Lions with a Week 5 bye, but will that actually help? Cheat Sheet War Room has compiled some awesome bye-week numbers to show that, yes, for the Saints, this might be a perfect storm.

Small sample size alert, obviously, but the Saints are among half the NFL teams that actually have a winning record coming out of a Bye in the last five years.

But it’s not just the Saints. Across the NFL, all teams historically perform better coming out of an early season Bye.

Teams coming off a Bye week in Weeks 5-8 have a winning record, while teams with a Bye in Weeks 11-14 have a losing record. Now, that’s not to say that the Saints are guaranteed a win against the Lions because they are coming out of a Bye in Weeks 5-8 as the first graphic shows that the Saints actually lost to the Lions coming out a Bye in Week 7 of the 2014 season 23-24.

This year, though, the Saints have the benefit of playing at home, and are looking to see the season debut of WR Willie Snead, and (fingers crossed) the season debut of OL Terron Armstead.

Things are lining up for the Saints, but that could just be setting us up for an epic disappointment.